Law Dawg Blawg

This Week's Featured Book

2008-06-20T15:25:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is In Pursuit of Knowledge: Scholars, Status, and Academic Culture by Deborah L. Rhode and published by the Stanford University Press.

“Although academics have never lacked for critics, publications on the profession tend to be either popularized polemics, which are engaging but misleading, or scholarly analyses, which are intellectually responsible but of little interest to anyone but specialists. In Pursuit of Knowledge offers an alternative: a unique portrait of academic life that should appeal to both experts and a general audience. Drawing on a wide range of disciplines, including higher education, history, law, sociology, economics, and literature, the book focuses on the ways in which the pursuit of status has undermined the pursuit of knowledge. Deborah Rhode argues that both individual scholars and institutions in higher education are caught in an arms race of reputation. The result has been to skew priorities in scholarship, erode commitments to teaching, compromise efforts of public intellectuals, and impede effectiveness in administration…” - Book Description

“Rhode approaches a familiar subject in unusual and creative ways, artfully synthesizing vast materials from different fields and sources. Her sober ethical argument is sure to stimulate debate among scholars and professional leaders in higher education.” – Ted Youn, Boston College

In Pursuit of Knowledge will be available to borrow after Friday, June 27, 2008

The Featured Book of the Week

2008-06-13T11:02:00.000-05:00

After a very long break, the Featured Book of the Week is back with Scientific Jury Selection by Joel D. Lieberman & Bruce D. Sales, published by the American Psychological Association.

“The authors provide a thorough review of the most common techniques used to select jurors, and a critical evaluation of the ultimate effectiveness of these methods. This critique is based upon an examination of the social science literature. Psychologists and other social scientists as well as practicing trial consultants who read the book should gain a better understanding of the current state of research relevant to scientific jury selection, and areas where new research needs to be conducted to advance the field. Attorneys who read the book should be better able to decide whether or not to hire consultants to assist in future litigation, and if so, what types of services these consultants should provide.” - Book Description

“Scientific jury selection is marked by wild claims and too little relevant data. This volume is a comprehensive and refreshingly balanced presentation of what we thing we know, what we actually know, and what we don’t know about scientific jury selection.” – Shari Seidman Diamond, PhD, JD, Northwestern University School of Law

Scientific Jury Selection will be available to borrow after Friday, June 20, 2008

This Week's Featured Book

2007-12-07T16:02:00.000-06:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Stump Your Lawyer! A Quiz to Challenge the Legal Mind by Howard Zaharoff and published by Chronicle Books.

“For the lawyers who think they know it all or for those of you who worry that your legal counsel can't tell a tort from a tart Stump Your Lawyer! is a hilarious tour of the quirks and curiosities of our legal system. This tongue-in-cheek volume offers witty, practical, and thought-provoking challenges for the legally minded. Short case histories, definitions, multiple-choice quizzes, and other formats mock the bar exam approach and probe the reader's knowledge of obscure statutes, baffling decisions, bizarre legal concepts, and antiquated jargon. Whether you're studying, practicing, or running from the law, this book will keep you laughing and learning all the way to the courthouse.” - Book Description

Stump Your Lawyer! will be available to borrow after Friday, December 14, 2007

The Featured Book of the Week

2007-11-27T13:19:00.000-06:00

This Week's Featured Book is An Honest Calling: The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln by Mark E. Steiner and published by Northern Illinois University Press.

“Abraham Lincoln practiced law for nearly 25 years, five times longer than he served as president. Nonetheless, this aspect of his life was known only in the broadest outlines until the Lincoln Legal Papers project set to work gathering the surviving documentation of more than 5,600 of his cases…This portrait not only depicts Lincoln’s work for the railroads and the infamous case in which he defended the claims of a slaveholder; it also illustrates his more typical cases involving debt and neighborly disputes…Most important, Steiner highlights Lincoln’s guiding principles as a lawyer. In contrast to the popular caricature of the lawyer as a scoundrel, Lincoln followed his personal resolve to be "honest at all events," thus earning the nickname "Honest Abe." For him, honesty meant representing clients to the best of his ability, regardless of his own beliefs about the justice of their cause. Lincoln also embraced a professional ideal that cast the lawyer as a guardian of order…Over the course of his legal career, however, Lincoln’s dedication to the community and his clients’ personal interests became outmoded. As a result of the rise of powerful, faceless corporate clients and the national debate over slavery, Lincoln the lawyer found himself in an increasingly impersonal, morally ambiguous world.” - Book Description

