Legal Research Process

Texas Register 

The first publication of the Texas Register was in 1976. It is compiled by the Texas Secretary of State and published weekly on Friday afternoons. It serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas.

The Texas Register includes:

• proposed, adopted,* and withdrawn rules;
• emergency rules;
• notices of state agency reviews of agency rules;
• Governor's proclamations, appointments, and executive orders (EO)
• summaries of requests for and opinions of the Attorney General; and
• other documents, such as requests for proposals and documentation of administrative enforcement of laws and regulations.

*Unlike the Federal Register, if there are no changes to a proposed rule, then the full text of the rule is not reprinted and one has to page back to notice of proposed rule.

Like the Fed. Reg, the Texas Register is a current awareness tool and, at the same time, a source of regulatory history. To keep current, you can look for the latest issue on a weekly basis for new ("Adopted Rules" section) and proposed regulations.

The Texas Register has content in the searchable database prior to print publication. This feature may be useful to preview proposed rules, adopted rules, and emergency rules prior to its print publication. 

Electronic Availability

• The Secretary of State is required to make the full text available to the public on their website.
  • The previous one year's issues are available to browse in PDF and html.
    • Go to the Secretary of State website and choose "Current Issue" 
  • The searchable database includes issues from February 2000 - Present. 
• Also available through the Secretary of State's Texas Administrative Code search.
• University of North Texas maintains historical archive from 1976.
  • There appears to be a one-month delay in archiving most recent issues. 
• Lexis (login required)
  • Provides issues from January 3,1992 - Present 
• Westlaw (login required)  
  • Provides splits the issues into separate databases.
  • Texas Proposed & Adopted Regulations - Current provides issues from the past 2 year - Present.
  • Texas Administrative Register - Historical provides issues from October 3, 1989 - December 13, 2013.
  • Texas Proposed & Adopted Regulations - All provides selected coverage beginning on January 1, 2006. 
•  Bloomberg (login required)  
  • Provides some limited access from 2011 - Present 

*Be sure to check currency when searching commercial databases.

Print Availability

The Texas Register is available in print at Tarlton on the 2nd floor. 

Ways to research regulations:

• If you would like to use an Index, the Secretary of State provides annual indexes in PDF and html from 1997 - Present.
  • Indexes for the years 2008 - Present contain full lists of all the rules and non-rule entries published in the weekly issues for that year.
  • The "Index of Rules" for these years list every rule entry organized by the Titles in the Texas Administrative Code and indicate whether the rule was Proposed: (P), Adopted: (A), Withdrawn: (W), Emergency: (E). Ex: Index of Rules 
  • The "Index of Non-Rulemaking Notices" lists every non-rule entry from that year, organized by the agency and cites the page number of the Register where it can be found. Ex: Index of Non-Rulemaking Notices 
  • Indexes for the years 1997 - 2007 organize the information by agency and by TAC titles affected.
    • In the "Agency Guide", the agencies are listed in alphabetical order with a list of proposed, adopted and withdrawn regulations, organized by the Chapter in the Texas Administrative Code the regulations fell under. Non-rule entries are also listed in this section under their respective agencies.  Ex: Agency Guide 
    • In the "TAC Titles Affected" pages, the rules published during that year are organized by the Titles of the Texas Administrative Code, but do not state the responsible agency or whether the rule was proposed, adopted or withdrawn. Ex: TAC Titles Affected
  • The Indexes for the years 1997 - 2003 also include a list of all the Open Meetings held by each agency. Ex: Open Meetings 
  • The Indexes for the years 1997 - 1998 also include a list of all the Regional Meetings held by each agency. Ex: Regional Meetings 
• Portal to Texas History's Texas Register maintains a historical archive from 1975 - Present. 
  • You may use natural language searching or browse by year. 
• The current issue is available in PDF and HTML versions. 
• You can also Search the Texas Register. Coverage from January 2000 - Present.
  • There are a variety of ways to search for a particular rule, including the text of the rule, the agency the rule applies to, the date, etc. The system does not allow searching for rules and non-rules at the same time.
  • The search results are organized by date and show up 10 entries at a time--there is no other way to organize the search results. 
  • Be sure to click "next" to view all results. 
  • There is a lot of utility in using this feature because it links to the Texas Administrative Code. 

As usual, both Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg have the additional options of natural language and terms and connectors searching.

• Historically, Westlaw has created unique identifiers rather than Bluebook Texas Register citations, so for rules older than 2019, you may not be able to search by citation.
• Be sure to check the coverage dates when using commercial databases. 

Lexis and Westlaw may be more familiar to the typical researcher, but in terms of currency, the free government sources are better. Searching by citation will not work in Westlaw for older rules.