BarclayBlog

Law Firm Hiring practices in the economic downturn

2009-08-28T13:43:00.003-04:00

The economy continues to impact the traditional large law firm hiring cycle:

A NY Times article focuses on 2Ls waiting for the chance to interview in the fall: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/business/26lawyers.html?em Some famous firms have stopped interviewing at Yale...
Gerry Shih, Downturn Dims Prospects Even at Top Law Schools, NYT 8/25/09

There have also been reports of delays of offers to those students who were fortunate enough to have a summer associate position in 2009.
http://www.nylj.com/nylawyer/news/09/08/082709l.html?hbxlogin=1
Gana Passarella, Please Continue to Hold...Your Career will be Determined by the First Available Agent (published in the Legal Intelligencer) 8/27/09

--Greg.

Movin' On

2009-05-04T13:16:00.002-04:00

To my faithful readers: After many happy
and productive years at the Barclay Law
Library, I will be moving on to become
Executive Director of the Dewitt Community
Library. This was a tough decision, but as
a former library director always told me,
change is good!

New Online Legal Magazine a "Refreshing Alternative" to Traditional Law Reviews

2009-04-26T15:01:00.008-04:00

The Legal Workshop is a new online legal journal
that seeks to disseminate legal scholarship to a broad
audience of readers. The new endeavor is produced by
a consortium of academic law reviews: Stanford Law
Review, New York University Law Review,
Cornell Law Review, Duke Law Journal, Georgetown Law
Journal, Northwestern Law Review, and University of
Chicago Law Review.

According to the press release (4/21/2009), the new journal
"offers an engaging alternative to traditional academic articles
that run 30,000 words with footnotes," instead featuring short,
plain-English articles about legal issues and ideas, written by
an author whose related, full-length work of scholarship
is forthcoming in one of the participating law reviews."

Library of Congress on YouTube

2009-04-26T14:39:00.002-04:00

The Library of Congress has a new YouTube site.
Currently, the site features 74 videos, organized
into the following playlists:

2008 National Book Festival (Readings by
authors from the National Book Festival, Washington DC,
Sept. 27, 2008)

Books and Beyond (Public talks at the Library of
Congress by authors of recently-published books)

Journeys and Crossings (Library staff provide
insights into historically significant materials in
the LC collection)

Early Films: Westinghouse, 1904
(Classic historic industrial films from the Westinghouse
Works, produced in April-May 1904)

Kluge Center Series: Prominent Scholars on Current Topics
(Prominent scholars present public lectures, book talks
and workshops)

Early Films: Edison Companies (Examples of popular
content filmed by Thomas Edison's labs in the 1880's)

Black's Law Dictionary Now Available for iPhone/iPod

2009-04-26T14:25:00.002-04:00

West, part of Thomson Reuters, has launched a Black's Law
Dictionary on iTunes. The new application for iPod or iPhone
features the most recent edition (the 8th) of the dictionary,
edited by Bryan A. Garner. The iPhone version, which sells for
a whopping $49.99, features hyperlinked cross-references and
audio pronunciations for some terms.
Check it out at the iPhone App Store.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi.

Law Professors Seek Injunction Over 'Sham' West Treatise Supplement

2009-04-16T08:59:00.002-04:00

Shannon Duffy (The Legal Intelligencer, 4/16/2009)
reports on a claim by two law professors that West
Publishing falsely identified them as authors of a
2008 supplement to their Pennsylvania criminal law
treatise.

According to the article, David Rudovsky of the University
of Pennsylvania and Leonard Sosnow of Widener Law School
"claimed that the December 2008 supplement...to their
book, Pennsylvania Criminal Procedure -- Law, Commentary
and Forms, was so poorly researched that it will harm their
reputations if allowed to remain on library shelves."

A lawyer for West, reports Duffy, "insisted that although West
was not proud of the first version of the supplement, it has
recently mailed out a new version that cures [the] defects
and includes a revised cover page that clearly explains
that Rudovsky and Sosnov ended their work on the updates
in 2007."

Senior U.S. District Judge John P. Fullam is expected to
rule soon the law professor's request for a preliminary
injunction.

National Archives to Release Reagan and Bush 41 Presidential Records

2009-04-16T08:50:00.002-04:00

National Archives news release:

"Acting Archivist of the United States Adrienne
Thomas announced [April 10, 2009] that 245,763 pages
of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush Presidential
records will be opened for research on Monday, April 13,
2009, at their respective libraries. These records, which
were still pending with the George W. Bush Administration
as of January 20, 2009, today cleared the review process
established by President Barack Obama under
Executive Order 13489."

Hat tip to beSpacific.

Best Academic Presses in Law

2009-04-14T20:06:00.001-04:00

Brian Leiter has posted the results of the poll here.

Internally Displaced Persons: Guide to Legal Information Resources on the Web

2009-04-14T19:44:00.004-04:00

Elisa Mason has published a new annotated web guide
on internally displaced persons on LLRX.

According to the 1998 United Nations Guiding Principles on
Internal Displacement, internally displaced
persons (IDP's) are "persons or groups of persons who have
been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or
places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of
or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflict,
situations of generalized violence, violations of human
rights or natural or human-made disasters, and who have
not crossed an internationally recognized State border."

The web guide encompasses international and regional
legal instruments and national legislation as well as
institutional arrangements for IDP's, conflict and disaster
IDP's, development IDP's and additional resources.

AAUP Releases Annual Faculty Salaries Report

2009-04-14T19:33:00.003-04:00

The AAUP (American Association of University Professors)
has released its 2008-09 Report on the Economic Status of
the Profession [PDF].

Paul Caron on the TaxProf Blog links to related data
and extracts faculty salary information for selected
top universities here.

Sources on the Law Review Submission Process

2009-04-09T15:31:00.003-04:00

Brian Leiter (and commentators) have noted
several useful sources for law grads and new
law faculty looking for guides on how the law review
submission process works.

Avvo Law School Rankings

2009-04-09T15:10:00.002-04:00

Avvo, the free web site that provides legal information,
rates lawyers and offers client reviews of lawyers, has started
its own law school rankings web site. The rankings are based
on Avvo's attorney ratings, which are gleaned from bar associations,
lawyers' Web sites, and lawyers themselves. This year, alumni
from 492 law schools are represented in the rankings. The
complete directory of law schools ranked may be found here.

U.S. News won't be getting nervous about the competition
from Avvo any time soon, but prospective law students
and their families will undoubtedly be checking out Avvo
as part of their research.

Hat tip to the Law Librarian Blog.

LSAT-Free Law School Admission

2009-04-09T14:54:00.003-04:00

Paul Caron at TaxProfBlog points us to the following
articles on the subject of law schools offering selected
undergrads the option of applying to its law school
without taking the LSAT.

ABA Journal
National Law Journal
Tuscaloosa News

Tax Planning for Professors on Visits and Sabbaticals

2009-04-07T09:28:00.002-04:00

Paul Caron on the TaxProfBlog brings our
attention to a practical article for law faculty
planning a sabbatical or visit to another
law school. Tax Planning for Professors on
Visits and Sabbaticals, by Myron Hulen (Colorado
State University, College of Business), William Kenny
(Portland State University, School of Business
Administration) & Anne L. Christensen
(Montana State University, College of Business),
was originally published in the Journal of Legal Tax
Research in 2005.

