United States Reports

For lawyers, citations to United States Reports are the standard reference for Supreme Court decisions.

Following The Bluebook, a commonly accepted citation protocol, the case Brown, et al., v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, for example, would be cited as: This citation indicates that the decision of the Court in the case entitled Brown v. Board of Education, as abbreviated in Bluebook style for footnotes, was decided in 1954 and can be found in volume 347 of the United States Reports starting on page 483.

Court reporters in that age received no salary, but were expected to profit from the publication and sale of their compiled decisions.

As Lawrence M. Friedman has explained: "In this volume, quietly and unobtrusively, began that magnificent series of reports, extending in an unbroken line to the present, that chronicles the work of the world's most powerful court.

When the Supreme Court moved to Washington, D.C. in 1800, Dallas remained in Philadelphia, and William Cranch took over as unofficial reporter of decisions.