Finding U.S.C.S. Prior Releases on the LexisNexis Digital Library

The LexisNexis Digital Library has over 260 legal resources. One major resource is the annotated United States Code Service (U.S.C.S.). This 299 volume set includes the United States Constitution, all 54 Titles of the U.S. Code, Federal Court Rules, and multiple finding aids.

The U.S.C.S. on the LexisNexis Digital Library contains the current edition with prior releases back to 2013. Prior releases can be helpful if you need to know what a statute or court rule looked like in a prior year. Please note that not all volumes include access to prior releases, and not all volumes have prior releases back to 2013.

To find prior releases, navigate to the volume containing the statute section or court rule you are interested in. For this example, I'll be looking for how 20 U.S.C.S. § 9105a looked after its 2012 amendment but before its 2018 amendment.

Once you have found the correct volume, click on the menu option for "Prior releases":

If the volume is available to borrow, each release will have a link that says "READ". Click "READ" on the release you would like to look at. You will then be prompted to "BORROW" the volume.

Clicking "BORROW" will allow you to read all available releases of that volume, including the most current release.

Once you borrow the release, the release will open. To confirm that you are looking at the desired release, take a look at the copyright page to see if it covers the year you are looking for.

Use the Table of Contents to navigate to your desired section.

You can also confirm the date of the statute by looking at the act information found after the text of the statute. For my example, I can see that the last act listed is Aug. 10, 2012, P. L. 112-166. Since I was looking for the statute as it was after this amendment, I am in the correct prior release.

The U.S.C.S. is a popular resource, so the volume you need may be in use by another library patron. If that is the case, you can place a hold on the volume by clicking "PLACE HOLD". You will be emailed once the volume is available to borrow.

Prior releases are also available for many other titles on the LexisNexis Digital Library, including state statutes like the Delaware Code Annotated and Michie's West Virginia Code Annotated, as well as for treatises and form sets like the Pennsylvania Law Encyclopedia and Bender's Federal Practice Forms.

For more tips on using the LexisNexis Digital Library, check out our blog post New LexisNexis Digital Library Platform.

Do you need to find a U.S. Code section from before 2013? Take a look at the member database HeinOnline or visit the library to use our in house Lexis and Westlaw computers. For additional information about finding historical U.S.C. sections on these databases, check out our U.S. Code research guide.

Have additional questions about the U.S. Code or the LexisNexis Digital Library? Ask us!