An Honest Calling will be available to borrow after Friday, November 30, 2007

The Featured Book of the Week

2007-11-16T09:51:00.000-06:00

This Week's Featured Book is To Have and to Hold: Marrying and its Documentation in Western Christendom, 400-1600, edited by Philip L. Reynolds and John Witte, Jr. and published by Cambridge University Press.

“This volume analyzes how, why, and when pre-modern Europeans documented their marriages - through property settlements, prenuptial contracts, court testimony, church weddings, and more. The authors consider both the function of documentation in the process of marrying and what the surviving documents say about pre-modern marriage. After analyzing the foundations of Western marriage set by Roman law and Patristic theology, the chapters provide vivid case studies of marital documents and practices in medieval France, England, Iceland, and Ireland, and in Renaissance Florence, Douai, and Geneva.”- Book Description

To Have and to Hold will be available to borrow after Friday, November 23, 2007

This Week's Featured Book

2007-11-09T17:20:00.000-06:00

The Featured Book of the Week is The Trial in American Life by Robert A. Ferguson and published by The University of Chicago Press.

“Since the earliest days of our nation, high-profile trials have captivated the American imagination. But such trials are more than mere spectacle: by providing a forum for discussion of contentious issues, they also serve as public ceremonies and barometers of thought. In The Trial in American Life, Robert Ferguson argues that we can only understand the importance of pivotal trials by examining their public impact as well as their legal significance…Ultimately, such questions lead Ferguson to the issue of modern press coverage of courtrooms. While acknowledging that media accounts can skew perceptions, Ferguson argues forcefully in favor of television coverage—and he takes the Supreme Court to task for its failure to grasp the importance of this issue. Trials must be seen to be understood, but Ferguson reminds us that we have a duty, currently ignored, to ensure that cameras serve the court rather than the media…”- Book Description

“A distinguished law professor, accomplished historian, and fine writer, Robert Ferguson is uniquely qualified to narrate and analyze high-profile trials in American History. This is a superb book and a tremendous achievement. The chapter on John Brown alone is worth the price of admission.” – Judge Richard A. Posner

The Trial in American Life will be available to borrow after Friday, November 16, 2007

The Featured Book of the Week

2007-10-26T17:34:00.000-05:00

This Week's Feature book is Dracula Was a Lawyer by Erin Barrett and Jack Mingo and published by Conari Press.

“It’s no laughing matter that many of us are fascinated by the legal system and the people within it. In Dracula Was a Lawyer, trivia experts Erin Barrett and Jack Mingo offer tidbits about the lawyers we love to hate (until we need one!), the pitfalls in our legal system, celebrity lawyers, and more. This curious compendium puts lawyers and legal history on trial and exposes more than 500 little-known facts and outrageous oddities from the wild world of law” - Book Description

Dracula Was a Lawyer will be available to borrow after Friday, November 2, 2007

This Week's Featured Book

2007-10-12T14:34:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Book is Judges and Their Audiences: A Perspective on Judicial Behavior by Lawrence Baum and published by Princeton University Press.