Social Networking Online & Criminal Justice

2009-04-07T09:15:00.002-04:00

Ken Strutin (Director of Legal Information Services at
the New York State Defenders Association) has published
a new article on LLRX that "provides a snapshot of many
of the novel and varied uses of social networking evidence
in the field of criminal justice. The resources [listed
in this web article] explore basic concepts about social
networking online, the use of materials found on profiling
sites for investigation and their impact on criminal litigation."

Web Archive of Blawgs from the Library of Congress

2009-04-07T08:45:00.004-04:00

The Legal Blawgs Web Archive (Library of Congress)
is a selective collection of authoritative sites (associated
with American Bar Association approved law schools,
research institutes, think tanks, and other expertise-
based organizations) that contain unique, born digital
content. These blogs contain journal-style entries,
articles and essays, discussions, and comments on
emerging legal issues, national and international. Sites
are domestic and in English, although foreign sites may
be included later in the duration of this project.

I'm proud to note that Syracuse University College of
Law's Impunity Watch is among the international and
comparative law selections.

The site may be browsed or searched.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi at LawSites.

Jury Finds that Ward Churchill Was Wrongfully Fired by U of Colorado

2009-04-05T18:12:00.002-04:00

The NY Times reports on the case here.
According to the article, "the jurors found that
Mr. Churchill’s political views had been a 'substantial
or motivating' factor in his dismissal, and that the
university had not shown that he would have been
dismissed anyway." Ward Churchill, who came
under attack for his controversial views about the
Sept. 11 attacks, was dismissed in 2007 from his
tenured faculty position at the University of Colorado.

University of Denver law students blog about the
trial and verdict on the Ward Churchill-
First Amendment Suit. Read Brian Leiter's
2007 posts on the case here and here.

The Life.com Photo Archive

2009-04-05T17:51:00.002-04:00

LIFE and Getty Images have collaborated to provide
readers with instant access to millions of photographs
free of charge. LIFE.com offers access to the legendary
LIFE and Getty photo archives as well as to more
than 3,000 new photographs added daily.

You can browse broad subject categories or search the
site. Additional features include guest editors'
photo picks, an email newsletter, and a list of most popular
photos.

You can link to photographs, email them to yourself
or others, download them as preview images (make
sure to read the terms of use) or share them through
popular social networking sites such as Facebook. All
photographs are for personal, non-commercial
use only.

Watch Eric Posner & Jack Balkin on "The Politics of Emergency"

2009-04-05T17:22:00.002-04:00

Bloggingheads.tv offers an entertaining and provocative
split-screen streaming video - a "diavlog"- of Eric Posner
(Chicago) and Jack Balkin (Yale) discussing
The Politics of Emergency.

Topics include:

Executive power in a time of emergency
Can the president change reality?
Obama’s political Ponzi scheme
Secrecy in the Obama administration
Jack vs. Eric: Should we fear the modern presidency?
Imagining an executive branch 2.0

Hat tip to the University of Chicago Law School
Faculty Blog.

HeinOnline Tip of the Week: How to Print a Specific Section or Document Within the Federal Register

2009-03-30T10:33:00.003-04:00

The HeinOnline Weblog announces a useful new
Tip of the Week tutorial on how to use the Table of
Contents at the beginning of the Federal Register
to identify where a section begins and ends (which
then makes it easy to print the document using
the custom page range printing tool).

This step-by-step illustrated tutorial makes the
process clear and easy.

Google Enlarges Its Search Results "Snippets" for Some Searches

2009-03-30T09:18:00.003-04:00

Google has announced that it will increase the length of
its search result "snippets" (abstracts) for more
complex searches.

Why is this change useful for researchers? When you enter
a longer query with more than three words, regular-length
snippets may not give you enough information nor provide
a meaningful context. Now, Google will increase the number
of lines in the snippet to provide more information and
show more of the words you typed in the context of the page.

For example, a search for "hearing impaired disability
employment rights Australia" now retrieves this four line
'snippet' that includes all of our search terms. A significant
term, hearing impaired, appears only in the last line, which
may have been omitted in the earlier Google results model.

Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Website
Following Australia 's ratification of the Convention on 18 July, ...
National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy : We have
continued to .... to oversee a project examining human rights issues
for hearing impaired and deaf ...www.hreoc.gov.au/disability_rights/
update/0808.html - 36k - Cached - Similar pages

New Legal Site Focuses on LGBT Community Legal Needs

2009-03-30T09:06:00.002-04:00

Legalout is a subscription-based online resource center that
provides the GLBT community with assistance in preparing
legal documents through an online format. Documents are
available on estate planning, living wills, domestic partnerships,
financial and health care power of attorney, co-parenting
agreements, and many others. In addition, the site provides
links and other information to support the legal needs of the
GLBT community.

The first document is free, after which users can choose either
a monthly subscription of $19.95 or an annual subscription of
$119.95. There is also an option for professionals that allows
multiple users and additional sharing and collaboration features.
All subscription levels allow unlimited access to the legal documents.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi on LawSites.

Webinar on "Getting Started" in HeinOnline

2009-03-23T14:46:00.003-04:00

Could you or your students benefit from a tutorial
on the basics of using HeinOnline? If so, check out the
webinar being hosted by Hein on Wednesday, April 15th
from 2:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m. EST.

The webinar (for HeinOnline subscribers)
will cover the following topics:

Logging in to the database and accessing the content
Navigating from one collection to another
How to navigate within the content using the interface

How to use the Field and Advanced Search options
How to print/download documents
Where to find additional help and resources for specific collections

To register, email marketing@wshein.com. Please include your
full name, name of your institution, and the email address to which you
would like HeinOnline to send the webinar invitation.

Getting Serious About Research Online

2009-03-23T14:02:00.002-04:00

Sarah Kubik (associate faculty member in visual
communications and design at Indiana University-
Purdue University) writes in Higher Ed Today
about the value of authoritative online research
sources in the evolving academic information
landscape.

Kublik, who was "shocked at [a student's] apparent
laziness and naiveté on conducting research" when he
presented three website addresses as his research
source list, realized that students are not being trained
to analyze online sources and select quality information
because many academics dismiss Internet sources
out of hand.

Kublik encourages academics to "take seriously issues related
to citing materials in media that didn’t exist a generation ago."
She advocates for recognition of online-only journals
(generally not peer-reviewed) that are frequently located
by students in web searches and cited in their research.
She suggests that, "while it once made sense to equate
print with quality, it’s time to embrace newer forms of
communication as valid. If they need academically
sound forms of verification and procedures for citation, let’s
get to work."

Make sure to look at the comments following the article.

Hat tip to Marie S. Newman at Out of the Jungle.

LitiLaw: Legal Article Research Portal

2009-03-23T13:55:00.002-04:00

From About LitiLaw:

A tremendous amount of high-quality legal research has
been written by lawyers as part of continuing legal education
(CLE) programs or conferences, or published in legal magazines
or articles...[o]ften they represent the best writing available
on a legal subject, but can be difficult to find.

Litilaw gathers descriptions of and links to these articles and
organizes the articles into an easy to use searchable collection.
We include the title, authors, a description, the publication,
year published and number of pages. The collection is text-
searchable to allow users to find articles by applicable keywords.
Articles are available full-text in PDF or PPT formats.
Articles are categorized and organized into over 50 substantive
and procedural areas of law.

NY Times on How Unauthorized Use of Technology Affecting Trial Outcomes

2009-03-20T11:27:00.003-04:00

An article in today's NY Times addresses the increasing
concerns about how the unauthorized use of technology
is affecting trial outcomes.

The article discusses instances of jurors doing Internet legal
research on a case in violation of judge's orders, using
Blackberries and iPhones to discuss cases with outsiders,
and posting updates about cases on Twitter and Facebook.

