LexLibris

As previously reported, a new service is coming to the University Libraries catalog: GET-IT!

Starting Monday the Public catalog at the Twin Cities campus will display a Get-It/Recall button. Patrons can request materials to be delivered to other TC campus libraries by login into the public online library catalog (MNCAT) and requesting a book to be delivered to another TC campus library.

http://www.lib.umn.edu/site/getit.phtml

From the website:

"Get It" consolidates book requesting services previously found in 3 places:

Recall - changing the due date of a book that has already been checked out for earlier pickup at any convenient campus library
Point-to-Point - for delivery of books not checked out, to be picked up at a more convenient campus library than the owning library
Libraries to U - for delivery of books to on-campus faculty/staff offices
An additional service is now being offered with the "Get It" link:

Paging - pulling books from the shelves of a library to be held for users at the Circulation Desk of that same library
To use "Get It" library users must log into Your Account. Users no longer have to fill out web forms; personal information and book information pre-populate. All the user has to do is make a menu choice indicating where s/he would like the book to be sent for pickup!

This includes an on-campus office delivery option for UMTC faculty and staff. Once a book is either returned or found on the shelf, shipping will take place within 48 hours on weekdays; most requests can be done within 24 hours.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 08:49 AM | Permalink

Excellence in the Workplace: Legal and Life Skills in a Nutshell
By Kathleen Kavanagh and Paula Nailon

The law library has three copies in the Reserve Collection: KF300 .K38x 2007

Description: This book deals with fundamental lawyering skills (such as analysis, research, writing, oral communication, and time management) as well as with characteristics of emotional intelligence, effective interpersonal relationships, models of professionalism, conflict and stress management, and generational differences. It also offers practical advice for building a successful career (such as creating a career plan, assessing a job offer, negotiating salaries, money management, and work-life balance). Successful lawyers tell us this is the book they wish they'd read when working at summer jobs during law school, or in their first jobs after graduation.

Features And Benefits:

Excellence in the Workplace has 37 chapters dedicated to developing and supporting the success of young legal professionals

The chapters are arranged in a logical order, beginning with preparing for a first day on the job, and progressing to life on the job, managing a budget, and maintaining work/life balance

The book is designed for easy reading and reference for students; additionally, chapters can also be used as teaching modules, individually or as a comprehensive series

The content is comprehensive-- covering a wide range of fundamental skills (such as research, analysis, writing, oral communication, managing assignments, and putting feedback to good use)

It also addresses issues of concern to many students such as overcoming shyness, understanding workplace culture, development of emotional intelligence and "people skills," and management of stress and conflict

The book teaches by example, using student reflections about real-life situations, shared in the form of on-the-job journal entries

Source: Law Librarian Blog

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 09:28 AM | Permalink

On the law library's home page is a link to Digital Legacies: Online exhibits and exhibit brochures. The following collections are highlighted:

Defending Human Rights: The Legacy of Dachau and Nuremberg
This brochure was prepared for an exhibition in November 2005, held in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of war crimes trials at Dachau and Nuremberg. A unique collection of photographs and documents collected by Horace R. Hansen, prosecutor of war crimes at Mauthausen, Buchenwald, Dachau and Flossenburg, were the centerpiece of the exhibition.

"To Fulfill These Rights:" African Americans and the Quest For Equality
A brochure prepared for an exhibition of materials drawn from the Arthur C. Pulling Rare Books Collection and the Archie Givens, Sr. Collection of African American Literature (April 2004).

This Country is Sacred to My People: American Indian Treaties 1820-1890
An exhibit catalog prepared on the occasion of the inaugural University of Minnesoat Law Library Distinquished Lecturer Series (April 2003).

Early International and Humanitarian Law
The origins of modern humanitarian law in early treatsies on the law of nations. A selective sampling of representative works from the 14th to early 18th centuries.

Sherlock Holmes and the Law
Essay and checklist from the Sherlock Holmes exhibition featuring works from the Law Library's Arthur C. Pulling Rare Book Collection and the Sherlock Holmes Collection of the University of Minnesota Libraries (December 2002).

Seven Centuries of Law
This exhibit traces the development of legal thought and publishing from the late fifteenth century to the present as reflected in a variety of materials from the Law Library's Arthur C. Pulling Rare Books Collection.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 12:18 PM | Permalink

According to a GPO Request for Information:

The United States Government Printing Office (GPO) plans to digitize the entire collection of legacy materials that have been disseminated through the Federal Depository Library Program. The estimated size of the collection is approximately 2.2 million documents, which amounts to about 90 million pages.

Source: WisBlawg via GOVDOCS-L list

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 10:34 AM | Permalink

Looking for a specific journal article? Here is a really easy way to get there!