“What motivates judges as decision makers?.. The conventional scholarly wisdom holds that judges on higher courts seek only to make good law, good policy, or both. In these theories, judges are influenced by other people only in limited ways, in consequence of their legal and policy goals. In contrast, Baum argues that the influence of judges' audiences is pervasive. This influence derives from judges' interest in popularity and respect, a motivation central to most people… Judges and Their Audiences uses research in social psychology to make the case that audiences shape judges' choices in substantial ways. Drawing on a broad range of scholarship on judicial decision-making and an array of empirical evidence, the book then analyzes the potential and actual impact of several audiences, including the public, other branches of government, court colleagues, the legal profession, and judges' social peers. Engagingly written, this book provides a deeper understanding of key issues concerning judicial behavior on which scholars disagree, identifies aspects of judicial behavior that diverge from the assumptions of existing models, and shows how those models can be strengthened.” - Book Description

“An original contribution to the study of judicial politics that draws from the field of social psychology to suggest a radically new approach to the study of decisional behavior.”- Sheldon Goldman, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Judges and Their Audiences will be available to borrow after Friday, October 19, 2007

This Week's Featured Book

2007-10-04T16:12:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything: Evolution, Intelligent Design and a School Board in Dover, PA by Gordy Slack and published by John Wiley & Sons.

“A compelling eyewitness account of the recent courtroom drama in Dover, Pennsylvania that put evolution on trial. Journalist Gordy Slack offers a riveting, personal, and often amusing first-hand account that details six weeks of some of the most widely ranging, fascinating, and just plain surreal testimony in U.S. legal history—a battle between hard science and religious conservatives wishing to promote a new version of creationism in schools. During the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Areas School Board trial, the members of the local school board defended their decision to require teachers to present intelligent design alongside evolution as an explanation for the origins and diversity of life on earth. The trial revealed much more than a disagreement about how to approach science education. It showed two essentially different and conflicting views of the world and the lengths some people will go to promote their own. The ruling by George W. Bush-appointed Judge John Jones III was unexpected in its stridency: Not only did he conclude that intelligent design was religion and not science and therefore had no place in a science classroom, he scolded the school board for wasting public time and money…” - Book Description

“Gordy Slack's beautifully written The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything should be on absolutely everyone's must read list. Although Slack does not conceal his own evolutionary commitments, he is balanced and fair, showing above all that this is a cultural battle and not simply one of science versus religion. The book is a terrific read.”- Michael Ruse, Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy, Florida State University

The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything will be available to borrow after Friday, October 12, 2007

Featured Book of the Week

2007-09-23T16:21:00.000-05:00

After a short break, the Featured Book of the Week is back. This week's Featured Book is The Myth of Judicial Activism: Making Sense of Supreme Court Decisions by Kermit Roosevelt III and published by Yale University Press.

“This carefully considered book is a welcome addition to the debate over “judicial activism.” Constitutional scholar Kermit Roosevelt III offers an elegantly simple way to resolve the heated discord between conservatives, who argue that the Constitution is immutable, and progressives, who insist that it is a living document that must be reinterpreted in new cultural contexts so that its meaning evolves. Roosevelt uses plain language and compelling examples to explain how the Constitution can be both a constant and an organic document. Recent years have witnessed an increasing drumbeat of complaints about judicial behavior, focusing particularly on Supreme Court decisions that critics charge are reflections of the Justices’ political preferences rather than enforcement of the Constitution. The author takes a balanced look at these controversial decisions through a compelling new lens of constitutional interpretation. He clarifies the task of the Supreme Court in constitutional cases, then sets out a model to describe how the Court creates doctrine to implement the meaning of the Constitution. Finally, Roosevelt uses this model to show which decisions can be justified as legitimate and which cannot.” - Book Description

“A graceful and compelling account of constitutional decision-making. Roosevelt shows how judges shape workable legal rules from constitutional meanings when reasonable minds can and do disagree. As learned as it is accessible, this book is a welcome antidote to today’s overheated constitutional rhetoric.”- Jack M. Balkin, Knight Professor of Constitutional Law and the First Amendment, Yale Law School

The Myth of Judicial Activism will be available to borrow after Friday, September 28, 2007

ASU Ross-Blakley Law Library Blog and Podcast Launched

2007-09-16T14:52:00.000-05:00

News from former SIU Law Library Reference/Web Services Librarian Diane Murley:

We have launched the Ross-Blakley Law Library Blog and podcast. You can visit the Ross-Blakley Law Library Blog at http://lawlibnews.blog.asu.edu/ or subscribe to our feed at http://feeds.feedburner.com/Ross-BlakleyLawLibraryBlog. In addition to library news and announcements, we will post research tips, reviews of legal information sources, library podcasts, online tutorials, animal photos of the week, and more. See our About page for more information.

