How to Cite the Exact eCFR Edition You Read

If you cite a federal regulation from the eCFR, the same URL shape can serve different text depending on when you load it. The “current” view carries a title-wide “up to date as of” banner, and that date is not the same thing as the section’s own last amendment date. To cite a specific version of the rule you actually read, use the date-pinned /on/YYYY-MM-DD/ URL, not the /current/ one — and confirm the date it says it’s showing, because a section’s own last-substantive-amendment date can be much earlier than the title-wide “up to date as of” date.

This original record-reading guide is a general reading aid, not cited evidence. It does not depict a source record; the article text and source links provide the facts.

Key points

• For 44 CFR 59.1, the eCFR’s “current” page shows a title-wide freshness banner, not a per-section one — see below for the banner’s exact wording and date.
• The date-pinned URL format (/on/YYYY-MM-DD/...) fixes the exact edition of the regulation you’re viewing, and the page confirms it in plain language.
• Fetching 44 CFR 59.24 through the identical path shape but two different pinned dates returns two materially different operative sentences of law — see below for the exact wording at each date.
• The amendment history note at the end of a section (the bracketed Federal Register citation list) tells you when that section was last substantively changed, which is a separate fact from the title’s overall “up to date as of” date — see below for the specific citation history.
• When you cite an eCFR section, record the exact URL (current or date-pinned) and the date shown on the page itself, not just “the eCFR” — that’s what makes the citation specific to the edition you read.

Title-wide freshness banner

For 44 CFR 59.1, opening the section through the /current/ path displays a banner describing the freshness of the whole title, not that one section. The banner reads:

“This content is from the eCFR and is authoritative but unofficial. Displaying title 44, up to date as of 9/03/2026. Title 44 was last amended 6/22/2026.” — eCFR: 44 CFR 59.1, current edition

That “up to date as of” date tells you the eCFR has incorporated all Federal Register changes through that date across the entire title — it does not tell you when the specific section you’re reading last changed. A section can sit unchanged for years while the title-wide date keeps advancing because other parts of the title were amended.

Date-pinned URL confirms edition

To cite a specific version of the regulation rather than “whatever is current when someone clicks the link,” use the /on/YYYY-MM-DD/ path instead of /current/. The page states outright which edition it’s showing:

“Displaying the eCFR in effect on 9/03/2026.” — eCFR: 44 CFR 59.1, in effect on 2026-09-03

That single sentence is the citation anchor: it names the exact date the served text corresponds to. Recording that date-pinned URL, rather than the /current/ one, is what makes the citation specific to the edition you read.

Same path, different dates

The clearest way to see why the date matters is to fetch the identical section at two different pinned dates. For 44 CFR 59.24, the 2020-01-01 edition reads:

“assure publication in the Federal Register under part 64 of this subchapter of the community’s loss of eligibility for the sale of flood insurance” — eCFR: 44 CFR 59.24, in effect on 2020-01-01

The current edition of the same section reads instead:

“assure publication of the community’s loss of eligibility for the sale of flood insurance on the internet or by another comparable method” — eCFR: 44 CFR 59.24, current edition

Both sentences come from the same section number, the same path shape, the same subchapter — but they describe different publication requirements. A citation that only names “44 CFR 59.24” without a date leaves a reader unable to tell which of these two operative sentences you mean.

Bracketed history note

Every eCFR section ends with a bracketed note listing the Federal Register citations that created and amended it. For 44 CFR 59.24, that note reads:

“[41 FR 46968, Oct. 26, 1976. Redesignated at 44 FR 31177, May 31, 1979, and amended at 48 FR 44543 and 44552, Sept. 29, 1983; 49 FR 4751, Feb. 8, 1984; 50 FR 36023, Sept. 4, 1985; 57 FR 19540, May 7, 1992; 59 FR 53598, Oct. 25, 1994; 62 FR 55715, Oct. 27, 1997; 85 FR 68789, Oct. 30, 2020]” — eCFR: 44 CFR 59.24, current edition

This note is the section’s own amendment record — it’s how you confirm the last date the specific section changed (here, October 30, 2020), separately from whatever title-wide “up to date as of” date the current page displays. Reading both dates together — the title-wide banner and the section’s own history note — is how you tell whether the section you’re citing has moved since the amendment you’re relying on.

This article covers only how to identify and cite a specific eCFR edition; it does not say whether any amendment to these sections is currently pending beyond what a given dated edition shows, since a date-pinned page returns only the text in force on that date and says nothing about anything still working its way through the rulemaking process. It also makes no claim about any specific property’s flood zone status, insurance requirement, or insurance cost — this is a citation method only, not a property-specific determination.

Source links

• eCFR: 44 CFR 59.1, current edition
• eCFR: 44 CFR 59.1, in effect on 2026-09-03
• eCFR: 44 CFR 59.24, current edition
• eCFR: 44 CFR 59.24, in effect on 2020-01-01