NJHA Library & Links

Laws & Regulations: New Jersey & United States

More Research Clues:

CLUES for Research of N.J. Laws

  • For a quick chronological list of recent legislation passed in N.J. for the current year with links to the full text of the law see: New Jersey Legislation Reviewedfrom New Jersey Law Network, copyright W3 Lawyer, Inc. 2000.
  • NJSA New Jersey Statutes Annotated from the N.J. State Legislature The NJSA compiles and publishes the laws in their final form. This web version of the NJSA (New Jersey Statutes Annotated) from the N.J. State Legislature can be cumbersome to use. Thus, try two of its features as follows.
    • First look at the NJSA detailed table of contents with hypertext links for each section of each title. From the main table of contents, click on the little "plus" sign to the left of each listing. To contract the list, click on the little "minus" sign.
    • Second, try the NJSA search feature at the bottom of the page. It is very useful and we recommend that you go to this feature if you cannot find what you want by browsing.
  • The Titles in the NJSA often used for healthcare research are:
    • NJSA Title 17B Insurance
    • NJSA Title 18A Education (includes libraries)
    • NJSA Title 24 Food and Drugs
    • NJSA Title 26 Health and Vital Statistics (includes hospitals)
    • NJSA Title 30 Institutions and Agencies (includes mentally ill)
    • NJSA Title 45 Professions and Occupations (includes licensure for doctors, nurses, pharmacists)
  • R.S. stands for Revised States, established in 1937 and not used since that time, and it is safe to ignore, when occasionally found in a citation.
  • The N.J. Law Network offers an alternative site for the NJSA New Jersey Statutes Annotated . From this entry page, click on the text phrase "Collapsible/Expandable Index of New Jersey Statutes" to access the expandable detailed table of contents using the plus and minus signs.
  • Legislative Histories is a compilation of the documents which express the purpose or intent behind the passage of a particular law. The State Library compiles histories on all New Jersey laws which are added to NJSA. Legislative histories for N.J. Laws from 1998 to 2001 are available via the web. Appropriations acts are excluded. Contact the Law Library for other years: Email: reflaw@njstatelib.org Telephone: 609-292-6230
Top of Page

CLUES for Research of N.J. Regulations

  • The Basics About Rules and Regulations in New Jersey Trenton: New Jersey State Nurses Association, c1999. Quick summary of the rulemaking process.
  • Both the New Jersey Register and the New Jersey Administrative Code are the state's official publications. They are published by the West Group, 610 Opperman Drive, P.O. Box 64526, St. Paul, MN 55164-0526 under the direction of the New Jersey Office of Administrative Law. Both titles are available in many libraries and via subscription. For subscription information call 1-800-808-9378. It is available commercially online (i.e. for a fee). Presently neither has free public access on the internet.
  • The New Jersey Register contains notices of proposed rules and rules adopted by State agencies pursuant to the New Jersey Constitution. It is issued twice monthly on the first and third Mondays of each month and Tuesday if Monday is a holiday.
  • The New Jersey Administrative Code, "codifies" or places in its final form all effective rules adopted by state agencies and filed with the Office of Administrative Law. It is updated monthly.
  • To be accurate with regulatory research you need to use both publications, since one updates the other. Start with the New Jersey Administrative Code and find the regulation needed. Check the list of valid pages and dates. Then refer to the New Jersey Register "rulemaking list" and find any proposed or final rules for the citation in the Code. There is a time lag from publication of final rules in the New Jersey Register into the New Jersey Administrative Code. Thus you should use both publications.
Top of Page

CLUES for Research of U.S. Bills

Searching "nosocomial infections" is a subject term and will retrieve a better list than using the keyword phrase 'hospital infections'. Likewise, searching "community hospitals" is a specific subject term and may retrieve a more precise list, rather than searching with the broader subject term, "hospitals". It depends on your information needs.
  • Searching by bill or amendment number: Most importantly, a search must be formatted to use the authorized abbreviations or it will not accurately retrieve what you want, or retrieve nothing at all. Definitely use the THOMAS help screenSearching by Bill/Amendment Number
  • Congressional Record
    is the official proceedings and debates of Congress and is published daily when Congress is in session. It is searchable by bill number, congressperson's name and subject. It is useful when you need background on bills.
Senate amendments are always printed in the Congressional Record and many House amendments offered on the floor are also printed here.
Top of Page

