Rulemaking is the process of creating regulations, which are statements by agencies that have the force of law. The authority to regulate is granted by Congress, and many laws passed by Congress give federal agencies flexibility to decide how best to implement the laws.
The Federal Register provides a uniform system for publishing presidential documents, regulatory documents with general applicability and legal effect, proposed and final regulations, notices, and documents required by statute to be published. Proposed and final regulations appear first in the Federal Register.
The Code of Federal Regulations is an annual codification of the rules published in the Federal Register. The C.F.R. is divided into 50 titles that represent broad areas subject to federal regulation.
Online access to state materials varies widely. Georgetown University Law Library has created state research guides for information about individual jurisdictions.
Use this tool from the Legal Information Institute to find primary law sources for each state. After selecting a state, look for a link labeled "Regulations". Note that online accessibility of regulations varies by state.
In Ohio, Baldwin’s Ohio Administrative Code (OAC) arranges state regulations by subject. Baldwin’s OAC is published by West, is annotated, and is updated by pocket parts. In between pocket parts, the Ohio Monthly Record publishes regulations in chronological order. See a sample page from the OAC below.
Administrative agencies are typically charged with enforcing the rules they promulgate. In this enforcement capacity, an agency may issue a variety of formal and informal adjudicative materials, including guidance, opinions, rulings, memoranda, orders, directives, decisions, or arbitrations. Unlike federal rules, there is no single source for accessing all adjudicative materials, and researchers may need to review a variety of resources to find a particular document, if indeed it was published and made publicly available.
Current administrative decisions and materials are frequently published to the website of a federal agency. Other sources of administrative materials (with examples) are:
A four-part citation format tells you where to find a regulation being cited:
| Title/Volume | Publication | Section/Page | Date |
| 10 | C.F.R. | §719.30 | (2020) |
| 84 | Fed. Reg. | 14,264 | (April 10, 2019) |
When consulting the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), it's important to pay attention to the date at the end of the citation. Make sure you are looking at the appropriate version of the code.
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