In the wake of our nation’s recession and painful budget cuts, legal researchers have lost a friend in the business: PreCYdent.com.

PreCYdent was a free legal search engine co-founded by University of San Diego law professor Thomas A. Smith in 2006. Its goal was to provide every person access to “state-of-the-art search technology to help them navigate through the large and complex body of legal authority.” And, because Smith and his cohorts believed that judicial opinions and statutes need to be in the public domain, this information was provided for free. Users could search and upload “any kind of legal document, including judicial opinions that are in the public domain.”

PreCYdent has lost its funding; its links are dead. One less free legal research site available to the masses.

For further information, click here for information about the history and the demise of PreCYdent.

All quotations are from PreCYdent’s “About Us” page archived in August 2008. You can use the wayback machine to find more.