CLUES for Research of U.S. Laws

  • A bill or legislation becomes a public law (federal statute) when enacted by Congress and signed by the President, or if not acted upon by the President within 10 days of his receipt, or if his veto is overridden by Congress. These statutes/laws are officially prepared and published by the Office of the Federal Register (OFR), National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).
  • There is a three-step process for official publication of federal statutes (public laws).
    • First, public laws are published first as Slip Laws because in their printed form they are paper pamphlets.
    • Secondly, laws are annually compiled into the United States Statutes at Large. The Statutes becomes the chronological compilation of all laws during one session of Congress.
    • Thirdly the law is "codified", amending, deleting or adding to the current body of existing law in a publication called the United States Code. This basic unannotated volume is extremely difficult to use; refer to the United States Code Annotated for research. Since this publication is fully revised every six years, you must use the cumulative supplements. The U.S. Code is published by the Law Revision Counsel of the House of Representatives not the Office of the Federal Register.
  • Compilations or lists of laws from the current Congress:
    • COMPLETE & UP-TO-DATE LIST
      Federal Register Online via GPO Access       The most up-to-date list appears in the Federal Register, though it does not link to the full text of the law. Use THOMAS or NARA for this purpose detailed below. There is a simple trick in the Federal Register to view the most current list of public laws. Search only the "Reader Aids" sectionfor the current day of the Federal Register. Go to the full text. This text retrieves several aids; go to the very end where the current public laws can be found.
    • SEARCH
       THOMAS Public Laws allows searching by terms (and browsing).
    • BROWSE
      NARA Catalog of Public Laws       provides the quickest lists for browsing.
  • Stay up to date or obtain paper copies of federal laws as follows:
    • PENS (Public Law Electronic Notification Service) is a free email service from NARA and requires an internet email account for access. It sends you an email notifying you of recently enacted public laws. (Very cool.) This email is not for specific inquiries to regulations. To subscribe, send an email to listserv@www.gsa.gov with the text message:
      subscribe PUBLAWS-L your name
    • PLUS (Public Laws Update Service) can be reached at 202-523-6641. It offers a recorded message of the most recently enacted laws providing by their public law number. It is not a complete list, just the most current laws, updated almost as soon as the law is enacted by the current session of Congress.
    • Telephone Orders for Laws (in Slip Law format): Call the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402 at 202-512-1808. For a small fee, this handy service lets you order a printed copy, especially useful if the law is large and you cannot print it from the web.
Top of Page

CLUES for Research of U.S. Regulations

  • Federal administrative bodies issue rules and regulations of a quasi-legislative nature. Valid federal regulations have the force of law and preempt state laws and rules. They are issued in the Federal Register. Rules and regulations may be issued only under statutory authority granted by Congress.
  • Two publications are used to research the federal system for rules and regulations: the daily Federal Register (FR) and the annually revised Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). All final regulations are codified in the CFR. "The CFR is keyed to and kept up-to-date by the daily Federal Register. These two publications must be used together to determine the latest version of any given rule. When a Federal agency publishes a regulation in the Federal Register, that regulation usually is an amendment to the existing CFR in the form of a change, an addition, or a removal." Also, final administrative rules are published first in the Federal Register and then in the Code of Federal Regulations.
  • The Federal Register contains five types of documents: Presidential documents, final rules and regulations, proposed rules, and regulations, notices, executive orders and corrections. It is published every federal working day, Monday through Friday. The Federal Register Reader Aids appear at the beginning or end of each issue and two are highly recommended: CFR Parts Affected, List of Public Laws.
  • What is the Federal Register and How Can the Public Use It? This is an excellent online starting point for research. It describes how to find the information you need using this publication.
  • The Federal Register Publications System
    To learn more, this information presents excellent summaries of these publications. There are also very helpful research tools such as the List of CFR Sections Affected, published monthly, that cumulates the CFR Parts Affected Reader Aid that appears in the Federal Register.
  • Federal Register Customer Information Telephones:
    • General Information, indexes and other finding aids 202-523-5227
    • Laws 523-5227
    • Presidential documents, executive orders and proclamations 523-5227
    • The United States Government Manual 523-5227
    • Electronic and on-line services (voice) 523-4534
    • Privacy Act Compilation 523-3187
    • PLUS Public Laws Update Service (numbers, dates, etc.) 523-6641
    • TTY for the deaf-and-hard-of-hearing 523-5229
  • Frequently Asked Questions Federal Register - Healthcare Related
  • Highly recommended reading:
    Gordon-Murnane, Laura. "The Federal Register Free on GPO Access," Searcher: The Magazine for Database Professionals, Vol l7, No. 6, June 1999, pp. 46-58. Abstract: Contact your hospital or organization's librarian for further information.
Top of Page

NJHA recommends using Microsoft Internet Explorer version 7.

Terms of Use Privacy Web Admin Contact Us


Click to expand category

Library & Links