A CMR Adventure: Tracing the History of a Massachusetts Regulation

Last year we published a blog post titled Understanding the CMR. If you haven’t seen it yet, be sure to give it a read! That blog helps you understand what the CMR is and how it's organized. Now it’s time to go to the next level and learn how to research the history of a Massachusetts regulation. We wrote about this in 2013, but our collections have undergone some changes since then, so we thought it was time for an updated post.

With that in mind, let’s look at 105 CMR 125.004. Let’s say you’d like to see all the changes that regulation has gone through since 2015. We’ll trace the history of this regulation together.

To start, we’ll need to go to the Cumulative Tables. The Cumulative Tables, sometimes called “indexes,” are published in the final Massachusetts Register of each calendar year. The cumulative tables start in 1976 and continue through to the present. These tables document all regulation filings, including amendments, new regulations, and emergency regulations, published in the Register during that year.

You’ll find the Cumulative Tables in our digital repository. We also maintain a binder of Cumulative Tables from 1978 to the present, available in our Reading Room alongside the CMR. If you don’t know when a regulation was first added or when it was amended, you should begin by looking at the earliest Cumulative Table and work forward through each year. This helps you create a timeline of the regulation’s history.

As we mentioned, we want to see all the changes that 105 CMR 125.004 has gone through since 2015. We’ll start by looking at the Cumulative Tables file that includes 2015, using the Tables found in our digital repository.

Our digitized Cumulative Tables are keyword searchable, meaning you can do a “ctrl + F” search within the file for “105 CMR.” Each page of the Cumulative Tables is organized as follows:

• Left-hand side: Agency title numbers (also called “digit title numbers”) in bold, with their chapter numbers listed beneath.

• Right-hand side: Two columns showing
1. The Register issue number where the regulation was published, and
2. The effective date of the amendment or filing

From there, you’ll see if section 125 is listed. If it is, you’ll want to make note of the Register number and the effective date to use later. If it’s not included, it means that changes to that section did not take place that year.

For example, a page from the 2014-2025 year-end Cumulative Table shows there were amendments to 105 CMR during that time period. The first amendment for 105 CMR 125 appeared on 2/24/17. By noting the Register issue number (1333), you’ll know exactly where to look to find the full text of the change.

Once you’ve identified the relevant Register issue number, the next step is to look at that issue of Massachusetts Register. Each issue contains the text of the regulation as it was filed, allowing you to see exactly how the regulation appeared at that time. The State Library houses the complete set of Massachusetts Registers in print, and many issues are also available in our digital repository.

Hint: look for the Settings section on the left side of your screen. Set the “Sort By” to “Z→A.” This will sort the Registers from newest to oldest, making it easier for you to find the specific Register you need. In our example, you’ll want to look at Register 1201 through 1400. Next you’ll search for Register 1333 to see if sub-section .004 is listed.

You’ll want to repeat this process until you’ve traced the history of the regulation up through the year you’re interested in. You would keep looking through the Cumulative Tables for changes to 105 CMR 125, find the appropriate Register number, then check that Register to see if sub-section .004 is listed.

In our example, 105 CMR 125 was updated on the following dates, focusing only on the changes that have occurred since 2015 :

2/24/17 (Register 1333)

From there, we’d look in the Registers to see if sub-section .004 is listed. You can search for a specific Register by searching for “no. XXXX” in the Search bar above the list of Items. Here are our search results when we search for Register 1333 using that format:

By using the Cumulative Tables and the Massachusetts Registers together, you can trace how a regulation has evolved over time, whether it was newly created, amended, or repealed. While the process can be a bit tedious, these resources make it possible to construct the full history of a Massachusetts regulation.

Whether you are conducting legal research, exploring public policy, or just curious, the State Library’s collections and staff are here to help you navigate the CMR and its associated resources.

Jessica Shrey
Legal Research Reference Librarian