Recently in Research Category

A U.C. Berkeley report shows that most Internet users don’t understand web site privacy policies, and that major online businesses like Google Inc. freely gather data and share it with affiliated businesses via loopholes in those policies.

Using trackers called “web bugs,” third parties collect user data from many popular web sites, and sites often allow this, even though their privacy policies say they don’t share user data with others.

Read more at http://sanfrancisco.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2009/06/01/daily22.html

Read the whole report at http://www.knowprivacy.org/

Updated Research Guide: Pretrial & Trial Practice Materials

A newly updated version of the Law Library’s “Guide to Pretrial & Trial Practice Materials” is now available at: http://local.law.umn.edu/library/pathfinders/trialpractice.html.

The guide’s primary focus is on trial practice in state and federal court in Minnesota. Various types of publications and resources such as nutshells, treatises, and CLE materials are covered. Advice on searching for other publications including periodical articles is also included.

Table of Contents:
General Materials on Litigation * Pretrial Practice * Trial Practice * Periodical Indexes * LexisNexis & Westlaw * Internet Resources.

Separating State from Church: A Research Guide to the Law of the Vatican City State
Stephen Young (Catholic University) and Alison Shea (Fordham) have deposited Separating State from Church: A Research Guide to the Law of the Vatican City State in SSRN.

From the abstract:

Mr. Young and Ms. Shea discuss the unique situation of the Vatican City State in legal research. They provide an overview of the founding documents and the constitutional structure of the world's smallest sovereign nation, a discussion of the complex nature of the Vatican's international status, and a bibliographic essay covering the materials most likely to be available in law libraries in the United States.

Source: Law Librarian Blog

The Law Library is pleased to announce the publication of a new research guide, “Researching Criminal Procedure in Federal & Minnesota Trial Courts” . This guide covers print and electronic primary and secondary sources for criminal procedure research.

The complete list of over 60 library research guides and pathfinders can be accessed from the Law Library’s Research Guides & Pathfinders web page at: http://local.law.umn.edu/library/pathfinders-directory.html.

Working in "cubicle city"? New studies suggest you might not be working at the highest level of productivity due to noise, distractions, and bad office layout.

Research was reported in Journal of Facilities Management, available in full-text through University Libraries.

"The impact of office layout on productivity" by Barry P. Haynes, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK (vol. 6, no. 3, 2008, p. 189-201)

"Performance loss in open-plan offices due to noise by speech" by Paul Roelofsen, Grontmij|Technical Management, Amersfoort, The Netherlands (vol. 6, no. 3, 2008, p. 202-211)

"Distractions in the workplace revisited" by Kathy O. Roper and Parminder Juneja, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, USA (vol. 6, no. 2, 2008, p. 91-109)

Beyond LexisNexis & Westlaw: UCLA's New Guide to Online Legal Research

UCLA has just released a new Beyond LexisNexis & Westlaw guide. It describes a wide range of online legal research resources and covers primary law, government resources, research guides, reference sources, forms, and legal news. Using the LibGuides platform, Beyond LexisNexis and Westlaw is well organized, very helpful and an excellent implementation of LibGuides by an academic law library.

Source: Law Librarian blog

A new research guide on family law is now available on the Law Library’s web site. For the purposes of this research guide “family law” is defined in its broadest sense, including husband and wife, parents and children, the nontraditional family, and the issues of marital property, divorce, custody, support, and family violence. Finding aids and tools such as library catalogs, bibliographies and periodical indexes are covered. The guide also covers various types of materials available in print and electronic formats including, model/uniform laws, treatises, popular/self-help works, related web sites and state law survey resources.

This guide was authored by Reference Librarian Peggy Hall.

Announcing a new Legal History research guide on the Law Library website.

In addition to general information on finding library resources, the guide highlights Legal History Databases & Web Sites, European Legal History, U.S. Government History, General History Databases & Web Sites, Trials, Courts & Judges, Other Countries & Legal Traditions, and Other Recommended Legal History Research Guides that are available.

Treatises 101

What is a Treatise?

A book. Or a series of books. But the unique characteristic is that a treatise is about one particular subject. So when you look in the law library's collection you will see treatises on all kinds of subjects.

