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International Legal Research: Constitutions

This Guide covers essential print and electronic resources for researching international and foreign law.

Introduction

Constitutions of foreign countries may change more frequently than that of the U.S. The Foreign Law Guide or a research guide on a specific country such as the Globalex or LLRX guides discussed earlier, provides a good avenue for finding such constitutions on the internet.

Constitutions of the Countries of the World

Constitutions of the Countries of the World K3157 .B613x

Blaustein’s Constitutions of the Countries of the World is the standard print source found in many libraries. In addition to providing the text of the constitution itself, this set often contains extensive background information about the country’s legal system and the adoption of the current or prior constitutions.

In keeping with its mission to provide a "modern link to legal history," HeinOnline is creating a database known as World Constitutions Illustrated. This database is a work in progress with a broad scope that international constitutional scholars will find useful. For every country, HeinOnline hopes to include: combined historic and current views of the constitution; historical development of a constitution (timeline); every current constitution in its original language format; multiple versions of translations; chapter specific links to legal classics (treatises); links to reference sources and country studies (i.e. World FactBook, Modern Legal Systems Cyclopedia); links to scholarly articles; bibliographies and links to relevant websites.