Find cases by judicial consideration of legislation
Researching by topic enables you to locate primary case law resources. Are you now researching for cases that have judicially interpreted a provision of legislation?
Start with looking at a relevant provision of legislation for a section or rule number. The legislation name with the section or rule number enables a focused search in databases.
Legislation example:
Crimes Act 1958 (Vic) s 4A
In this example the name of the Act is Crimes Act 1958. The jurisdiction of the Act is Victoria. The relevant provision of the Act is section 4A.
Finding legislation judicially considered in different databases
Below is a selected list of databases that can be searched by legislation name with provision number. Click on the drop-downs for how to search effectively in those different databases.
Finding legislation judicially considered in CaseBase Cases (Lexis+ Australia)
CaseBase Cases is an online case citator, accessed via the Lexis+ Australia platform. CaseBase editors analyse and index each judgment, which makes this database a good place to start finding cases which have judicially considered legislation.
CaseBase lists mostly Australian cases, however overseas cases are also included if they are relevant to Australian law.
- Use the CaseBase Advanced Search (on Lexis+ Australia) and enter the name of the Act into the Legislation Title field and the relevant provision of the Act into the Provision Number field.
- You can add additional information in the Advanced Search box, such as jurisdiction or date range. Alternatively, you can filter using the options on the left-hand side of the results screen.
Finding legislation judicially considered in LawNow Plus Legislation Citator (Lexis+ Australia)
LawNow Plus Legislation Citator includes full text of current, repealed and historical versions of Australian legislation that is accessed via the Lexis+ Australia platform.
- Use LawNow Plus Legislation Citator Advanced Search (in Lexis+ Australia) and enter the name of the Act into the Legislation Title field and the relevant provision of the Act into the Provision Name/Number field.
- Click on the title of the Act in the results list.
- Once you have located the required provision or part of the Act, click on the links at the top of the page to see cases which have interpreted that section or publications which have referred to that section.
- Or scroll down to the Case Activity section.
- To view the section within the context of the whole Act, click on View Legislation to read the full text of the section. You can then return to the citator by clicking on View Legislation Citator, or click on Table of Contents to navigate to other sections within the Act.
Finding legislation judicially considered in Westlaw Australia
Westlaw Australia contains full-text unreported judgments from Australian courts and tribunals and Australian authorised law reports.
- Use the Westlaw Australia homepage. Select Cases under Content Types
- From the Cases page select the Advanced option next to the Search bar.
- Enter the name of the Act, using double quotes around the name, in the Legislation Cited (Title) field. Enter the relevant provision of the Act into the Legislation Cited (Provision) field.
- The fields will be automatically connected in the main search bar. Select the search icon to run the search.
- Search results can be narrowed by adding additional terms in the Search within results field. Or refine by jurisdiction or date from the left-hand column.