According to the article, mistrials and appeals resulting from
this kind of unauthorized use of technology are on the increase,
posing more challenges to judges to curtail juror behavior
to protect the integrity of the courtroom. Says Douglas
Keene, president of the American Society of Trial Consultants,
"The technological landscape has changed so much that
today’s judge has to... not just go through boilerplate
instructions.”

Hat tip to Laura Appleman at Faculty Lounge.

Berkman Center's Media Cloud Tracks Traditional and Citizen-based News Sources

2009-03-20T10:40:00.005-04:00

Do bloggers introduce story lines into mainstream media
or the other way around? What parts of the world are being
covered or ignored by different media sources?

These are the kinds of questions that inspired the
Berkman Center for Internet and Society (teamed
with Thomson Reuters) to launch Media Cloud,
an analytical system that lets you track and analyze
the flow of news as it appears in the mainstream media,
citizen media and blogs.

From the Media Cloud homepage:

The Internet is fundamentally altering the way that news is
produced and distributed, but there are few comprehensive
approaches to understanding the nature of these changes.
Media Cloud automatically builds an archive of news stories
and blog posts from the web, applies language processing,
and gives you ways to analyze and visualize the data. The
system is still in early development, but we invite you to
explore our current data and suggest research ideas.
This is an open-source project, and we will be releasing all
of the code soon.

You can read background on the project here.

Survey of Public Opinion About Government Secrecy

2009-03-18T09:01:00.002-04:00

The Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University
has conducted a survey of public opinion about government
secrecy to mark Sunshine Week, a non-partisan open
government initiative led by the American Society of
Newspaper Editors.

According to the survey, since 2006, the percentage of
adults who believe the federal government to be somewhat
or very secretive has been on the rise -- from 62 percent
in 2006 to 74 percent in 2008. In this year's survey, the
percentage drops slightly to 73.

The web site provides select survey findings.
Graphics for the survey and other FOI issues are
available from McClatchy-Tribune for use during
Sunshine Week.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi's post via Legal Blog Watch.

New Blog on the Ward Churchill First Amendment Case

2009-03-18T08:33:00.002-04:00

University of Denver law students and faculty from
the Race to the Bottom blog have launched a separate
blog on the Ward Churchill first amendment case.

"Churchill came to the public forefront when reports
surfaced about an essay he wrote that contained critical
comments about the US concerning the 9/11 attacks on
the trade towers in NY (the comments are posted on
Wikipedia). Churchill was ultimately dismissed from the
University of Colorado. He has brought suit alleging
that he was dismissed for exercising his first amendment
rights because of the criticisms in the 9/11 essay.
The University of Colorado, on the other hand, is
asserting that Churchill was dismissed because his
conduct fell 'below minimum standards of professional
integrity.'" (Race to the Bottom, Covering Churchill v.
University of Colorado).

Students and faculty will attend every session of the trial.
They will post after each session, assessing the progress of
the trial. In addition, others will be asked to participate and
write occasional commentary.

Primary materials, including the complaint and the answer,
are posted on the Denver Corporate Governance web site.

HeinOnline's Tip of the Week: Searching for a Section in the U.S. Code

2009-03-18T08:15:00.002-04:00

This week, the HeinOnline Weblog tutorial
offers strategies for searching the new U.S. Code
database.

This tutorial will be of particular interest to those
doing historical research. The HeinOnline collection
covers the years 1925 - 2006.

ABA Immigration Consulting Fraud Web Site

2009-03-16T17:37:00.003-04:00

The ABA Commission on Immigration has launched
a web site devoted to Notario fraud. Notarios
falsely advertise themselves as immigration consultants
qualified to assist immigrants seeking lawful status.
Victims not only pay (often exorbitant) fees for
services they never receive, but may suffer
adverse legal consequences as a results of the
services notarios do provide.

The site describes the practice of notario fraud and
its implications for victims. It offers a list of resources,
a listserv, and a referral service for victims and
for attorneys who wish to assist them.

Hat tip to the Law Librarian Blog.

How to Limit a Web Search by Date

2009-03-16T17:26:00.002-04:00

Have you ever tried to limit an Internet
search by date? If so, you know how
challenging it can be.

Phil Bradley (librarian and web search guru)
offers a number of suggestions on which
search engines to use and what features they
offer to restrict searches by date.

Hat tip to the LibrarianInBlack.

ABA Standards for Faculty Employment Challenged

2009-03-05T10:14:00.007-05:00

Inside Higher Education (3/2/2009) reports on challenges
by some law school deans to the ABA standards on the
hiring and employment of faculty members. According to
the article, "many law deans have argued that the
[ABA] requirements represent unwarranted intrusion in
their schools' affairs and drive up costs." Others argue
that the status of some law school staff (such as clinical
faculty members and librarians) would likely be negatively
affected should the standards be eliminated.

A push to drop the standards was launched by Henry Bienen
(departing president of Northwestern University), who
sent a letter to 130 college presidents whose law schools
belong to the law deans' group, encouraging them to
sign a statement requesting that the ABA Council on
Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar drop the
standards related to terms of employment. Bienen
has faced critics at Northwestern and elsewhere, who
fear that the proposed changes could threaten academic
freedom for tenured as well as and non-tenured faculty.

Pew Report: Generations Online in 2009

2009-03-05T09:49:00.002-05:00

The Pew Internet and American Life Project
has issued a report that reveals some surprises
about Internet use by groups of all ages. According
to the report, older Internet users are more
likely to research government web sites than younger
researchers, and only 73% of teens currently say they
use email, down from 89% in 2004 (likely because
of an increased use by teens of social networking
sites).

This and other Pew Reports of related interest may
be viewed and downloaded in PDF from the Pew web site.

Documents: U.S v. Bernard L. Madoff

2009-03-05T09:32:00.002-05:00

The U.S. Department of Justice, Southern
District of New York, has launched a web page
for information and documents pertaining to
U.S v. Bernard L. Madoff.

Current documents include (all PDF):
Criminal Complaint
Order Freezing Assets and Granting Other Relief
in the SEC's civil action
Order Appointing the Trustee
Madoff Filed Brief
Madoff Reply Brief

In addition, the DOJ site links to the Madoff
Trustee Site and the SIPC claims site.

New and Updated Foreign, Comparative and Int'l Law Research Articles from GlobaLex

2009-03-02T17:03:00.002-05:00

GlobaLex (NYU Hauser Global Law School Program)
announces the following new and updated research
articles for February, 2009:

Research Guide to the Somaliland Legal System
(Mohamed Farah Hersi)

UPDATE: Global Warming: A Comparative Guide to
the E.U. and the U.S. and Their Approaches to the U.N.
Framework Convention on Climate Change and the
Kyoto Protocol (Deborah Paulus-Jagrič)

UPDATE: Comparative Law (Paul Norman;
Updated by Hester Smith)

UPDATE: Japanese Law via the Internet
(Makoto Ibusuki; Revised by Takako Okada)

UPDATE: Introduction to Researching South
Pacific Law (Peter Murgatroyd)

State and Federal Resources on the Stimulus Package

2009-03-02T16:52:00.001-05:00

beSpacific has posted a list of
state and federal resources on the stimulus
package. The list includes sources from
government agencies, the national Conference
of State Legislatures, and related information
posted on beSpacific.

NALP Releases its "Perspectives on Fall 2008 Law School Recruiting"

2009-02-26T09:35:00.002-05:00

NALP has released a 2o-page report that reveals
a dramatic decline in available 2L summer associate
positions from 2007 to 2008.

