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Federal Tax Research: Online Research and Free Websites

Resources available at the UIC Law School for tax research.

Online Research

Because the tax code is ever changing and because of the large quantity of primary and secondary material available online research is an important research strategy. Online research often has the advantage of being updated frequently and of linking related documents so the user need not use multiple print sources.

 Although Westlaw and Lexis are all around legal research systems they also contain extensive tax related content as part of their research systems. In addition, the Lois L. Biro Law Library also subscribes to RIA Checkpoint and BNA . These two specialized online tax research systems offer extensive coverage of primary, secondary, and practice oriented tax material.

RIA Checkpoint as well as BNA Library can be accessed through links in the Louis L. Biro Library web pages.

The table below lists the locations of important tax materials in the respective online services.

Content in Online Tax Databases

 

 

 

Westlaw

(Database Name)

 

 

LexisNexis

(Database Name)

 

RIA Checkpoint

(Directory Name)

 

BNA

(Directory Name)

 
Tax Code FFTX-USCA FEDTAX/CODE

Internal Revenue Code

 Internal Revenue code

Legislative

Histories

 FTX-LH FEDTAX/LEGIS

Legislation

(selected histories only)

Legislation

(selected histories only)

Treasury

Regulations

 FTX-REG FEDTAX/ALLREG Federal Tax Regulations Treasury Regulations
Revenue Rulings FTX-RR FEDTAX/CB Revenue Rulings

Revenue Rulings,

Revenue Procedures,

Notices & Announcements
Federal Court Cases FTX-CS FEDTAX/CASES American Federal Tax Reporter Federal Tax Cases

Tax Court Cases

(Regular and

Memorandum)

 

 FTX-TCT FEDTAX/TX Tax Court Decisions U.S. Tax Court

Websites

The internet can be a fertile ground for finding current awareness and primary tax legal materials. Sites are ever changing, so periodic searches on major internet search engines can keep researchers apprised of new sites. Below are selected sites related to tax law.

  • The ABA Section on Taxation.  This webpage contains comprehensive links to primary sources and  current tax news. It also has pages of interest to law students.   
  • Legal Bitstream.  This site contains a database offering advanced searches of tax cases (1990 to present), regulations, and many other administrative documents. Currently free use.
  • Legal Information Institute at Cornell.  An early innovator in providing free access to legal materials.
  • Tax Prof Blog. This blog  provides updates and commentary on current tax issues and scholarship. It also has links to other tax related blogs and essential tax sites.   
  • The Reading Room at the IRS website contains Internal Revenue Bulletins under the Published Tax Guidance section of the page. Private Letter Rulings as well as other guidance documents are found under the Non-Precedential Rulings and Advice section of the page.

Tax News and Current Awareness

  • Lexis Tax Law Center freely provides news, commentary, blogs, short articles, and other useful information.

Accessing UIC Law Databases

Users will need to provide their assigned Westlaw or LexisNexis login and password information when selecting links to those databases.

For other databases, such as Bloomberg Law and RIA checkpoint, links should lead directly to the resources if accessed from on-campus. If used off-campus, users will need to enter their UIC NETID and password to access the databases after selecting the database link.

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