Use the “Citation Linker” available at: http://tc.liblink.umn.edu/sfx_local/cgi/core/citation-linker.cgi. Simply enter the parts of the citation you know and click Go!

The Citation Linker also helps you find specific journals and books through its search engine.

Thanks to Assoc. Dir. Connie Lenz for sharing.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 10:13 AM | Permalink

The law library now has full-text access to over 150 legal publications from Cambridge University Press and Wolters Kluwer Law & Business via the MyiLibrary platform at: http://www.lib.umn.edu/get/myilibrary.

These books offer researchers new opportunities to discover content by searching for terms and concepts throughout the collection.

We are very interested in feedback from patrons who use these new e-books. Please send your comments to lawlib@umn.edu.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 04:05 PM | Permalink

University Student Legal Service and Community Learning Center offer Careers in Law Forum
What: Careers in Law Forum
When: 12-4:30 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 27
Where: Coffman Memorial Union Great Hall, 300 Washington Ave. S.E. Minneapolis
Contact: Mark Karon, University Student Legal Service, (612) 624-1001
Ryan Mathre, University News Service, (612) 625-0552

Photo by Keith Maguire

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (2/18/2008) -- University Student Legal Service, together with the Career and Community Learning Center, (CCLC) is sponsoring a Careers in Law Forum from 12-4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 27, at Coffman Memorial Union Great Hall, 300 Washington Ave. S.E. Minneapolis. The event is free and open to all university students as well as others interested students in the Twin Cities area.

From 12 to 2:00 p.m. individuals will have an opportunity to meet with the law school admissions counselors as well as representatives from various law-related agencies to discuss career and educational opportunities. In addition to law schools, participants include paralegal certification programs, corrections and law enforcement. Students will also be able to gather information about law school test preparation and pre-law advising.

Law schools attending will include: California Western School of Law, University of San Diego School of Law, University of Wisconsin School of Law, University of Minnesota School of Law, St. Thomas University School of Law, Willamette School of Law, Hamline University School of Law, University of North Dakota School of Law, University of Oregon School of Law, University of Iowa School of Law, University of Colorado School of Law, William Mitchell College of Law, Michigan State University School of Law, Notre Dame Law School and Marquette University School of Law.

Other agencies that will be present include: Minnesota Department of Corrections, St. Paul Police Department, Minnesota State Patrol, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Hamline University Legal Studies, Test Preparation Resources, U.S. Probation Department, Minnesota Department of Human Resources and Minnesota Paralegal Institute.

From 2:00 until 4:30 p.m. there will be breakout sessions with the law schools and agencies allowing students to meet and learn about various options in greater detail.

Source: University News Service

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 12:30 PM | Permalink

Resources inspired by Daddy's Girl by Lisa Scottoline

In the LART (Law, Literature and the Arts) Collection, located on the 2nd floor of the law library, we have several books by Lisa Scottoline. One of her most recent, Daddy's Girl, tells the story of law professor Nan Greco's quest to solve the mystery behind the last words of a dying prison guard caught in a riot when Nan is teaching a class at the prison. Scottoline uses the Underground Railroad as part of a plot twist. From the author's website:

The idea for Daddy's Girl came from a long standing fascination Lisa has had with the Underground Railroad, which was very active in Chester County, Pennsylvania, found just over the Mason-Dixon Line. The "central route" or "Eastern Line" of the Underground Railroad began in Maryland and Delaware ran north through Chester County, and traveled farther to Norristown and then Philadelphia.

More resources on the Underground Railroad:
Underground Railroad Freedom Center: http://www.freedomcenter.org/
Underground Railroad Foundation: http://www.ugrrf.org/
Civil War and Underground Railroad Museum of Philadelphia: http://www.cwurmuseum.org/
John Freeman Walls Historic Site and Underground Railroad Museum: http://www.undergroundrailroadmuseum.com/
Underground Railroad Flight to Freedom Program: http://www.the-ugrr.org/

More Resources:
NorthStar: Stories of Minnesota's Black Pioneers: http://www.tpt.org/northstar/Resources.html

Images of the Antislavery Movement in Massachusetts: http://www.masshist.org/online/abolition.cfm
Description:
The state of Massachusetts played a major role in the American antislavery movement, and for a number of decades, the epicenter of this movement was in Boston. The Massachusetts Historical Society created this website in order to highlight some of the visual materials from their collection that deal with this facet of American history. Visitors to the site can look over digital images of 840 items, which include paintings, sculptures, banners, and broadsides. Items featured within this archive include formal portraits of noted lawyer Wendell Phillips, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, and Senator Charles Sumner. Additionally, visitors can also view a ticket to the 1857 Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society speech and a diagram of a plan for resisting the fugitive slave law.

