Oyez

Oyez is a free multimedia archive of the Supreme Court of the United States, and it is the most direct way for a student to hear how the Court actually works. Its signature feature is synchronised audio: for thousands of cases you can play the recording of the oral argument while a transcript scrolls alongside, with each speaker identified by name so students can follow who is a justice, who is counsel, and who is interrupting whom.

Each case page also carries a plain-language facts summary, the specific legal question at issue, the holding, the vote breakdown, and short summaries of the majority, concurring and dissenting opinions. That structure means a student can understand a landmark case in ten minutes without reading a full judicial opinion, and then go deeper by listening to the argument or reading the opinions in full.

The archive covers the Court''s full history, with audio for most cases since 1955 and case abstracts reaching back much further. Alongside cases, Oyez hosts biographies of every justice who has ever served, including their appointing president, tenure and voting record, plus advocate profiles showing which lawyers have argued most frequently.

For homeschooling families studying government, civics or American history, Oyez solves a specific problem: constitutional principles are abstract until a student hears them being fought over. Playing four minutes of argument from a case on free speech or search and seizure turns a textbook paragraph into a live dispute with real stakes, and the transcripts make it accessible to students who would struggle with audio alone.

It is a non-profit collaboration between the Cornell Legal Information Institute, Justia and Chicago-Kent College of Law. Everything is free with no account required. Best suited to high school, with strong material for motivated middle schoolers. Explore more from Oyez.