legal-citation
Does USA have Neutral Citations like those of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and UK?
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CANZUK" rel="nofollow noreferrer">CANZUK</a>'s Neutral Citations all utilize the same formula — does  USA have anything alike? I cannot remember who, but some professor wrote that American citations are more baffling than CANZUK's Neutral Citations.</p>
<p><a href="https://canlii.ca/t/frpws#par391" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Gonzales v. Oregon</em>, 546 U.S. 243 (2006)</a> doesn't <a href="https://libguides.library.qut.edu.au/c.php?g=458197&amp;p=3131805" rel="nofollow noreferrer">abbreviate the court</a> — SCOTUS in this case.<br />
<a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/scc/doc/2007/2007scc41/2007scc41.html?searchUrlHash=AAAAAQAZImNhc3RsZSByb2NrIHYuIGdvbnphbGVzIgAAAAAB&amp;resultIndex=1#document" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Castle Rock v. Gonzales</em>, 125 S.Ct. 2796 (2005)</a> doesn't <a href="https://libguides.library.qut.edu.au/c.php?g=458197&amp;p=3131805" rel="nofollow noreferrer">number the judgment</a>.</p>
<p>But CANZUK Neutral Citations bear <a href="https://studyguides.lib.uts.edu.au/caselaw/citations" rel="nofollow noreferrer">the Judgment Year + Court Identifier + Judgment Number</a>.</p>
<blockquote>
<h4>United Kingdom</h4>
<p>ACG Acquisition XX LLC v Olympic Airlines SA (in
liquidation) [2013] EWCA Civ 369 [. . .]<br />
ACG Acquisition XX LLC v Olympic Airlines   SA (in
liquidation) [2012] EWHC 1070 (Comm) [. . .]<br />
Actionstrength Ltd v International Glass Engineering
SpA [2003] UKHL 17</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Severine Saintier, <em>Poole's Textbook on Contract Law</em> (2021 15th edn), page xv.</p>
<blockquote>
<h4>Australia</h4>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd v Karam [2005] NSWCA 344</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Equuscorp Pty Ltd v Glengallen Investments Pty Ltd [2004] HCA 55</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Neil Andrews, <em>Contract Law in Practice</em> (2021), page lvii.</p>
<blockquote>
<h4>Canada</h4>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>0856464 BC Ltd v Timber West Forest Corp (2014) BCSC 2433</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Westpoint Management Ltd v Chocolate Factory Apartments Ltd [2007] NSWCA 253</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Whiten v Pilot Insurance Co [2002] SCC 18</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<h4>New Zealand</h4>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Bahramitash v Kumar [2005] NZSC 39</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Electricity Corporation of New Zealand Ltd v Fletcher Challenge Ltd [2001] NZCA 289</p>
</blockquote>
<p><em>Ibid</em>, page lviii.</p>

<h3>Your examples are not neutral citations</h3>
<p><em>Gonzales v. Oregon</em>, <a href="https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep546/usrep546243/usrep546243.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">546 U.S. 243</a> (2006) and
<em>Castle Rock v. Gonzales</em>, 125 S.Ct. 2796 (2005) are not neutral citations because elements depend on the particular reporter series, rather than being neutral as to who has published.</p>
<p>These are citations to:</p>
<ul>
<li>The case found at <a href="https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep545/usrep545748/usrep545748.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">page 243 of volume 546</a> of the <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/USReports.aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">U.S. Reports</a> (the Court's official reporter), decided in 2006</li>
<li>The case found at page 2796 of Volume 125 of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Reporter_System" rel="nofollow noreferrer">West Publishing's Supreme Court Reporter</a>, decided in 2005 (and this decision is <em>also</em> reported in the U.S. Reports at <a href="https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep545/usrep545748/usrep545748.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">545 U.S. 748</a>)</li>
</ul>
<p>The court name is not separately mentioned because it is readily inferred from the reporters.</p>
<h3>Some courts <em>have</em> enabled / prescribed some form of neutral citation</h3>
<p>Federal and state courts in the U.S. do not uniformly provide their decisions with vendor-neutral citations, but many do provide and/or prescribe some method of citation that does not rely on proprietary reporters.</p>
<p>The Illinois state court system has directed parties to cite Illinois state court decisions by <a href="https://ilcourtsaudio.blob.core.windows.net/antilles-resources/resources/2374deda-2eed-448e-8b4b-24a22a348f28/Rule%206.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">reference to the year, court level, and docket number</a>.</p>
<p>Several other states have adopted a more typical neutral citation system, using the year, court, and sequence number. This conforms with the approach <a href="https://www.aallnet.org/resources-publications/publications/universal-citation-guide/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">recommended by the American Association of Law Libraries</a> and is consistent with Canadian, N.Z., and U.K. practice. E.g. <a href="https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1110&amp;context=law-lib_borgeson" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Oklahoma and North Dakota</a>:</p>
<ul>
<li>1995 OK 11</li>
<li>1997 ND 15</li>
</ul>

<p>American courts do not have any officially prescribed standard for citing cases.</p>
<p>The citations we use don't usually include a judgment number, but I'd say they're still pretty straightforward in most cases. Generally, most citations will be laid out to include the following information:</p>
<ul>
<li>The name of the case (usually as <em>Plaintiff v. Defendant</em>),</li>
<li>A reference to the volume and page of the reporter publishing the decision,</li>
<li>The court issuing the decision (if necessary),</li>
<li>The year of the decision.</li>
</ul>
<p>Looking at <a href="https://casetext.com/case/gonzales-v-oregon-4" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Gonzales v. Oregon</em>, 546 U.S. 243 (2006)</a>, for instance, the citation doesn't <em>say</em> that it's a SCOTUS decision, but it also doesn't need to because it's a citation to Volume 546, Page 243 of the U.S. Reports, which publishes decisions exclusively from the U.S. Supreme Court. But decisions from the circuit courts of appeals don't have their own individual reporters, so you would need to identify which court issued the decision when citing the case that <em>Gonzales</em> affirmed, e.g., <a href="https://casetext.com/case/oregon-v-ashcroft" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Oregon v. Ashcroft</em>, 368 F.3d 1118 (9th Cir. 2004)</a></p>
<p>The most widely accepted standard for citations -- whether to court decisions or previous court filings or external sources -- is the <a href="https://www.legalbluebook.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Bluebook</a>, and &quot;baffling&quot; would be a generally accepted description of that standard. I imagine you've heard of the criticisms from <a href="https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/want_to_even_out_lawyer_quality_and_end_contingent_fees_adopt_a_uniform_pay" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Judge Posner</a>, who has written repeatedly on this topic.</p>