From The Scout Report, Copyright Internet Scout 1994-2008.
http://scout.wisc.edu/

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 10:02 AM | Permalink

Robert Ambrogi notes on his blog LawSites:
"There's something happening here. Just two days after Public.Research.Org published 1.8 million pages of copyright-free federal case law online (see his post), the company that provided it with those cases, Fastcase, unveiled an even larger free library of cases, statutes, regulations, court rules and legal forms. Called The Public Library of Law, it claims in an announcement to be "the most comprehensive free resource for legal research online." This is all part of the company's commitment "to democratize the law," says CEO Ed Walters:

"American law used to be controlled by foreign-owned publishers. Over the past eight years, Fastcase has smashed through those bottlenecks with our premium service for lawyers. Now, by launching the Fastcase Public Library of Law as a free service, we are also empowering non-lawyers to learn about and use the law themselves."

PLOL includes all the federal cases Fastcase provided to Public.Research.Org, plus appellate cases from all 50 states from 1997 forward. In addition, it has statutes from all states, court rules from all states, regulations from selected states, the U.S. Code, the Code of Federal Regulations and federal court rules.

What's the catch? None. Users do have to register and agree to the terms of service, but registration is free and the TOS is standard fare. PLOL lacks the bells, whistles and red flags of Fastcase and other commercial research services. But for simple, bare-bones research, you can't beat the price."

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 08:27 AM | Permalink

Something new is coming to the UMN Public Catalog: GET IT!
Get It is a one stop paging service for the TC UMN campus.
Get It combines three previous services (Recall, Point-to-Point, and Libraries to U) with an in-house paging service for more convenient, simplified delivery service!

Watch for more details coming soon. Get It is planned to start March 3.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 08:29 AM | Permalink

Let the law library show you the love!
We appreciate all of our library patrons and hope you will join us for some Valentine's Day treats on Thursday February 14.

From 9-11 am, we'll have muffins and coffee, with more treats all afternoon.
Stop by and warm up with a little love from your law library!

Generate your own candy hearts at http://www.cryptogram.com/hearts/

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 08:19 AM | Permalink

PreCYdent is a new search engine containing cases and statutes that are in the public domain. It is free to use, and has a user-friendly search box similar to Google's. PreCYdent is an open source site and currently has 355589 opinions and 2501 statutes dating from 04/01/1759 to 02/11/2008. If you want to try it out, click here.

Source: bkallusky01's blog from Hamline University School of Law

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 11:03 AM | Permalink

Three of the faculty members at the Moritz College of Law at the Ohio State University have recently written an Election Law book. It is also available in full-text on the Internet and a print copy will be added to the law library collection.

From Registration to Recounts: The Election Ecosystems of Five Midwestern States
By Steven F. Huefner, Daniel P. Tokaji & Edward B. Foley, with Nathan A. Cemenska


Description: From voting machines to provisional ballots to voter identification requirements, the "nuts and bolts" of the country's election systems have generated concern across the political spectrum. Yet in the face of considerable disagreement over what changes should be made, the debate has too often proceeded without an adequate understanding of existing rules and practices. This book helps fill that gap by describing the results of a yearlong study of election administration in five key Midwestern states: Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Not only have these five states historically played a pivotal role in national politics, but they also provide examples of a variety of approaches to election administration. The book's in-depth, comprehensive election administration study offers analysis of what has worked well in these five states and what has fallen short. This groundbreaking study will assist legislators and policymakers as they work to build election ecosystems that are efficient, effective, fair, and accessible to all citizens.

Read the book online at: http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/joyce/index.php

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 01:00 PM | Permalink

Here are some new or updated legal resources that have recently been announced:

Do Legal Origins Have Persistent Effects Over Time? A Look at Law and Finance around the World c. 1900
Author: Aldo Musacchio: Abstract: How persistent are the effects of legal institutions adopted or inherited in the distant past? A substantial literature argues that legal origins have persistent effects that explain clear differences in investor protections and financial development around the world today (La Porta et al., 1998, 1999 and passim). This paper examines the persistence of the effects of legal origins by examining new estimates of different indicators of financial development in more than 20 countries in 1900 and 1913. The evidence presented does not yield robust results that can sustain the hypothesis of persistence effects of legal origin, but it is not powerful enough to reject it either. Then the paper examines if there were systematic differences in the extent of investor protections across countries, since that is the main channel through which legal origin affects financial development, and shows that all the evidence supports the idea of relative convergence in corporate governance practices across legal families circa 1900. The paper concludes that, if the evidence presented is representative, the variation observed in financial development around the world today is likely a product of events of the twentieth century rather than a consequence of long-term (and persistent) differences occasioned by legal traditions.
Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/08-030.pdf

Merlin Information Systems: Carole Levitt and Mark Rosch, authors of The Lawyer's Guide to Fact Finding on the Internet, introduce Merlin Information Systems, a useful database for skip-tracing, marshalling assets, and backgrounding people. Lawyers and law firms should take note of the special offer at the end of the article. This article originally appeared in the ALI-ABA newsletter, Internet Fact Finding For Lawyers (Jan/Feb 2008).