"The median number of offers to 2Ls for summer associate
positions at firms of all sizes fell from 15 in the fall of 2007
to 10 in the fall of 2008. The decline was even steeper at firms
with 700 or more attorneys, where the median number of
summer associate offers fell from 30 in 2007 to 18.5 in 2008.
Additionally, fewer callback interviews yielded summer
associate offers in 2008. In recent years, about 60% of
callback interviews led to summer associate offers.
Last fall, however, only 47% of callback interviews led to
offers."

A synopsis of the report appears in the National
Law Journal of 2/25/2009.

How Law Schools are Using Twitter

2009-02-26T09:13:00.002-05:00

The Social Media Law Student blog (2/20/2009)
reports that an increasing number of law schools
are using Twitter to communicate with
students and promote their law school websites.

According to the blog, Twitter has been
adopted by law schools such as Harvard,
Yale, Duke and Buffalo to instantly communicate
with the law school community through a single
web page (a Twitter feed on the law school web
site). News, events, website updates and student
and faculty accomplishments are all being shared
through this popular message delivery service rather
than through email, which may not reach everyone
in a timely manner.

The Twitter feeds also serve as promotional
tools because they attracts visitors to law school
web sites and offer 'up-to-the minute' information
about activities at the schools.

See the blog post for a list of law schools currently
using Twitter.

NAACP Top 100 Films of the Century (1909-2009)

2009-02-26T08:34:00.002-05:00

The NAACP is recognizing people of color in film
on its "NAACP 100 Years, 100 Films" web page.
The site groups films by theme. Films of possible
interest to law faculty and students are included
in categories such as Biography, Crime, Documentary,
and Drama. For each title, you will find a synopsis
of the film, a list of cast members, the film
trailer, and availability on Blockbuster.

There are more than 100 film titles included
on the site - the final 100 will be selected with
input from web site visitors.

"Fewer Loans Available for Bar Prep"

2009-02-24T09:35:00.002-05:00

Petra Pasternak (Law.com) reports on the
decrease in availability of private loans for
bar prep courses. Pasternak spoke with
Hasting's director of financial aid, Linda Bisesi,
who indicated that "a larger number of students
than usual have been denied private loans [for
bar prep courses] than usual."

In the article, other law school financial aid staff
report that the problem hasn't yet surfaced
in their law schools, but they see the potential
for future problems as as lenders tighten their
belts or go out of business altogether.

Chicago Law Faculty Blog Discussion on the Future of the WTO

2009-02-24T08:58:00.002-05:00

This week, the University of Chicago Law School Faculty
Blog is hosting a discussion on the question of "how the
shifts in the balance of economic power challenge the
existing international economic order in general, and the
World Trade Organization in particular."

Assistant Professor of Law Anu Bradford will initiate the
conversation, and she will be joined by Assistant Professor
of Law Daniel Abebe, Gregory Shaffer of the University of
Minnesota, and Richard Steinberg of UCLA.

All are welcome to join the discussion.

Rule of Law in Armed Conflicts Project: RULAC

2009-02-24T08:33:00.002-05:00

From the RULAC Web Site (About Us):

The Rule of Law in Armed Conflicts (RULAC) Project
is an initiative of the Geneva Academy of International
Humanitarian Law and Human Rights to support the
application and implementation of international law in
armed conflict. Through its global database, the Project
aims ultimately to report on every State and disputed
territory in the world, addressing both the legal norms
that apply as well as the extent to which they are
respected by the relevant actors.

Hat tip to Cornell Law Library InSite.

Law Profs Blog on Legal Education and the Economic Crisis

2009-02-18T08:46:00.002-05:00

A "property prof" on the Faculty Lounge blog
(2/16/2009) speculates on what legal education is
going to look like after the economic crisis. Larger
class sizes (because of fewer faculty), elimination or
reduction of low enrollment (seminar style) courses,
more adjuncts and bigger teaching loads are
among the pessimistic projections.

Michael Cahill on Prawfsblawg (2/15/2009) suggests that
"a contraction of some form in the legal-education market"
might be a good thing, since "odds do not favor [law grads]
obtaining high-paying employment after law school."

Back in October of 2008, Alfred Brophy wrote on the Faculty
Lounge blog about a slow down in faculty hiring and
hiring freezes at some law schools.

Khmer Rouge Genocide Tribunal Site & Databases at Yale Cambodian Genocide Program

2009-02-18T08:10:00.005-05:00

The Cambodian Genocide Program at Yale has developed
an extensive web resource on the Cambodian genocide of
1975 -1979 that claimed more than 20% of the Cambodian
population.

Included in this rich collection is a page devoted to the Khmer
Rouge Genocide Tribunal and four Cambodian Genocide
Databases containing information on human rights violations
in Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge regime.

The Khmer Rouge Tribunal web page includes news,
tribunal documents, articles and related readings,
and photographs.

The Cambodian Genocide Data Bases consist of the
following databases:

1) a bibliographic database of records on 2,963 primary
and secondary documents, articles and books dealing
with atrocities during the Khmer Rouge regime

2)a biographic database on 19,049 Khmer Rouge military
and political leaders and many victims of the Khmer Rouge
regime.

3) a photographic database of more than 5,000 prisoner mug
shots taken at Tuol Sleng prison

4) a geographic database that includes an interactive
computerized map, plus a collection of approximately 100
scanned maps showing the locations of mass grave pits
and Khmer Rouge-era prisons and memorials

NEW! Legal Information & Technology eJournal on SSRN

2009-02-10T08:16:00.000-05:00

Legal Information & Technology is a new e-journal on
SSRN that includes working papers, forthcoming articles,
and recently published articles in all areas of legal
information scholarship. The journal is edited by
Randy J. Diamond (Missouri School of Law) and
Lee F. Peoples (Oklahoma City University School
of Law).

Topics include (but are not limited to):

1) the impact of legal information on domestic, comparative,
and international legal systems

2) the treatment of legal information authorities and
precedents

3) the examination of rules, practices, and commentary
limiting or expanding applications of legal information

4) the study of economic, legal, political and social conditions limiting
or extending access to legal information

5) the finding and use of legal information by academics to produce
legal scholarship, by law students to learn the law, by attorneys in
practice, and by judges and others decision makers to determine
legal outcomes

6) the history of legal information systems and technological
advancements

7)legal information system design and assessment

8) the relationship of substantive areas of law (such as information
law, intellectual freedom, intellectual property, and national
security law) and other academic disciplines to legal information.

Guantánamo Docket

2009-02-10T08:11:00.002-05:00

The New York Times has developed an interactive
database of Pentagon documents and NY Times
research regarding the 779 men who have been
detained at Guantanamo since January, 2002.

"This interactive database includes information about
the detainees, thousands of pages of government
documents and links to court records and news media
reports."

The database may be searched or browsed by
by detainee name, citizenship, and status. A
sidebar provides information about the latest transfers.

Hat tip to the Librarians' Internet Index (1/29/2009).

Adobe PDF Guide and Tutorial

2009-02-06T09:15:00.002-05:00

The Digital Inspiration Blog has posted a handy
Adobe PDF Guide and Tutorial that tells you
how to do such things as: merge two or more PDF
files into one; create a single PDF package by merging
files of different formats; directly save a web page as PDF
without having to save that page as an HTML file first, and;
convert PDF files into other formats like Word documents,
images, HTML web pages, etc.

