Moot Court Research Help

These tools for Boston College faculty and students will help you manage your citations as you collect your documents for your writing assignment.  Some tools will check and correct automatically as you enter legal citations. In addition, some tools will extract your citations to produce a Table of Authorities for your document, and run batch checking of all cited authority within an uploaded document using a citator tool.  See details below.

BC Law students: Please check your course guidelines or speak with your professor to ensure that you are allowed to use these products.  Some classes, such as Law Practice I and II, have course rules restricting the use of citation-formatting aids.

Lexis offers two tools from the Lexis+ interface. Log in to Lexis+ and then select Legal Research; choose the Tools tab. You will see Brief Check and Brief Link are available.

Lexis offers registered users the option of downloading a Word add-in known as Lexis for Microsoft Office. Once you’ve downloaded Lexis for Microsoft Office, it will appear in your Word ribbon.  You can cite-check a document for conformance to Bluebook style and the software will flag any citations which do not correspond to a citation in the Lexis database.  In addition, you can run a Shepard’s citation check for all citations in your document in addition to the cite check process. After you’ve reviewed the Shepard’s flags, you can remove the flags from the document prior to submission.  

In addition, you can create a table of authorities for your document using Lexis for Microsoft Office. Download this add-on by navigating to https://supportcenter.lexisnexis.com/app/answers/answer_view/a_id/1088018  Enter your Lexis+ username and password. From the next screen, select Windows or Mac versions.

• Insert Shepard's Citations flags.
• Check citation formatting, including Bluebook.
• Create and insert a table of authorities. 
• Check the status of all or selected citations. 
• Create a Cited Decisions list.
• Verify quotations - verify quotations within your document if the cited material is contained within a case, statute, regulation, law review, treatise, etc. on the Lexis Advance platform.

Documentation for Lexis for Microsoft Office is available here.

Westlaw offers practice support tools to students. Drafting Assistant allows you to upload a Word document and then choose from a menu of tools that includes:

• Insert KeyCite flags
• Check citation formatting, including Bluebook
• Designate your document as either a Legal Brief or a Law Review for formatting.
• create and insert a table of authorities
• Check the status of citations
• Create a cited decisions list
• Verify quotations - use QuoteRight feature within WestCheck

To locate Drafting Assistant Essential, first login into your Westlaw account and from the pull-down menu in the top left of the screen, select Drafting Assistant.  

Westlaw also has Drafting Assistant software you can download and install to be used with Microsoft Word. When installed you can work with the document you are drafting in Word using all of the same tools listed above rather than having to upload your document to Westlaw.  You can download the Drafting Assistant software here.

There is a User Manual to aid in using Drafting Assistant available here.

vLex offers an add-on tool, vLex for Microsoft Word. This tool recognizes citations originating in multiple jurisdictions,     including the United Kingdom, U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Spain.

EndNote Web is a web-based tool that allows you collect, organize and format references. EndNote Web is free to the Boston College community and available from any computer with internet access. This product supports many bibliographic styles including Chicago, MLA, and the Bluebook.    

• Import citations from databases (e.g., EBSCO or JSTOR)
• Set up folders and upload attachments
• Supports many bibliographic styles (e.g., Bluebook, Chicago, MLA)
• Create bibliographies and/or insert in-text citations (plug-in)