A Pocket Guide to the Classified Information Procedures Act: Keeping Government Secrets: A Pocket Guide for Judges on the State-Secrets Privilege, the Classified Information Procedures Act, and Court Security Officers is available from the Federal Judicial Center: "Most federal judges come into contact with classified information infrequently, if at all, but when they do, they are faced with the dilemma of how to protect government secrets in the context of an otherwise public proceeding. This pocket guide is designed to familiarize federal judges with statutes and procedures established to help public courts protect government secrets when courts are called upon to do so. The guide provides information about the Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA), information security officers, and secure storage facilities."

USLaw.com tracks 1,000-plus law blogs including over 40 that cover law libraries and legal research. Check out the Law Blog Directory.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 12:16 PM | Permalink

Here is the list of new titles the law library acquired in January 2008. The list is also on the library's home page.

January Acquisitions

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 01:37 PM | Permalink

U of M's "EthicShare" Project Pilots a Groundbreaking Approach to Ethics Research

The University of Minnesota Center for Bioethics in partnership with the University of Minnesota Libraries and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering has been awarded a $517,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to develop and pilot “EthicShare,” an online Web site and bibliographic database for ethics scholars to discover and share high quality digital articles and other materials—scholarly and popular press articles, multimedia objects, pre-prints, and archival documents.

During the pilot phase, the EthicShare team will develop features for users to rate, comment on, and vet content, allowing EthicShare to establish new forms of editorial control and community participation in the growth and future of the Web site.

“EthicShare is a groundbreaking opportunity for scholars to work together to create a new approach to identifying and sharing the best materials in ethics,” says Jeffrey Kahn, Director of the University of Minnesota Center for Bioethics and one of the project’s principal investigators. “The technologies we are putting to work will allow for detailed searching, including the ability to use reviews and quality ratings by colleagues as a way to find and select scholarly materials. EthicShare will also create a way for scholars to share works in progress and collaborate on new ideas.”

The EthicShare pilot is a continuation of an earlier grant awarded to the University of Minnesota by the Council of Libraries and Information Resources (CLIR) with funds from the Mellon Foundation. EthicShare grows out of a planning partnership with Indiana University-Bloomington; Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis; the University of Virginia; and Georgetown University. This phase of EthicShare is bolstered by newly established relationships with the National Library of Medicine (NLM), OCLC, and others.

EthicShare is part of a larger trend towards discipline-specific online communities that support the humanities, social sciences, and the sciences—all fields that play a role in practical ethics scholarship. Recent priorities of American Council of Learned Societies, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Science Foundation, as well as the University of Minnesota, have included strategies to build community and support collaborative exchange among scholars distributed across the globe.

As a partnership between the Center for Bioethics, the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, and the University Libraries, EthicShare is a unique interdisciplinary collaboration that brings together a diverse but deep commitment to innovation in the areas of information discovery, scholarly exchange, and dissemination. Wendy Pradt Lougee, University Librarian, and Computer Science and Engineering professor John Riedl, both co-principal investigators along with Professor Kahn, are leaders in the fields of digital library development, and social networking and collaborative filtering, respectively.

Together with Professor Kahn, Lougee and Riedl hope to develop a virtual community for scholars that serves as a model for scholarly research for fields beyond practical ethics.

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 08:21 AM | Permalink

Thomson West announces the launch of WestBlog.net, a blog devoted to covering LegalTech New York. In conjunction with the new blog, West released a podcast, Legal Blogging: Trends and Tips, in which Robert Ambrogi was one of three guests interviewed by West's Gretchen DeSutter, along with Monica Bay, editor-in-chief of Law Technology News, and Ashby Jones from The Wall Street Journal. West's announcement of the blog says:

"The blog will feature daily reports showcasing the breaking news, products and personalities that make LegalTech New York the legal industry's most anticipated legal technology trade show. Reports will include text, photos and video and audio interviews with executives from West, Thomson Elite and other Thomson businesses, industry influencers, customers and media."

You can find all the West podcasts at this page.

Source: Robert Ambrogi's Lawsites

Posted by University of Minnesota Law Library at 02:37 PM | Permalink