Louisiana Attorney General Opinions: How to Find, Read and Cite Them

Short answer: Louisiana attorney general opinions are written answers from the state's top lawyer to questions of Louisiana law. The attorney general must answer state officials and agencies, and local bodies and some local officials can also ask. Every opinion has a number such as 16-0020. The office calls its opinions "advisory," meaning they do not have the force of law. Its website holds them as downloadable letters.

TL;DR

• Who can ask: the governor, state officials, boards, agencies, district attorneys, and local governing bodies and officers. Private people can ask only about holding two public jobs at once.
• The numbers: two digits for the year the request was logged, a dash, and four digits. A letter on the end, like 15-0002A, means a follow-up.
• The deadline: a statute gives state boards and agencies a 30-day answer. It leaves out parish and city governing bodies.
• Where: the attorney general's opinions page, with a search box that has a few quirks.
• Staleness: the office says its opinions can be revised after court rulings or new laws. Dollar amounts in old opinions are the usual trap.

How to read a Louisiana opinion number

The first two digits are a year. The last four are a count, padded with zeros. Real examples:

So the two digits do not always match the year on the letter. I found no page where the office explains the prefix. I treat it as a file number and use the letter's date for the date. A letter on the end marks a follow-up. Opinion 15-0002A opens by saying that 15-0002 "is clarified." Opinion 91-0117A says the office "previously responded" to the same request. When you find a number, search for the same number with an A or B.

Each letter also opens with a subject line. Opinion 16-0020 carries "90-A-1 PUBLIC FUNDS & CONTRACTS." That tag helps you find related letters.

Who can ask, and the 30-day rule

A statute is a law passed by the legislature. Louisiana Revised Statutes section 49:251, titled "Opinions," sets the duty. The attorney general "shall give his opinion in writing upon all questions of law when required by the governor, the state auditor, or the state treasurer" (the officials who check and hold state money). The office must also advise district attorneys when they ask.

For state boards, agencies and commissions, the statute adds a clock: the attorney general "shall, within thirty days of receipt of a request, give his opinion in writing." That promise leaves out "parish and municipal governing authorities," meaning the governing bodies of parishes (Louisiana's counties) and of cities and towns. Neither the office's page nor the statute gives those bodies a deadline.

The office's page says local governing bodies, their officers and certain local officials "can also request opinions." Requests must be a signed letter to the attorney general, sent by mail to the Civil Division at P.O. Box 94005, Baton Rouge, LA 70804, or by email to OpinionRequest@ag.louisiana.gov.

Private people are mostly shut out. The page says they are directed only to questions about dual officeholding or dual employment, which means holding two public jobs at the same time.

One more rule is easy to miss. Under part C of the same statute, a state board or agency whose lawyer says the public bid law does not apply to it "shall request an opinion" first. It may not act on that advice until the opinion arrives. The public bid law requires governments to advertise big construction jobs and give them to the lowest responsible bidder, meaning the qualified company with the lowest price.

Do Louisiana attorney general opinions bind anyone?

The office's own words are: "These opinions, while advisory, don't carry the force of law and are bound by the facts provided." They "can be revised due to court rulings or legislative changes."

Three points follow. An opinion answers the facts in the request, and your facts may differ. This guide does not rely on a court ruling about how much weight judges give opinions, because I did not find one on the office's page or in the statute. I also did not find a Louisiana law that protects an official who follows an opinion, so do not assume one.

Where to find them

The attorney general's opinions page has a search box. Its own instructions matter:

• Search by number in the form yy-xxxx. To find opinion 01-435, "please type 01-0435."
• For topics, use short phrases such as "dual office" or "public bid law."
• Skip quotation marks. The search does not use them for exact matches.

Each opinion downloads as a letter at the same address pattern, ending in the number. The oldest I could open was 91-0117A, dated May 8, 1991. I could not confirm that nothing earlier is online, and a law library may hold older volumes.

A real opinion: can a city require contractors to hire locally?