You can find previous podcast episodes and subscribe to our podcast, the Ross-Blakley Law Library Channel, on iTunes or our feed at http://ross-blakley_law_library_channel.classcaster.org/blog/. Future episodes of the podcast will introduce you to the people who work in the law library, share research tips and tools, and cover library services and events.

BlawgWorld 2007

2007-08-22T12:26:00.000-05:00

It seems like ages ago that I submitted a couple of my Law Dawg Blawg posts for inclusion in this eBook. BlawgWorld 2007 with TechnoLawyer Problem/Solution Guide is now available for download at http://www.technolawyer.com/r.asp?L11470&M1. I hope you enjoy it.

By the way, in case you are wondering why I haven't posted here in so long, I have moved to Arizona to take a position at the Ross-Blakley Law Library, Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, at Arizona State University.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-08-10T13:20:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is A Well-Regulated Militia: The Founding Fathers and the Origins of Gun Control in America by Saul Cornell and published by Oxford University Press.

“Americans are deeply divided over the Second Amendment. Some passionately assert that the Amendment protects an individual's right to own guns. Others, that it does no more than protect the right of states to maintain militias. Now, in the first and only comprehensive history of this bitter controversy, Saul Cornell proves conclusively that both sides are wrong. Cornell, a leading constitutional historian, shows that the Founders understood the right to bear arms as neither an individual nor a collective right, but as a civic right--an obligation citizens owed to the state to arm themselves so that they could participate in a well regulated militia. He shows how the modern "collective right" view of the Second Amendment, the one federal courts have accepted for over a hundred years, owes more to the Anti-Federalists than the Founders…A Well-Regulated Militia not only restores the lost meaning of the original Second Amendment, but it provides a clear historical road map that charts how we have arrived at our current impasse over guns. For anyone interested in understanding the great American gun debate, this is a must read.” - Book Description

“A provocative alternative in the debate over the historical meaning of the Second Amendment. Anyone interested in how the right to bear arms was thought about in the early republic will need to take this book into account.” - Keith E. Whittington, author of Constitutional Interpretation

A Well-Regulated Militia will be available to borrow after Friday, August 17, 2007

2007-08-03T10:46:00.000-05:00

This week's Featured Book is People, Property, or Pets? edited by Marc. D Hauser, Fiery Cushman, and Matthew Kamen and published by Purdue University Press.

“What's the difference between owning a painting, a dog, or a young child? For starters, you can't own a child, but you are legally responsible for their care. You can own a painting and a dog; both fall under the jurisdiction of the law and in particular, property rights. But why should a dog, man's best friend, an animal with a mind and emotions, fall under the same general category as a painting? Juxtaposed in this way, the question seems silly. How could the law be so foolish? Can't lawyers see the difference? Why shouldn't dogs end up in the same category as young children, a category of living things that require our care? If the law recognized dogs, along with cats, cows, mice, monkeys, birds, and flies as requiring legal guardianship, this would have radical consequences for how we live our lives. We couldn't keep animals in zoos, couldn't eat them, use their fur to keep warm, or test them with drugs to improve our own health. Their lives would be different, and so would ours. This book explores these issues, but does so in a fresh new way. Rather than engage the debate from the perspective of a single voice, or the combination of voices from different experts, we present a set of essays from a lawyer philosopher, biochemist, psychologist, and animal scientist, together with a group of educated students engaged in the debate. The essays are set up to present both sides, some adopting arguments in favor of a shift to legal guardianship, while others support their status as property. Experts in the field will be engaged by the subtle issues surrounding this debate, while educators will find the student essays refreshing and of interest in class room seminars.” - Book Description

People, Property, or Pets? will be available to borrow after Friday, August 10, 2007

This Week's Featured Book

2007-07-27T09:52:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Courting Failure: How Competition for Big Cases is Corrupting the Bankruptcy Courts. Lynn M. LoPucki authored the book and The University of Michigan Press published it.

