Contents of Court Records

Generally, a court record is an official written account of what occurred in the court. It is, in a sense, a written history of the proceedings of a case. Although the words record, docket, and minutes are sometimes used interchangeably, record generally carries a broader meaning than docket and minutes.

Docket often refers to the list of cases heard by a court, which is sometimes called the court calendar. Dockets typically list the names of plaintiffs and defendants and case file numbers. Dockets also usually contain brief descriptions of important acts done in court in the conduct of a case, including the date a case was heard and a list of important documents related to the case. Dockets are usually kept in chronological (not alphabetical) order. Many courts have several different dockets, such as criminal, civil, and equity dockets. Dockets serve as tables of contents to court cases; a study of dockets is only genealogically significant in that it can give the researcher more details about a specific case.

The term minutes generally refers to notes made by the clerk of the court in the course of proceedings. Minutes are brief accounts kept by the clerk of all actions taken by the court. They usually include the names of the plaintiff and defendant and a brief description or summary of the action taken. They are usually kept in chronological order. When minutes are written out by the clerk in proper and final form, they become part of the court record. Commonly it is the minutes of local courts that appear in published form and are available for genealogical research.

A court record consists not only of minutes, but also of pleadings and other documents which are filed with the court, such as written evidence, bonds, correspondence, petitions, and depositions. The record also includes orders and rulings of the court, which may be called judgments, decrees, or orders. Orders sometimes include a brief description of the case. Some actions of a court reflected in court orders—such as orders granting citizenship, appointing guardians, and re-recording deeds to replace destroyed land records—are not found in other court records.

The form that a court record takes varies greatly from one court to another and from one time period to another. Often, court minutes are kept in record books. In some courts, there are separate docket books and separate order books. Documents which are part of the record but cannot physically be included in the record book are kept in case files, which consist of folders, packets, or bundles of all the loose documents relating to the case. Case files and folders are usually put in storage and so are not readily available for research and are more difficult to abstract; this leaves the court minute books and the docket books as the most accessible and the record types most often found in printed form. While the clerk of the court prepares the court record, in doing so, he or she is supposed to be acting under the authority and control of the judge of that court.

Often, a court will be said to be a court of record or a court not of record. In a broad sense, a court of record is one which is required by law to keep a record of its proceedings. Whether or not a court is a court of record is primarily important to the researcher only in helping determine the likelihood that records of that court still exist. Naturally, courts of record, which are supposed to keep permanent records, are more likely to have records that have survived than courts not of record, which are not required to keep permanent records. There have been (and still are) many courts not of record in America. Because, generally, these courts were not required to keep permanent records of proceedings, the likelihood is that many, if not most, of the early records of such courts have not survived.