How PlainStatute is built

One page, one state, one question

PlainStatute is organized the way people actually search. Each topic answers a single everyday-law question, and each state gets its own page for that question, because the answer changes at the state line. We currently cover 56 topics across 806 state pages, and the coverage keeps expanding. You land on the exact state and question you searched for, not a national overview that makes you guess.

From statute to plain English

Each page is made the same way, one state at a time.

1. Read the official statute. We start from the state legislature's own text for the specific code section that governs the question, not a summary of it.

2. Pull out the exact answer. We find the precise figure or rule the reader came for, such as the deposit cap, the notice period, or the filing deadline.

3. Rewrite it in plain English. We restate the rule in everyday words while keeping the real number and any condition attached to it. A conditional rule stays conditional, and it is never flattened into a single tidy number that would mislead.

4. Cite and link the source. The exact statute citation, down to the subsection, sits next to the fact and links to the official text so you can confirm it.

5. Show the date and the tier. Each page shows when it was last reviewed and a visible source tier, so you always know how strongly the figure is backed.

Where the numbers come from

Figures come only from primary sources: the official statute, a disclosed public mirror of that code when the official site blocks automated reading, a controlling federal statute, or governing case law. Aggregator sites are never a source of record. Each page shows one of three source tiers, using the same vocabulary everywhere: Confirmed (read against the source, with a review date), Cited (linked to its source but not yet matched word-for-word), and Under editorial review. For the full verification rules, including how we handle a statute that is silent on a point, see our editorial standards.

What we refuse to do

We do not invent numbers, and we do not borrow a plausible figure from a secondary site. Where the code sets no figure, the page says the law is silent and shows the chapter it was read against. The plain-language writing is our own, tied to the specific statute for that state, not generic text repeated across pages with the state name swapped in.

Original research

Beyond the reference pages, we compute original datasets from our own corpus and show exactly how the numbers were derived. The first is the Statute Plain-Language Complexity Index, which measures the reading level of our explainers for each area of law. Everything is computed from published pages at build time, never hardcoded.

Information, not advice

PlainStatute is a reference, not a law firm. The pages are legal information, not legal advice, and reading them creates no attorney-client relationship. Before you act, confirm the current rule with the official source linked on the page. See our full disclaimer, and if you find an error, use the contact page so we can re-verify and update the review date.