On March 3, 2016, the attorney general answered State Senator Conrad Appel in opinion 16-0020. New Orleans had adopted an ordinance, which is a city rule, telling contractors on public works jobs over $150,000 to hire local workers. The senator asked if that was legal.

The answer, in the opinion's own heading: "Louisiana's Public Bid Law does not provide any authority for establishing a local hiring preference." The office reasoned that "a political entity has no authority to take any action which is inconsistent with the Public Bid Law." It concluded the ordinance "would likely be declared illegal." It also pointed to a state law saying any local preference for local contractors is "contrary to" the statute.

A contractor cares because it shows what a city can add to a bid. A local official cares because it warned the city before a court tested the rule. The letter is on the attorney general's site.

Is an old opinion still good?

This opinion is a good test. I checked the statutes in October 2026. The opinion says the bid law applies to jobs "exceeding $150,000." The current statute, section 38:2212, no longer says that. It sets a "contract limit" that "shall be equal to" two hundred fifty thousand dollars per project and lets it rise each year with consumer prices. The section has been amended many times since 2016. So the number in the opinion is out of date, even if the rule against local preferences may not be. That rule rests on section 38:2225, last amended in 2014.

Use the same three checks on any letter:

1. Read the statute it explains, and look for changes since the date.
2. Search for the same number with an A or B on the end, and for newer letters on the topic.
3. Look for a court ruling. The office says rulings can force a revision.

I found no list of withdrawn Louisiana opinions on the office's page.

How to cite one

The office states no citation form for outsiders. Its own letters cite other opinions as "La. Atty. Gen. Op. No. 08-0157." Use that form plus the letter's date, such as La. Atty. Gen. Op. No. 16-0020 (Mar. 3, 2016), which is short for Louisiana Attorney General Opinion Number 16-0020. This is a practical format, not a court rule.

Keep any letter suffix. 15-0002 and 15-0002A are two different documents.

Mistakes people make in Louisiana

• Dropping the zeros in a search. Type 01-0435, not 01-435.
• Reading 24-0101 as a 2024 letter. Check the date on the letter. This one is from 2025.
• Skipping the A and B letters. A clarification can change the answer.
• Copying old dollar figures. The $150,000 bid limit in 16-0020 has since been replaced.
• Assuming a city or parish gets 30 days. The statute's deadline leaves them out.
• Applying an opinion to different facts. The office says it is "bound by the facts provided."

This guide is part of US Law Data: The Complete Guide, a map of where US law comes from and how to use it.

FAQ

Who can request a Louisiana attorney general opinion? The governor, state auditor and treasurer, state boards and agencies, and district attorneys. The office also takes requests from local governing bodies and some local officers. Private people can ask only about dual officeholding or dual employment.

Is a Louisiana attorney general opinion the law? No. The office says its opinions "don't carry the force of law." They answer the facts given and can be revised after court rulings or new laws.

How do I search for an opinion by number? Use the form yy-xxxx with zero padding. Type 01-0435, not 01-435. Skip quotation marks in the search box.

What does the letter on the end of a number mean? It marks a follow-up. In 15-0002A, the office says the earlier opinion 15-0002 "is clarified." Read both.

How long does the office take? For state boards and agencies, the statute says within 30 days of receipt. It excludes parish and municipal governing bodies, so no statute sets their deadline.

How do I cite one? Use the office's own form, such as La. Atty. Gen. Op. No. 16-0020, and add the letter's date.

How do I know if an opinion is still good? Check the statute for changes, look for A or B follow-ups and newer letters, and look for court rulings. The office posts no withdrawn list that I found.

Readers who want Louisiana opinions beside the statutes they apply, such as sections 38:2212 and 38:2225, can search both in Vaquill AI's data on US statutes, regulations and opinions. For the wider picture, see how to find and cite Louisiana law. The national guide shows how other states number and publish theirs, and this plain-English citation primer explains reading a statute cite.

Priyansh Khodiyar

Co-Founder & CTO

Priyansh leads engineering and AI at Vaquill AI: the pipelines that pull statutes, regulations and court rules from every US jurisdiction's official publisher, and the REST API, MCP server and open dataset that serve them.