Justice Scalia Calls Student's Question "Nasty and Impolite"

2009-02-06T08:02:00.003-05:00

The Blog of the Legal Times reports that United
States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
responded harshly to a student's question
at a public appearance on Tuesday in West Palm
Beach, Florida.

According to the article, Sarah Jeck (a Florida Atlantic
University honors college junior) asked whether the
rationale for Scalia's well-known opposition to cameras
in the Supreme Court was "vitiated" by the fact that
the Court allows public visitors to view arguments and
releases full argument transcripts to the public, and that
justices go out on book tours (Scalia's latest book was
for sale at the West Palm Beach venue). Scalia initial
response was, "That's a nasty, impolite question."

A report of the incident in the Palm Beach Post
indicates that Scalia eventually returned to
Jeck's question, saying that - although he originally
supported the concept of cameras in the courtroom
- he eventually came to oppose it because the
"30 second take-outs" would not provide a true
picture of the proceedings.

Feminist Law Professors Blog Has A New Location

2009-02-05T08:57:00.000-05:00

Update your bookmarks and aggregators!
The Feminist Law Professors Blog has a new
location.

Who Are the Most Cited Authors in HeinOnline?

2009-02-05T08:47:00.002-05:00

The HeinOnline Weblog has published a list of the 50
Most Cited Authors, which includes the number of
articles authors have written and a cumulative
number of times all of their articles have been cited.

The analysis was run over the 1,200+ legal periodicals,
30,000+ volumes, 1,000,000+ articles, and over 19 million
pages of content in the HeinOnline Law Journal Library.
The analysis was done using Hein's new citation
analysis tool, Hein's ScholarCheck.

Harvard's Olin Center Launches "Journal of Legal Analysis"

2009-02-05T08:35:00.002-05:00

The John M. Olin Center at Harvard Law School
has launched the Journal of Legal Analysis, a faculty-
edited online journal.

From the announcement:

The Journal of Legal Analysis aspires to publish the best
legal scholarship from all disciplinary perspectives and in all
styles, whether verbal, formal, or empirical. The JLA is faculty-
edited. All articles are subject to peer review. The Journal is co-
published by Harvard University Press and the John M. Olin
Center for Law, Economics, and Business. JLA articles are free
on the web. Published articles will be gathered into bound volumes
once a year and made available for purchase.

How to Email Search Results on HeinOnline

2009-02-02T13:50:00.004-05:00

It's easy to share your search results on HeinOnline!

HeinOnline's most recent Tip of the Week tutorial describes
and illustrates how to email your search results from HeinOnline
databases. It also gives you steps on how to export Law Library
Journal search results to CSV, EndNote, or Refworks (currently,
this is the only library from which you can export search results).

New Research Resources from the United Nations

2009-02-02T13:43:00.002-05:00

From the UN Pulse (1/23/2009):

The UN Office of Legal Affairs, Codification Division
has launched several new online resources:

Official Records of Diplomatic Conferences;

A new portal for all legal publications;

UN Legal Publications Global Search; and

RSS feed for the Audiovisual Library of International Law.

Hat tip to Joe Hodnicki at the Law Librarian Blog.

New Int'l, Comparative & Foreign Law Research Articles on GlobaLex

2009-02-02T13:26:00.001-05:00

The following new and updated research articles are
now available on GlobaLex (Hauser Global Law School
Program at NYU):

Civil Procedure: A Guide to Primary and Secondary Sources
(Radu D. Popa & Mirela Roznovschi)

Malawi: Legal System and Research Resources
(Redson Edward Kapindu)

Sri Lanka: Legal Research and Legal System
(Aquinas V. Tambimuttu)

UPDATE: Researching Law in Denmark
(Rasmus H. Wandall & co-author Steen Rosendahl)

UPDATE: A Legal Research Guide to Pakistan
(Omar Sial)

UPDATE: A Guide to Turkish Public Law and Legal Research
(Serap Yazici)

Legal Writing Candidate Sues After Unsuccessful Job Bid

2009-01-28T10:01:00.002-05:00

Teresa Wagner, Associate Director of the University of Iowa
College of Law Writing Resource Center, has filed a lawsuit
against the law school, claiming that she was rejected for a
legal writing faculty position because of her conservative
political views.

Read more about it here:

TaxProfBlog
WSJ Law Blog
Volokh Conspiracy

Associated Press
Daily Iowan
Iowa City Press-Citizen

CALI's New "Legal Education Commons" - A Boon For Law Faculty

2009-01-28T09:28:00.002-05:00

CALI announces it's new Legal Education Commons, a place
for teachers of the law to find, utilize, and share legal education
materials. The Center is an open pool of legal education materials
available under a creative commons license, so teachers of the
law can utilize what they find in the LEC to help them teach.

So far, the LEC includes 700,000+ federal court cases from
public.resource.org as well as 300+ original illustrations from
CALI lessons. Users are encouraged to upload files for sharing
by contributing syllabi, presentations, podcasts, or any file
they believe may be helpful to others who wish to teach or learn
the law.

Washington Post Launches "Who Runs Gov" Blog

2009-01-28T09:16:00.003-05:00

The Washington Post has launched a new blog,
Who Runs Gov, that will be an ever-growing database
of government power-brokers containing key information
on new administration officials, lawmakers, senior Hill aides
and - ultimately- interest group and think tank experts.

According to the home page, the new site "aim[s] to be a
single-stop shop for all those interested in the people and
personalities who run the government...offering[ing] a
unique look of Washington through key players and
personalities."

Unlike Wikipedia, which also contains profiles of
government officials, profile changes on Who Runs Gov
are not visible until site staff approve them. Officials are
allowed/encouraged to edit their own profiles. Also, purely
government personality profiles are more consistent and
aim to be predictable.

Nifong Ethics Hearing Now Online

2009-01-26T09:12:00.004-05:00

Complete video of the North Carolina disbarment hearing
against former Durham County District Attorney Michael B.
Nifong is available online at The Internet Archive. The
video files of the sessions were donated to Public.Resource.Org
by Courtroom Connect.

The State Bar of North Carolina sought Nifong's disbarment
over his ethical misconduct in the 2006 Duke University lacrosse
case.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi (LawSites).

LucidChart - Easy and Free Flowchart Tool

2009-01-26T08:35:00.002-05:00

LibrarianInBlack.net brings our attention to LucidChart,
a free web-based collaborative flow-chart application
that requires no plug-ins.

Features include:

A simple interface
Ability to add users to edit a document
Ability to create multiple pages/flowcharts that you can link together
Text that is automatically centered in the image
Ability to export of flowchart as a PDF, webpage, PNG, or JPG file

Santa Clara Law Attracts Prospective Students in Virtual World

2009-01-23T15:34:00.003-05:00

On Thursday (9/22) , Santa Clara Law School hosted an event
on Second Life - an online virtual world - to attract
prospective law students. According to a law school
announcement, the event included a video welcome by
Dean Donal Polden followed by a live application workshop.
Participants were able to ask questions of the admissions
office staff and gather information about applying to the
law school.

Release of 2008 Law School Survey of Student Engagement (LSSSE)

2009-01-23T14:35:00.002-05:00

From the LSSSE announcement:

"LSSSE is pleased to present the online edition of the
LSSSE Annual Survey Results 2008 -- Student
Engagement in Law Schools: Preparing 21st Century
Lawyers. The 2008 report examines LSSSE aggregated
findings and explores several themes, and discusses how
law schools across the country are using LSSSE results.
Our online edition contains both the Annual Survey Results
and other selected findings from the 2008 survey."

