This database, available as part of the HeinOnline group of digital content or separately, aims to comprehensively collect or “illustrate” the current and historical versions of constitutions for all countries of the world, along with commentary in periodicals and monographs, country analysis and data, and general background on constitutional theory, history and jurisprudence. The initial release provided the current constitutions for 193 countries, plus further historic background on the constitutions of the United Kingdom, France, Brazil, and Colombia. Constitutional documents and amending laws are provided in the original language or languages, as well as in English translations whenever available. The additional country information is incorporated from the following data sources accessible through HeinOnline: Annual Human Rights Reports Submitted to Congress by the U.S. Department of State (1976 – current); British & Foreign State Papers (1812- 1968); Country Studies (reports from the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress); Modern Legal Systems Cyclopedia; and World Fact Book (1981 - current) from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

At the initial release, 800 classic monographs on constitutions were included in the database; the collection was expected to expand to at least 2000 classic monographs within the year, and ultimately to at least 2400 titles. There is also a bibliography of additional resources on constitutional development in various countries.

In addition to incorporating 2800 links to scholarly articles on general constitutional development and in reference to particular countries, there are links to related articles in the Law Library Journal (accessible to subscribers of that database). Journal content incorporated into the initial release of the database includes articles from Bill of Rights Review, Constitutional Forum, East European Constitutional Review, and the International Journal of Constitutional Law. There are also links to external sources including Globalex, Wikipedia and government web pages for the various countries.

In January 2011, Choice magazine included World Constitutions Illustrated in its Outstanding Academic Titles list for 2010, which is a selective list chosen from around 700 titles among more than 25,000 submitted to Choice for review in 2010. A review of the new resource in Choice¹ noted two strengths of the collection content: consolidating access to a wide variety of resources, and providing contextual background on the historical development of particular constitutions. The review also stated that in comparison with other sources for constitution documents, the Hein resource has the potential of providing significant support for advanced research by aggregating historical background documents and commentary. For a list of other sources for world constitutions see Appendix A.

Sources

Hein has gathered documents from reference sources as well as independent publications. The publisher is actively recruiting contributions of content from scholars or librarians for source content or suggestions for monographs, documents, or articles. There is a “Contribute to the Project” button in the collection interface. Specialist editors are being recruited for each country.