Bluebooking and Legal Citation

Both Lexis and Westlaw automatically generate citations in Bluebook style, California Style Manual style, and other formats. As with other citation tools, these features are time saving but can make errors and should be double checked against the actual Bluebook or California Style Manual.

To generate a citation, highlight the text you would like to cite and select Copy with Reference or Copy. Use the dropdown menu to chose Standard (Bluebook) style or California (California Style Manual) style.

For more details, see the video below:

Citation tools include a range of browser plug-ins, stand alone programs, and websites that automatically save and format citations.

Several citation tools provide Bluebook style formatting, with varying degrees of accuracy. Georgetown's law librarians conducted a comparison of the major Bluebook citation tools and concluded that the free Zotero and Mendeley plug-ins are the most reliable but still made minor mistakes for almost every citation tested.

The take away: citation tools are a time saving way to pull citation information and organize it in roughly the right order. However, you should always double check them against the Bluebook itself.