Among the topics covered are student engagement and age;
law school characteristics and student engagement; race and
ethnicity and student engagement, and; another look at the
3L experience.

IP Podcast Series

2009-01-20T16:10:00.002-05:00

The Intellectual Property Colloquium is an online audio
program devoted to intellectual property topics.

From the description:
"We aspire to be something like an NPR talk show, but
focused on copyrights and patents, and aimed primarily
at a legal audience. Our programs are neither lectures nor
debates. They are instead conversations, with guests drawn
from academia, the entertainment community, the judiciary,
and various technology industries."

You can listen to the programs on the web site or download
them. Programs are accompanied by suggested reading
lists. CLE credit may be requested for some states, including
New York.

Ten Minute Mentor: Online Legal Instructional Videos

2009-01-20T12:32:00.003-05:00

The Ten Minute Mentor, sponsored by the Texas Young
Lawyers Association, offers a collection of short instructional
videos by Texas attorneys on a variety of legal topics. The
emphasis is on Texas law, but also includes videos of general
interest in such areas as immigration, malpractice and lawyering
skills.

The videos may be viewed on the web site or downloaded
as MP3/4 podcasts.

Lawyer2Lawyer Podcast: Diversity in the Legal Profession

2008-12-16T10:26:00.003-05:00

Co-hosts Robert Ambrogi and J. Craig Williams
discuss diversity in the legal profession in their
Lawyer2Lawyer podcast available on the Legal
Talk Network.

Guests include Fred Alvarez, chair of the ABA Commission
on Opportunities for Racial and Ethnic Minorities in the
Profession, Richard A. Soden, of counsel to the
Boston office of the national law firm of Goodwin Procter LLP,
and Justice Dan Sosa Jr., retired Justice of the
New Mexico Supreme Court.

The guests discuss "progress over the years, how they have
overcome barriers and made opportunities available to others
and how they encourage young people to pursue law as a career."

The Weirdest Legal Cases of 2008

2008-12-16T10:02:00.002-05:00

Need a laugh or a good story to share with your
students? Gary Slapper (Director of the Centre for
Law at The Open University) offers his list
of the year's weirdest legal cases in the Times
Online (12/050/2008).

Among the weirdest are:

An English bodybuilder fined for grunting
noisily while weightlifting.

An American women who sued L'Oreal
because the results of one of their hair coloring
products made her depressed.

Check out the article for eight more weird legal cases,
and read Slapper's weekly column on weird cases
every Friday in the Times Online.

New GlobaLex Research Articles in Foreign, Comparative & Int'l Law

2008-12-16T09:11:00.002-05:00

The following new and updated research articles are
now available on GlobaLex (NYU Hauser Global
Law School Program):

European Union Travaux Preparatoires:
A Guide to Tracing Working Documents
(Patrick Overy)

Introduction to the Legal System and Legal Research
of the Kingdom of Thailand (Joe Leeds)

The Lebanese Legal System and Research
(Firas El Samad)

UPDATE: Finnish Law on the Internet
Sarvilinna (Update by Erika Bergström)

UPDATE: Laws of the Republic of Kazakhstan:
A Guide to Web Based Resources
(Oleg Stalbovskiy & Maria Stalbovskaya)

UPDATE: Guide to Legal Research in Norway
(Pål A. Bertnes)

UPDATE: A Research Guide to the Turkmenistan
Legal System (Oleg Stalbovskiy & Maria Stalbovskaya)

UPDATE: An Overview of the Egyptian Legal System
and Legal Research (Dr. Mohamed S. E. Abdel Wahab)

Scottish Legal History: A Research Guide
(Yasmin Morais)

Update: A Guide to Online Research Resources for
the Australian Federal Legal System with some
Reference to the State Level (Petal Kinder)

"BigLaw Faces Grade-less JDs"

2008-12-14T15:39:00.002-05:00

Michael Estrin (Bitter Lawyer, 12/11/2008)
ponders the consequences of law school pass/fail
grading systems on the hiring practices of big law firms,
asking: "Does the elimination of competition from a
highly-competitive profession make any sense what-
soever?"

Estrin suggests that, as more top law schools (like
Harvard and Stanford) strive to make the law school
experience more collegial by implementing
pass/fail grading systems, law firms will be faced with
accepting "more young lawyers whose last significant
competitive experience was the LSAT." The author
also points out that stellar graduates with high GPAs
from other law schools may no longer have
the edge over job candidates from elite schools who
would have graduated at the bottom of their class in
a graded system.

Estrin concludes that the lack of competition inherent
in the pass/fail grading system may be detrimental to the
legal profession - "a lawyer who tells a client that they
'passed' the case likely won’t last very long."

Search and Find Magazines on Google Book Search

2008-12-14T15:12:00.002-05:00

On 12/9/2008, The Official Google Blog announced
that Google has partnered with publishers to begin
digitizing millions of articles from magazines as
diverse as the New York Magazine, Popular
Mechanics and Ebony.

Magazine articles located through Google Book
Search appear in full color and in their original
context (i.e., you can scroll forwards and
backwards to other articles in the same issue).

Google also plans to begin blending magazine results into
traditional Google.com search results. For now you can
restrict your Google Book Search to magazines by using the
advanced search function and selecting "Magazines"
under the Content options.

State Responses to Immigration Database

2008-12-08T08:43:00.002-05:00

The Migration Policy Institute has launched State Responses
to Immigration:A Database of All State Legislation.

The database contains all bills and resolutions related to immigrants
or immigration that were considered by state legislators across the
nation. At present, the database contains all immigration-related
legislation for 2007. Data for 2008 and historic 2001-2006 data
will be added in the coming months.

The site offers a useful discussion of the database methodology which
will assist researchers to understand how MPI identified, excluded,
and classified immigration measures within the database.

Search All Law Schools from the CALI Web Site

2008-12-08T08:34:00.002-05:00

The CALI web site features a Google Custom Search
that allows you to search all law school web pages
through a single search.

Hat tip to Marianne Alcorn and Beth Difelice of the
Ross-Blakley Law Library at Arizona State.

How to Reach a Human When You Call Your Credit Card Company

2008-12-03T13:52:00.003-05:00

The GetHuman Database, compiled by Paul English,
is a nifty list of phone numbers for credit card companies,
car companies, airlines, etc. with instructions on how to
by-pass electronic customer service options and reach
an actual human being.

You might also wish to try GetHuman2, a companion
site by Walt Tetschner that is more actively maintained
then the original.

NYU's New Grading Curve

2008-12-03T13:45:00.002-05:00

Brian Leiter has posted NYU School of Law's new mandatory
grading curve for first-year law students and its advisory
upper level curve for classes with 28 or more law students.

ABA Launches Its Own Social Networking Site

2008-12-03T13:27:00.002-05:00

The ABA has launched its own social networking
site called Legally Minded. The goal of the site is
to "create an unparalleled resource that gathers
law school students, academics, firm administrators,
legal support staff, judges, paralegals, attorneys, law
librarians and other professionals to contribute, network,
and collaborate online."

LegallyMinded enables you to connect with other members;
exchange ideas, files and schedules within virtual groups;
engage with other members via blogs, wikis, chats, and
discussion groups; explore resources in such areas as careers,
education, practice management, and diversity; schedule
meetings using an integrated calendar; and, rate and comment
on community content.

Hat tip to Robert Ambrogi on LawSites.

Worth Noting: Empirical Legal Studies Blog

2008-12-01T08:42:00.001-05:00

The Empirical Legal Studies blog is a collaborative project
produced by Professor Jason Czarnezki of the Vermont Law
School, Professors Michael Heise and Theodore Eisenberg of
the Cornell Law School, and William Ford of the John Marshall
Law School.

