Researchers should not rely on the validity of a Code of Federal Regulations (hereinafter CFR) section without first checking for changes to that section. The process requires checking the Federal Register for any changes to a CFR section that have been promulgated since the latest revision date of the CFR volume in which the section appears. (In other words, if you are looking at a CFR section in a CFR volume with, say, a cover revision date of April 1, 1999, you need to look for changes to the section that may have appeared in the Federal Register after that date.)

All of the sources discussed in this guide are shelved on aisles 1B & 2B of the Library. If you need help locating this aisle, please check with a librarian.

The CFR and Federal Register are also available through a number of online sources. On Westlaw, choose the CFR or FEDREG databases. With Lexis, use the GENFED; CFR or GENFED; FEDREG library/file combinations. The Government Printing Office provides free online access to the CFR and Federal Register through its GPO Access web site at http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/index.html. Finally, the Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School offers an excellent web version of the CFR (http://lii.law.cornell.edu/). Generally, the process for updating a CFR section online is quite different from the process described belowfor the paper version of the CFR. See the help files and FAQs for the online service you choose to use or check with a reference librarian to learn how to update electronic CFR materials.

Take the following steps to update a CFR section:

1. Note the revision date on the cover of the CFR volume in which the section you are checking appears; you will need to check for any changes after that date through the current date.
   
   Occasionally, due to difficulties involved in printing and distributing the CFR, the volume you are using will be more than twelve months out-of-date. If so, the process involved in updating the CFR becomes too complicated to explain in a short research guide. If the revision date on the CFR volume in which your section appears is one year old or more, please ask a reference librarian for help updating the section.
   
   
2. Assuming your revision date is less than one year old, your next step is to check the most recent edition of the List of Sections Affected (hereinafter LSA). This pamphlet, published monthly, contains lists of changes to a CFR section and the corresponding page of the Federal Register on which the text of the changes appears. If the section in question is listed in the LSA, you will need to check the Federal Register page number listed in reference to that section in order to find the text of the change.
   
   
3. Check the CFR Parts Affected list in the back of the last Federal Register published in every full month that has passed since the publication of the LSA. This list appears in each issue of the Federal Register; it cumulates daily throughout a given month. Thus, the list published in the last issue of for each month provides a cumulative list of changes to the CFR for that month only. For instance, the CFR Parts Affected list that appears in the May 31 issue of the Federal Register will contain all changes to CFR sections that have been referenced in the Federal Register between May 1 and May 31.
   
   
4. Check the CFR Parts Affected list in the back of the last Federal Register available. (In our library, there is typically a 1-2 week time lag between the publication of an issue of the Federal Register and its receipt.) Remember that the list in the last issue received will reflect all changes made during that month through the issue's date.
   
   
5. Shepardize the CFR section. In addition to the process noted above, a researcher may want to check the section in Shepard's Code of Federal Regulations Citations, not only for citing entries, but to make sure that the section has not been found to be unconstitutional.
   
   

Example. Assume that on April 15 you are attempting to update 45 CFR sec. 1355.20. The revision date for Title 40 is October of last year. As less than one year has passed since this revision date, you can update this section using the instructions in this user guide. First, you will check the most recent LSA available; let's assume the January issue is the most recent available. You will then need to check the CFR Parts Affected lists in the last issues of the Federal Register published in February and March--the only two full months that have passed since publication of the January LSA. Next, you must check the most recent Federal Register available in April, which will not be the April 15 issue due to the time lag between publication and receipt. Finally, you should Shepardize your section to discover any negative treatment of the regulation by the courts.

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