Carol’s Corner Office Blog

If you are employed by a a law office there are times when you need to create a Table of Authorities for a pleading, such as an Amicus Brief. A Table of Authorities is used to to cite references to cases, statutes, etc. referenced in your pleading.

MS Word has the ability to quickly and easily create your Table of Authorities for you. All you have to do is mark the citations within your document and then tell MS Word to create your Table for you.

Follow the steps below to create your Table of Authorities:

1. Select the long, full citation that you would like to use.
2. Click on SHIFT + ALT + I, which will cause the Mark Citation dialog box to appear.
3. Make any formatting changes that you like to the text in the Selected Text box.
4. Use the drop-down Category list to select the category to which the citation belongs.
5. In the Short Citation box, edit the text to reflect the short version of the citation.
6. Click on Mark to mark the instant citation or Mark All to search your document and mark all instances.
7. Click on Cancel or Close.

Now all you have to do is click on the designated page for your TOA and click on Insert | Reference | Tables and Indexes and select Table of Authorities.

That’s it! You are finished.  Pretty cool isn’t it?  Most secretaries blanch at the thought of creating an automatic TOA but it is really quite simple.

This tip is for MS Word version 2003