The ELS blog serves as an online forum to discuss and provide
links for emerging empirical legal scholarship, provide conference
updates, discuss empirical claims that have emerged in public and
political discourse, facilitate discussion for guest empirical scholars
and assess current empirical findings and methodologies.

Recent posts include:

Judging National Security Post-9/11: An Empirical Investigation
Data Update: New ICPSR Data on Hate Crimes
Judicial Decisionmaking "By The Numbers"

Audiovisual Library of International Law

2008-12-01T08:18:00.002-05:00

Cornell Law Library's InSite Current Awareness Service
of 11/17/2008 points us to the United Nations' Audiovisual
Library of International Law. The Audiovisual Library is a
unique, multimedia resource which provides the United Nations
with the unprecedented capacity to provide high quality
international law training and research materials to an
unlimited number of recipients on a global level.

The Audiovisual Library consists of three pillars: (1) the
Historic Archives containing documents and audiovisual
materials relating to the negotiation and adoption of
significant legal instruments under the auspices of the
United Nations and related agencies since 1945;
(2) theLecture Series featuring a permanent collection of
lectures on virtually every subject of international law
given by leading international law scholars and practitioners
from different countries and legal systems; and
(3) theResearch Library providing an on-line international
law library with links to treaties, jurisprudence, publications
and documents, scholarly writings and research guides.

The Audiovisual Library is available to all individuals and
institutions around the world for free via the Internet.

"The Fast-Food Information Age: We Are What We Read"

2008-11-24T09:25:00.005-05:00

beSpacific (11/22/2008) points us to a thought-
provoking Encyclopedia Britannica Blog post
by author Michael Ross entitled, The Fast-Food
Information Age: We Are What We Read.

Citing two recent academic studies, Ross states that
"between 90% and 98% of library users today assume
that they can get all of the information they need just
by doing a search on Google. This means that even teachers
and students—whose jobs and degrees depend on trust and
accuracy—in addition to ordinary Internet users, turn to search
engines (e.g., Google, Yahoo) as their first, and perhaps only,
destination for information."

Ross encourages us follow the lead of the natural, whole foods
movement and "care as much about what we put into our
brains as we put into our stomachs."

Chicago-Kent Launches Web Resource on the 2008 Financial Crisis

2008-11-24T09:16:00.003-05:00

The Chicago-Kent College of Law (ITT Downtown
Campus Library) has launched a new web resource
on the 2008 financial crisis.

The primer provides resources such as articles on the
failure of regulation, the Congressional testimony of key
players, editorials on the government's bailout of banks,
books on previous financial debacles, and the voices of
people who have lost homes in foreclosures.
It includes links and citations to print resources as well
as excerpts from radio and television programming on
the topic.

Web Site on How Congress Works

2008-11-24T08:39:00.004-05:00

The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on
Rules has developed an information guide on How
Congress Works. This is a wonderful tools for
instructors of legislative process and legislative
history.

The site links to materials on the following topics:
Rules and Precedents of the House;
Parliamentary Terms & Definitions; General
Parliamentary Procedure; the Budget Process; House
Floor Procedures; House Committee Procedures;
Resolving Differences With the Senate; selected CRS
Reports; and, the Legislative Process.

Hat tip to Joe Hodnicki at the Law Librarian Blog.

Supreme Court of Canada - Disabled & Clinically Obese Have Right to 2 Airline Seats

2008-11-21T09:14:00.004-05:00

The Supreme Court of Canada denied an appeal by three
Canadian airlines Thursday that would compel functionally obese
passengers and disabled individuals who need an attendant
to purchase two airline seats.

The ruling came out five years after the initial complaint
was filed in 2002. The application for leave to appeal from
the judgment of the Federal Court of Appeal, Number 08-A-11,
dated May 5, 2008, was dismissed with costs to the respondents,
Joanne Neubauer and Council of Canadians with Disabilities.
The text of the Supreme Court judgment in appeal had not been
released at the time of this writing.

Newspaper Political Cartoons Celebrate Election

2008-11-21T09:03:00.005-05:00

Bigpicture’s posterous has compiled a wonderful
sampling of newspapers' political cartoons celebrating
this year's historic election. Enjoy!

Lawyer2Lawyer Podcast: Legal Issues in the Auto Bailout

2008-11-21T08:55:00.003-05:00

This week, Lawyer2Lawyer co-hosts Robert Ambrogi
and J. Craig Williams discuss the legal and policy issues
surrounding a bailout for the big three automakers.

Guests are Professor Eugene F. Fama, the Robert R.
McCormick Distinguished Service Professor of Finance at
the University of Chicago Booth School of Business;
Andrew Z. Schwartz, head of the Bankruptcy and
Restructuring Group at Foley Hoag LLP in Boston; and
Lisa C. Wood, partner and co-chair of the Securities and
Corporate Disputes Practice at Foley Hoag in Boston.

Listen to or download the show from this page.

Law Professors in the Obama Administration

2008-11-18T17:44:00.002-05:00

Nan Hunter (Georgetown Law) is compiling a list of
law professors in President-Elect Obama's transition
team. She is calling them "Lawbama profs."

"Tour the Legal Web's New Sites"

2008-11-18T17:15:00.001-05:00

This month, Robert Ambrogi features new legal web
sites in his Law Technology News column on Law.com.

Included in his review are:

Lexis Web (Lexis' Internet search engine)
eLawExchange (e-discovery web site)
LitiReviews (a site for legal software and technology)
Global Legal Monitor (global legal news)
Codes.gov (state and municipal public safety codes)
USPTO Examiners (about patent examiners and trademark
examining attorneys)

Rehnquist Papers Opened to Researchers at the Hoover Institution

2008-11-18T17:06:00.002-05:00

From the Hoover Institution press release
(11/12/2008):

Materials from the papers of the late Justice William H.
Rehnquist involving his work from 1947 to 1971 and
Supreme Court cases from the 1972 to 1974 terms will be
opened to researchers on November 17, 2008, at the
Hoover Institution. The materials are part of the vast
Rehnquist collection donated to the Hoover Institution
Archives at Stanford University.

A finding aid for the materials open on November 17 is
also available.

Read the New York Times article concerning the opening
of the Rehnquist papers.

Institute for Women's Policy Research

2008-11-14T13:03:00.002-05:00

Cornell Law Library's InSite current awareness service
of 11/3/2008 points us to the Institute for Women's Policy
Research, an independent, non-profit research organization
that also works with graduate programs in public policy and
women's studies at George Washington University.

"The Institute works with policymakers, scholars, and public
interest groups around the country to design, execute,
and disseminate research that illuminates economics and social
policy issues affecting women and families, and to build a network
of individuals and organizations that conduct and use women-
oriented policy research."

Reports and documents on the web site address the five
major program areas (poverty, welfare, and income security;
work and family; employment, education, and economic change;
health and safety; and democracy and society) as well as special
topics.

In addition to academic research reports (most available for free
in PDF format and/or available for purchase), the site includes
speeches - some in audio format - given by Institute-affiliated
scholars.

2008-2009 Presidential Transition Resources

2008-11-14T12:40:00.004-05:00

The General Services Administration (GSA) has developed
a 2008-2009 Presidential Transition web site in consultation
with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).