What makes a treatise a treatise, not just a book? The subject, not the form. A little logic: All treatises are books (unless they are electronic) but not all books are treatises.

Treatises are great secondary sources to use when you begin your research or whenever you need clarification to better understand complex legal issues.

Another way of looking at it:
Treatises are legal texts that are often multivolume in size. Treatises can vary in terms of style and analysis but they generally provide a detailed survey of a particular field of law. See for example, Corbin on Contracts (Law Reserve KF 801.C65). Treatises are a secondary source and lack legal authority. However, because they are written by respected legal scholars they can carry considerable persuasive value depending on how highly the author and the treatise are regarded by the court.

Why use a Treatise?
*To gain an in-depth overview of a single area of law.
*To start your research especially if you don't know much about your subject.
*To find persuasive authority for a case. (Depending on the reputation of the author and the source, a treatise can be a persuasive authority in a court).
*To find precise summaries of issues in a certain area of law.
*To find citations to cases, statutes, regulations and other secondary sources.
*To find analysis, explanation, and criticism of the law.
*To gain familiarity with the keywords, terms of art, issues, key cases, statutes and history of a particular area of law.

Where can I find a treatise?

There are many treatises available in the Law Library. Most of the treatises are found on the first floor (in the KF section), some are on Reserve, and some are in the other areas of the collection. If you want to find a treatise on a particular subject, enter keywords or the subject in the online catalog. Note any call numbers that appear on the
subject, then peruse the section for any treatises of interest.

For a list of selected treatises by topic available at the Law Library go to: http://local.law.umn.edu/library/studyaidpubs.html.

Many thanks to Reference Librarian Mary Rumsey and the Ross-Blakley Law Library blog for contributing to this post.

Timing is Everything: Panels Explain Deadlines for Final Action
Within the Scope blog, EL Lipman, author

Within the last four weeks, the Minnesota Court of Appeals has twice addressed the question of when an agency head must make a final decision upon a contested case record – both times providing the instruction in unpublished opinions.

Minnesota law provides that “[u]nless otherwise provided by law, the report or order of the administrative law judge constitutes the final decision in the case unless the agency modifies or rejects it … within 90 days after the record of the proceeding closes ….�?

In mid-November, an appellate panel held that unless another date is set by the agency, a final decision is due within 90 days of the last presentation of arguments to the agency head. If the agency’s decision is not forthcoming within that period, continued the panel, the Administrative Law Judge’s decision below becomes final.

This week, a separate panel, in a different case, added other gloss. In “matters relating to zoning,�? a final decision by the agency head is due within 60 days of the deadline for filing exceptions and arguments to the Administrative Law Judge’s report. As the panel reasoned, a narrowing of the timeline is required because Minn. Stat. § 15.99 provides that “an agency must approve or deny within 60 days a written request relating to zoning … [and that failure] of an agency to deny a request within 60 days is approval of the request.�?

Read more, including the two opinions referenced above, at the Within The Scope Blog

A provocative piece from the folks at Mental Floss. Here is an excerpt:

“In July 2006, women accounted for just under 17% of parliamentarians worldwide. A woman was the head of government in only seven countries.�? This could be due to short supply, higher cost of entry due to family, or to voter attitude, which previous research has found may be “distaste�? for female leadership.

Researchers at the Center for International Development at Harvard have found that voters, men in particular, are prejudiced against female leaders. At least those in certain villages in India, where the 73rd Amendment mandates that at least 1/3 of government positions be filled by women. This mandate allowed the researchers to study the attitude toward female leaders and how exposure to female leadership changed those attitudes.

Read more at: http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/18230

Genie Tyburski has announced that The Virtual Chase will close by May 2009. Read more at: http://www.legaline.com/2008/07/losing-friend-virtual-chase.html and http://thevirtualchase.com/

Arthur Miller (in a video interview) says "law schools are not doing their customers a service in terms of legal research." See more at: http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/law_librarian_blog/2008/07/arthur-miller-l.html

Improving Legal Research Instruction: Texas Tech's Certificate of Excellence in Legal Research Program

As law schools send their graduates off to practice law and their first and second year students to summer programs, many are all too often ill-equipped to perform legal research effectively. Arturo Torres, Associate Dean, Law Library and Computing, and Professor of Law at Texas Tech School of Law, describes below a comprehensive, systematic and convenient legal research program for Texas Tech students.

