Citing Session Laws digitized on Internet Archive

By cynthia.heidor… on Wed, 02/15/2023 - 21:15

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Our study group met and created this citation for a session law that was published in a book, and subsequently found online at Internet Archive. In drafting this citation, we considered the first layer following section 13.13, p. 748, in Evidence Explained. We drafted the second layer as an online source.  We have two questions:

1. Is the sequencing right for the first layer? 

2. For the digitized images, does the title "Indiana acts, 1822-23, 7th session," belong before or after the description "digitized images"? 

Laws of the State of Indiana Passed and Published at the Seventh Session of the General Assembly Held at Corydon, [2 December 1822] (Corydon: Carpenter and Douglass, 1823), p. 79, Chap. XLV, “…an act, authorizing the granting of letters testamentary, and letters of administration, for the settlement of intestate estates, and for other purposes,” Sec. 1., approved 9 January 1823; digitized images, “Indiana acts, 1822-23, 7th session,” Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/isl-ind-gov-acts-1823/page/n37/mode/2up : accessed 15 February 2023), image 40 of 90.

Thank you for taking a look at this one for us! 

Submitted byEEon Thu, 02/16/2023 - 08:55

Cynthia.heidor, you and your study group have done well.  EE would tinker in just a couple of places, one of which you have anticipated:

Laws of the State of Indiana Passed and Published at the Seventh Session of the General Assembly Held at Corydon, [2 December 1822] (Corydon: Carpenter and Douglass, 1823), p. 79, Chap. XLV, “An act to amend an act—approved January 29th, 1818, entitled 'an act, authorizing the granting of letters testamentary, and letters of administration, for the settlement of intestate estates, and for other purposes',” Sec. 1., approved 9 January 1823; digitized images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/isl-ind-gov-acts-1823/page/n37/mode/2up : accessed 15 February 2023), image 40 of 90.

Explanations:

  • The citation places an ellipsis at the start of the name of the act. As a general rule of punctuation, ellipses do not appear at the start of a quotation. We may start a quotation at any point by simply typing/writng an open-quote mark and adding whatever words we want to quote. (EE 2.43, 2.67)  In these two sections dealing with ellipses, note the caution against deleting words at the start of a quoted title. In this case, the ellipsis at the start of the title to the act eliminated important words. This act is not just "an act, authorizing the granting of letters ..." This act is an act to amend a prior act; the title you cited for the 1823 act was actually the title of the 1818 act that's being amended in 1823.
  • Punctuation wise, restoring the omitted words calls for an alteration in the quotation marks because you now have a quote (the old title) within a new quote (the new title).
  • As you questioned, the phrase "Indiana acts, 1822-23, 7th session" is not necessary. At Archive.org, the standard approach is to query for the title of the book. If you wish to include Archive.org's shortened title in your citation, there is no harm done because it is possible to query Archive.org for just that shortened title and get the right hit. But it adds no new and essential detail and increases the length of the citation.

Thank you! We debated quotes within a quote. Your modifications make it very clear. It is good to know that we don't need the Internet Archive title. It was fun to craft this as a group. We appreciate this forum - it is a great learning place!