The Presidential Transition Act of 2000 (P.L. 106-293) provides
that the transition directory "shall be a compilation of Federal
publications and materials with supplementary materials
developed by the Administrator that provides information on
the officers, organization, and statutory and administrative
authorities, functions, duties, responsibilities, and mission
of each department and agency."

The site includes leadership publications, nominee and
appointee guidance, and other material on the U.S.
government and presidential transition and inauguration.

Hat tip to the Librarians' Internet Index (11/13/2008).

"Slavery Reparations: What Happened?"

2008-11-12T09:43:00.002-05:00

An interesting op-ed piece by Walter Olson in the LA Times
(10/31/2008) ponders possible reasons for the apparent
demise of the reparations movement. Olsen reports that,
"according to LexisNexis, U.S. newspapers and wire services
ran nearly 2,600 stories including the words "slavery" and
"reparations" in the year leading up to 9/11. Since then, the
yearly average has been less than 1,000." Read the article
to learn Olsen's views on why the topic seems to have since
disappeared from the national agenda.

Hat tip to the Faculty Lounge.

Top 50 Homeland Security Blogs

2008-11-12T09:37:00.002-05:00

E-Justice lists the top 50 homeland security blogs.
The site identifies government blogs; blogs by strategists,
theorists, and analysts; academic and research blogs;
opinion and news sites; and blogs by specific homeland
security issues.

Hat tip to Law X.O.

Google's "Ancient Rome 3D"

2008-11-12T09:23:00.002-05:00

The Official Google Blog reports on the launch of
Ancient Rome 3D, a layer of Google Earth where
"everyone in the world, from Rome itself to Calcutta,
can now travel through time and discover Ancient
Rome as it was 1,688 years ago when it was ruled by
Emperor Constantine."

Ancient Rome 3D includes more than 6,700 buildings of
Ancient Rome rebuilt in 3D. Inside of the Rome 3D layer of
Google Earth, you can "fly into Rome as it looked in 320 A.D.;
tour the interior of famous buildings; visit sites such as
the Roman Forum, Colosseum and the Forum of Julius Caesar;
and learn about how the Romans lived."

To access Ancient Rome 3D, you must install Google Earth
4.3 on your computer.

CRS Report: Status of a Senator Who Has Been Indicted for or Convicted of a Felony

2008-11-06T18:23:00.002-05:00

The Congressional Research Service has prepared a report
on the Status of a Senator Who Has Been Indicted
for or Convicted of a Felony (October 22, 2008) [PDF].

Hat tip to beSpacific.

HeinOnline Tutorial on Federal Legislative History Research

2008-11-06T17:39:00.002-05:00

HeinOnline is a terrific resource for researching
federal legislative histories. The HeinOnline Weblog
offers an easy-to-follow tutorial on how to use their
collections' federal legislative history resources. The
tutorial includes a helpful step-by-step example,
using the Administrative Procedure Act bill as
illustration. (HeinOnline is a subscription service).

5 Million Digitized Pages Available at the Center for Retrospective Digitization in Göttingen

2008-11-04T09:45:00.004-05:00

The Center for Retrospective Digitization at the Göttingen State
and University Library offers more than 5 million pages from historic
works, including books, journals, maps and periodicals. Subject
collections include autobiographies, works in the humanities,
social sciences, and hard sciences, mathematical literature, North
American literature (mostly in German), Sibirica, travel literature,
and zoologica. The contents are searchable and browsable.

Included in the digital collection is the magnificent Gutenberg Bible.

Source for Federal, International and State Market Statistics

2008-10-22T09:21:00.003-04:00

The United States Department of Labor, Bureau
of Labor Statistics web site features a list of links to
statistics and information from: more than 70 agencies
in the U.S. Federal Government; State Labor Markets;
and International Statistical Agencies.

New Media & Technology Law Blog

2008-10-22T09:10:00.002-04:00

Jeffrey D. Neuburger and Daryn A. Grossman at
Proskauer Rose LLP have launched the New Media
& Technology Law Blog. The blog focuses on legal
developments related to technology, media and
communications, including Internet and emerging
technologies, new distribution platforms, electronic
and online commerce, technology-based marketing,
mobile issues and more.

Recent posts include:

Let's Go Crazy: What Does It Mean to "Consider" Fair Use?
Plaintiff's Postings on MySpace Negate Invasion of Privacy Claim
Things We Are Running Out of Besides Oil: IP Addresses

The Citation of Wikipedia in American Judicial Opinions

2008-10-22T08:58:00.002-04:00

Joe Hodnicki at the Law Librarian Blog points us to
a recent article on SSRN by Lee Peoples entitled, The
Citation of Wikipedia in American Judicial Opinions.

Here's an excerpt from the article abstract:

"This article will comprehensively examine citations
to Wikipedia in American judicial opinions. The impact
of references to Wikipedia in judicial opinions on law of
evidence, judicial ethics, the judicial role in the common
law adversarial system, the de-legalization of American
law, and the future of stare decisis will be explored.
Best practices for the citation of Wikis in judicial opinions
will be discussed."

Article author Lee Peoples is Associate Professor of Law
Library Science & Director of International Programs
at Oklahoma City University School of Law.

Worth Noting: United Nations Infonation For Country Data

2008-10-17T12:27:00.002-04:00

The United Nations Infonation database on the
U.N. Cyberschoolbus web site allows researchers to view
and compare statistical data for countries that are a
part of the United Nations.

Infonation now offers basic and advanced versions.
In the basic version, you can choose up to six countries
from an alphabetical list of all countries. In the advanced
version you can choose up to six countries from 57 different
country groupings arranged by geographic region, membership
in intergovernmental organizations, or socio-economic status.
In both versions, data can be displayed as a bar graph that
can be printed.

New York State's Problem-Solving Courts Newsletter

2008-10-17T09:22:00.005-04:00

PSC is the official newsletter of the Office of the Deputy
Chief Administrative Judge for Court Operations and
Planning. The Office was established in January 2003 to
"oversee the implementation and operation of New York’s
problem-solving courts and other special projects and court
initiatives." The courts address drug and alcohol addiction,
domestic violence, mental illness, sex offenses and other
issues.

The inaugural issue (July, 2008) of PCS provides
a statistical snapshot of problem-solving courts
and litigants, "features the first annual Problem-Solving
Courts Symposium and provide[s] an overview of the
different types of problem-solving courts. Future issues will
cover other topics of interest to PSC judges and staff as well
as those looking to learn more about problem-solving courts
in New York State."

Lexis Launches Web Search for Legal Information on the Internet

2008-10-17T08:35:00.004-04:00

LexisNexis has launched (in beta) a free web search
tool that retrieves targeted legal information on the
Internet from sources vetted by LexisNexis editorial staff.
According to the User Reference Guide, "all content has
met LexisNexis' criteria for being authoritative and
accurate."

The search engine operates much the same as Google.
In addition to the web search results, Lexis Web includes
a selection of "LexisNexis Recommended Sources"
available to LexisNexis subscribers.

While the product is in beta, Web Search is separate
from from the LexisNexis research system.

Second Circuit Judge Slams Pro Bono Work

2008-10-15T09:18:00.003-04:00

The ACS Blog reports on Second Circuit Chief Judge
Dennis Jacobs' controversial comments about pro bono
work made during a Federalist Society meeting
in Rochester last week.

The blog cites an article from the Daily Record of Rochester
which reports Jacobs' assertion that pro bono work is primarily
an "antisocial" and self-serving activity lawyers use to
develop their skills, firms use to recruit and "give solace"
to associates, and nonprofits use to further a political agenda.
Jacobs is quoted as saying that "No public good is good for
everybody."