"The Law Library at the Texas Tech University School of Law offers an extracurricular non-credit certificate program in legal research. By completing this program, students earn a credential that can be listed on their resume as proof of the research skills they offer prospective employers.

"To earn the Certificate of Excellence in Legal Research, students must complete 30 clock hours of instruction and assessment. Each student must complete 20 hours of required courses and 10 hours of electives. Each class consists of two or three hours of lecture and demonstration and one hour of skills assessment. To earn credit for each class, the student must satisfactorily complete the one-hour skill assessment. A representative sample of a semester course schedule is below.

"Students may begin the program as early as the second semester of their first year of law school and complete the required number of hours anytime before graduation. Classes in print research, electronic research, and various other general research topics are offered every semester and during the summer session. Students register online based on their needs and availability.

"The program has been in existence for about two years and we are proud to report that as of spring 2008 eight students have received their certificates. Many students are currently in the pipeline and working toward certification.

"Based on our experiences over the last two years, we will be revamping the program in summer 2008. We will be reviewing the course offerings, including required courses, rigor of skill assessment, and general program administration streamlining. The program is further described at http://www.law.ttu.edu/lawlibrary/library/coe/.

-- Arturo Torres, Associate Dean, Law Library and Computing, and Professor of Law, Texas Tech School of Law

Source: Law Librarian Blog

The University of California at Berkeley has created several video tutorials that demonstrate how to do Congressional research in the following areas, each of which is highly useful for law students:

Finding bills and Congressional debates from 1989 forward on Thomas

Finding a Congressional report on LexisNexis Congressional

Finding debates from 1873 to the present in print in the Congressional Record.

Note that the video tutorials last from two to five minutes apiece, and that they require Macromedia’s Flash player to be installed on your computer.

Source: Virtual Library Cat's Eye View blog

Via the HeinOnline Blog, here are two useful research tips:

Do you have the name and author of an article from a Law Journal, but do not know the journal name or citation and need to find it in HeinOnline? This tip outlines how to conduct a search for the article in 4 easy steps, starting at the log in screen. Read how at: http://heinonline.blogspot.com/2008/04/heinonlines-tip-of-week-looking-for.html

A Code of Federal Regulations Quick Reference Guide is now available in HeinOnline. This guide outlines the various options available for navigating this collection, from browsing to using the Title and Part Quick Locator, to searching for specific variables. If you often find yourself looking for a specific section of a part, check out the various search examples in the guide.

This guide can be accessed from the Educational Resources page or by clicking on the Resources tab inside the CFR library and then clicking on the link under the Help & Training section. See how at: http://heinonline.blogspot.com/2008/04/cfr-quick-reference-guide-now-available.html

And don't forget about the HeinOnline YouTube Channel, full of research tips and demonstrations. Visit at http://www.youtube.com/HeinOnline08

Tariq Hafeez, President of and General Counsel for LegalEase Solutions LLC, discusses outsourcing legal research on the Legal Process Outsourcing blog.

Source: Law Librarian Blog

"Ellie Margolis (Temple) Surfin' Safari - Why Competent Lawyers Should Research on the Web, 10 Yale Journal of Law & Technology __ (2007), reviews the various ways in which the adequacy of a lawyer's research can be measured. If you are interested in the possiblity that legal research may become a bar exam component, check out this article. Here's the abstract from SSRN:

'The easy availability of information on the internet has drastically changed the way that lawyers conduct legal research, but has it affected the standards for competency to which lawyers are held? This article explores the ways in which judges' and lawyers' expectations have been shaped by technological changes in the last two decades.

The article reviews the various ways in which the adequacy of a lawyer's research can be measured - the Model Rules of Professional Conduct, court rules such as Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and malpractice claims. All of these approaches reveal that competence is measured both by what techniques are standard in practice and by what sources judges look to in supporting their decisions. By both of these measures, a competent lawyer today must go beyond Lexis and Westlaw and conduct legal research directly on the internet.

