Statutory law refers to laws passed by a legislative body. Typical examples include acts passed by the state legislature, as well as local ordinances passed by a county or municipality. Researchers most often research statutory law by using statutory codes or codes of ordinances. These codes include only the statutory laws currently in force, organized by topic.
The facts and circumstances of a legal issue will determine whether you need to research state statutory codes or local codes of ordinances. The resources below provide information on locating state and local statutory law.
Article III, Section I, Paragraph I of the Georgia Constitution vests legislative power in the General Assembly. Members of the General Assembly work with interested parties to take ideas for laws and introduce them as bills or resolutions. Only members of the General Assembly can introduce legislation. P ursuant to Ga. Const . art. III, § IV, para . I, t he Georgia General Assembly meets for no more than forty legislative days every year .
A bill becomes law once identical language of the bill pass both the House and the Senate, and is signed by the Governor. Once signed by the Governor, the bill becomes known as an act or a statute. Acts are published in Georgia Laws, which includes all of the acts and resolutions passed during an assembly session. In addition to publication in Georgia Laws, acts of general statewide application are integrated into the two statutory codes: Official Code of Georgia Annotated (O.C.G.A.) or West’s Code of Georgia Annotated (Ga. Code Ann.).
For more information on the legislative process, consult the following book or the Georgia General Assembly's Legislation webpage.
Handbook for Georgia Legislators, 14th Edition by Carl Vinson Institute of Government Call Number: KFG421.5 ISBN: 9780692327630 Publication Date: 2014-12-07Now in its fourteenth edition, the Handbook for Georgia Legislators is the only comprehensive guide to the legislative process in Georgia. In 1958, the Carl Vinson Institute of Government at the University of Georgia published the first edition of the handbook to help educate newly elected and veteran Georgia state representatives and senators about the legislative process and current issues and challenges. Since that time, the book also has been useful for legislative staff, state agencies, attorneys, teachers, students, and other citizens interested in the legislative process in Georgia. This edition of the handbook incorporates changes in the law and legislative procedure that have occurred since the previous edition (published in 2007), including new lobby and ethics rules, House and Senate rules changes, court decisions, agency policies, and other actions affecting the General Assembly and its membership.
Georgia’s two current print statutory codes are the LexisNexis published Official Code of Georgia Annotated (O.C.G.A.), and the Thomson West published West’s Code of Georgia Annotated (Ga. Code Ann).
Georgia had several statutory codes p rior to the Official Code of Georgia Annotated and West's Code of Georgia Annotated, most notably the Harrison Company’s annotated version of the Code of 1933, titled Georgia Code Annotated. However, in 1976 the Code Revision Study Committee recommended a complete revision of the code. The legislature contracted with the Michie Company, which LexisNexis later acquired, to work with the state in preparing a new official code. During a special session in 1981, the Georgia General Assembly adopted the results of this effort, the Official Code of Georgia Annotated. This code became effective on November 1, 1982.
While published by competing companies, both of the current codes provide the text of statutes and uniform laws currently in force. Both codes are also annotated, meaning users will find references to secondary sources that cite the code sections, as well as cases that cite, discuss, or explain the code sections. It should be noted that there will be some differences in the annotations provided by each code because they are compiled by different editors.
While the text of the law is the same in each code, only the O.C.G.A. has been deemed an official version of the law by the Georgia General Assembly. Therefore, when citing a code section, researchers must always cite to the O.C.G.A. using the following citation format: O.C.G.A. § 1-3-1 (year).
Both the Official Code of Georgia Annotated and West's Code of Georgia Annotated organize the code sections under the same three number citation system. Statutes in the codes are organized by title, chapter, and section. The title represents the major subject area, the chapter a subtopic, and the section represents the actual text of the law.
For example, O.C.G.A. § 9-4-6 (year) refers to title 9, chapter 4, section 6 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated. To access this code section in print, you would locate the volume of the O.C.G.A. that covers title 9 and chapter 4, and then turn in the book to where the text of 9-4-6 begins. Code sections are arranged within a title in chronological order. Because both codes utilize the same three number citation system, the text of O.C.G.A. § 9-4-6 is the same as Ga. Code Ann. § 9-4-6.
When researching Georgia cases, you may come across cases published prior to the enactment of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated. These cases will cite to previous versions of the Georgia code, most commonly the Harrison's Georgia Code Annotated (Code of 1933). The Harrison code utilized a two number citation system (81A-101), instead of the three number system (9-11-1) used by the current Georgia codes.
The Tables volume of the O.C.G.A. allows you to convert citations that use the two number citation system (labeled 1933 Code) to the current three number citation system (labeled 1981 Code). The conversion tables provided in the Tables volume of the O.C.G.A. are only available in the print version of the O.C.G.A., and are not available online or in the West's Code of Georgia Annotated.