Administrative codes are the subject organization of regulations. A register is usually a chronological publication and includes notices and proposed regulations as well as final regulations.
Agency decisions, orders, and opinions are much more difficult to find than statutes, cases, or regulations. Generally, check OneSearch, the agency’s website, Lexis & Westlaw, and other commercial publishing sources such as VitalLaw and Bloomberg Law.
With the exception of Federal, Ohio, and selected Indiana and Kentucky material, the Law Library primarily relies on electronic versions of administrative law materials. Note that the Bluebook has special rules for citing Treasury materials.
See our Federal Administrative Law Guide for further details on researching Federal Administrative Law.
Both temporary and final regulations are first published as Treasury Decisions. They are numbered with a numerical prefix indicating the tax with which the regulation deals and then the code section.
Income Tax = 1
Estate Tax = 20
Gift Tax = 25
Example: Treas. Reg. § 1.48.9 is a regulation on income tax, section 48 of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC).
Temporary Federal Tax Regulations are effective immediately and often issued after a new tax statute. They do not require notice or a public comment period. They can remain in effect for up to three years.
The Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is a subject arrangement of general and permanent regulations. A regulation will be published first in the Federal Register and later be codified in the CFR. The print CFR is revised yearly on a quarterly basis:
Use it to find regulations relating to a statute or presidential proclamation.
Sometimes when looking at a particular statute in the United States Code Annotated or United States Code Service you will find a reference to a related administrative regulation.
A good topical secondary source or loose-leaf service will refer to or reproduce regulations.
The Federal Register Act in 1935, required the Federal government to publish all the administrative rules and regulations, Presidential proclamations and executive orders and any other documents that have "general applicablity and legal effect" in the Federal Register. The Federal Register is published every business day.
Use advance searching and fields/segments where you can.
IRS pronouncements in response to factual questions from taxpayers or the IRS field offices that the IRS feels are of general interest. They are official interpretations by the IRS so the agency is bound by them until the ruling is revoked.
Letter Rulings and Private Letter Rulings are written responses to specific taxpayer written requests. They deal with a specific set of facts and have no precedential value.
Another type of private ruling but these are written by the IRS in response to taxpayer or IRS field office questions when auditing a return. These also have no precedential value.
You can Shepardize and KeyCite administrative regulations. This will help you find proposed regulations, judicial treatment and interpretation of regulations; and locate secondary sources citing regulations.
The IRS is bound by U.S. Supreme Court decisions but it is more complicated when it comes to decisions by other lower courts. If the Commissioner decides to abide by an adverse decision, it is an acquiescence. A nonacquiescence means the Commissioner disagrees with the adverse decision and will only follow the decision for the specific taxpayer whose case resulted in the adverse ruling.
You can find the announcements regarding acquiescence or nonacquiescence in:
The AOD is a formal memorandum prepared by the IRS Office of Chief Counsel that announces the future litigation position the IRS will take with regard to the court decision addressed by the AOD.
For more details on Ohio Administrative Law resources, see our Ohio Research Guide.
Use Lexis, Westlaw, or go to the state government website. A good listing of Administrative Codes and Registers is at the Administrative Codes and Registers Section of the National Association of Secretaries of State, http://www.administrativerules.org (click on Administrative Rules).