Because many legal materials are increasingly available only online, and because judges are showing a greater willingness to rely on non-legal information available on the web, the article concludes that a lawyer cannot competently represent a client without conducting research on the internet. The conclusion urges law schools and the practicing bar to be aware of this development and instruct law students and new lawyers accordingly.'"

Source: Law Librarian Blog

The Feminist Law Professors blog has some useful tips for research assistants in their Sept.12 post:
http://feministlawprofs.law.sc.edu/?p=2289

Here's a really good one:
14. Get to know the law librarians. They’re smart, knowledgeable and have heard most requests before. They can do a whole lot more than just help you with Westlaw problems or point you toward the F.Supp. Often the librarians have been working with certain professors for years, and they know what the professor means when she asks an RA to do x or y.

Thanks to Connie Lenz for the head's up.

From the Out of the Jungle blog comes news of an important study that will be of interest to readers who are educators and researchers:

Today's edition of Inside Higher Ed features an article entitled "If You Teach Them, They Will Be Happy" that discusses a study, written by Kennon M. Sheldon, professor of psychology at the University of Missouri at Columbia and Lawrence S. Krieger, professor of law at Florida State University, published in the current issue of Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

The study compares recent classes at two law schools, one in the second tier and one in the fourth tier. At the first law school, faculty scholarship was emphasized, which was why the school ranked in the second tier. At the second school, good teaching was emphasized. The students at both schools had similar undergraduate GPAs and LSAT scores. What is interesting, however, is that students at the second school performed significantly better on the bar exam than did students at the first school. Professor Krieger, one of the co-authors, stated "that it was 'almost shocking' to see 'how significantly the fourth tier students outperformed the second tier law students on the bar.'" He went on to state that "'it makes sense psychologically--the students at the fourth tier school were happier--and it makes sense that they would have learned more from better teachers.'"

Read more...

"Study: New Lawyer Skills Are Lacking"
A study by Berkman Fellow (Harvard Law School), Gene Koo, in partnership with LexisNexis, finds that most new lawyers lack critical practice skills, including adequate legal research skills. The study targeted a broad range of necessary skills. This summary, however, focuses on shortcomings in research skills.

New lawyers lack critical evaluation skills. "One law firm partner, for example, complained that his newer associates regularly grab data from the Web without checking their provenance and accuracy." While this short-coming is cited in the context of online legal research, one wonders if it is then possible to possess the skill when reading print materials.

RELATED: Law Librarians Debate Student Research Skills
CCH Law Student eMonthly, October 2006
("As a law student, you may not be aware you and your classmates are the subject of an on-going debate between Canadian law firm and law school librarians. Many librarians in firms assert that the law schools are not doing enough to give all students a solid grounding in legal research. Students who come out of law school with excellent research skills have more often than not honed these skills either while taking elective advanced legal research courses, or through practical experience outside the classroom. We see that some students are missing this component, however, whether it is inadvertent or by choice. Law school librarians sympathize and try to do more, but often feel the problem is too large to be resolved without significant changes to the law program itself. While both sides have thus far remained amicable, a solution has yet to be found.")

RELATED: Quality Legal Writing Instruction and ABA Accreditation Standard 405
Association of Legal Writing Directors and the Legal Writing Institute, 21 January 2000
("Studies that explore outcomes assessment show that legal education is failing in the field of Legal Writing. As an academic discipline, Legal Writing has developed the ability to teach students how to express themselves well in writing and how to use the writing process as a tool for thinking. But many law schools treat this field and the faculty who specialize in it in ways that damage teaching and learning." This report also discusses inadequacies in legal research training.)"

Source: TVC Alert Research News, 30 March 2007, Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, LLP, http://www.virtualchase.com/tvcalert/transfer.asp?xmlFile=mar07/30mar07.xml

Odd name aside, Voice of the Shuttle (VoS) from UC-Santa Barbara is quite a handy tool for links to legal resources...and several other humanities disciplines. From "About VoS":
"Its mission has been to provide a structured and briefly annotated guide to online resources that at once respects the established humanities disciplines in their professional organization and points toward the transformation of those disciplines as they interact with the sciences and social sciences and with new digital media."

Check it out for yourself! http://vos.ucsb.edu/