Foreign Materials
Cases and legislation from Australia, Canada, England and Wales, Scotland, Ireland and the United States.
Chapters 8 and 9 cover foreign cases and foreign legislation. r 8.1 sets the frame: follow the chapter 3 rules where you can, and layer the jurisdiction’s own differences on top.
Nearly every one of those differences is about the year.
Year brackets by jurisdiction
This table is most of chapter 8.
| Jurisdiction | Year bracket |
|---|---|
| Australia, Canada (reported) | round |
| England and Wales | square |
| Canada (neutral citation) | none at all |
| Scotland (law report) | never square |
| Scotland (neutral citation) | square |
| United States | round, at the END, sharing a bracket with the court |
A Scottish neutral citation takes square brackets even though a Scottish law report never does, because a neutral citation is not a law report.
English nominate reports
A nominate report needs two citations: the report itself and its reprint in the English Reports, separated by a comma, with the year given once (r 8.4.2(b)).
A pinpoint names the page in both. A later reference gives the nominate page only.
Choosing the right English report
r 8.4.1 marks the All England Reports and the Weekly Law Reports as the wrong choice where the Law Reports are available. Pincite cannot know what else a case was reported in, so this one is on you.
Foreign legislation
A pre-1963 United Kingdom statute carries a regnal year and a chapter number. Devolved legislation carries no jurisdiction identifier at all, because the jurisdiction is already inside the title.
Canadian statutes run the volume marker and the jurisdiction together with no space, as “RSBC” or “RSC”.
United States materials
The United States Code, session laws, model codes and restatements, and the Constitution each have their own form under r 9.5.
No court identifier is given where the series reports only one court, as with the Federal Supplement, the Federal Reporter and the United States Reports. A Courts of Appeals citation still names its circuit, which is a different thing.
Related Index entries
Australian caseCanadian caseEnglish or Welsh caseEnglish nominate reportScottish caseUnited States caseAustralian legislationCanadian statuteUnited Kingdom statute before 1963Modern United Kingdom or devolved statuteUnited States CodeUnited States session lawUnited States model law or restatementUnited States ConstitutionLast reviewed 6 August 2026