“A sobering chronicle of our broken bankruptcy-court system, Courting Failure exposes yet another American institution corrupted by greed, avarice, and the thirst for power. Lynn LoPucki's eye-opening account of the widespread and systematic decay of America's bankruptcy courts is a blockbuster story that has yet to be reported in the media. LoPucki reveals the profound corruption in the U.S. bankruptcy system and how this breakdown has directly led to the major corporate failures of the last decade, including Enron, MCI, WorldCom, and Global Crossing. LoPucki, one of the nation's leading experts on bankruptcy law, offers a clear and compelling picture of the destructive power of "forum shopping," in which attorneys choose courts that offer the most favorable outcome for their bankrupt clients. The courts, lured by power and prestige, streamline their requirements and lower their standards to compete for these lucrative cases. The result has been a series of increasingly shoddy reorganizations of major American corporations, proposed by greedy corporate executives and authorized by case-hungry judges.” - Book Description

"This book is smart, shocking and funny. This story has everything-professional greed, wrecked companies, and embarrassed judges. Insiders are already buzzing." – Elizabeth Warren, Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

Courting Failure will be available to borrow after Friday, August 3, 2007

"How to Bring Associates Into the Law Library"

2007-07-25T09:23:00.000-05:00

William P. Atkins, a partner in Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman's McLean, Va., office, recently wrote an article for Legal Times commenting on the decline of use of the law library in firms by summer associates and young associates and the increased dependence of online legal research resources. In the article he voices his concerns and notes researching solely with electronic tools may lead to a myopic research strategy. He states, “in relying so heavily on a singular case found electronically, the researcher adopts a view ironically constrained by technology, its boundaries set by what a keyboard and mouse can deliver to us, not by the totality of information out there.”

Although Mr. Atkins shows an appreciation for print resources, he is by no means “an embittered Luddite.” He admits to being addicted to his Blackberry and is “a big fan of online research,” but conditions their usefulness as being tools.

In concluding his article, Mr. Atkins describes his firm’s answer to “how to bring associates into the law library.” The solution is “Summer Associate Research Challenge” which was created by Mr. Atkins and Kevin Kramer, another partner, about six years ago. The goal of the contest is to answer the most legal research questions in 90 minutes or less by only using print resources and providing photocopies of the answers. Regarding the challenge, Mr. Atkins remarks, “this fun, page-flipping fury shows that our field will always benefit from a broad understanding of the law first. That means we need to keep a healthy level of familiarity and faith in books, versus continually leaving research to cyberspace.”

Featured Book of the Week

2007-07-24T16:37:00.000-05:00

Albeit belated, this week's Featured Book is The Spirit of American Law. It was edited by George S. Grossman and published by Westview Press.

“An anthology of introductory readings on the roots, current practice, and future of American law - This collection of readings is intended as a broad introduction to the roots, practice, and future of law in America. Compiled from the recommended reading lists for first-year students from over eighty law schools, the selections in this anthology were chosen to explore broad subjects rather than specific niches of law. The readings have been selected largely from books with appeal to the general public; only the concluding section contains articles from legal periodicals. Professor Grossman has chosen readings that illustrate the defining characteristics of America's legal profession, the philosophical issues that underlie the day-to-day practice of law, and the social consequences of sometimes abstract legal decisions. The organization is largely chronological-thirty-three readings divided into sections on the roots, growth, and future of an American institution.” - Book Description

“This is an excellent collection that every law student and practitioner can dip into at their leisure and find an appreciation of our legal system.” - Bimonthly Review of Law Books

The Spirit of American Law will be available to borrow after Friday, July 27, 2007

Today in Legal History blog

2007-07-22T11:49:00.000-05:00

What to know what happened on this day in law or government? If so, check out Today in Legal History blog. Today in Legal History is a collaboration between FindLaw and Justice Talking.

Congratulations, Andrew R. Roszak

2007-07-11T06:06:00.000-05:00

Andrew R. Roszak, J.D. / M.P.A. Candidate - Class of 2008, sent us this good news:

His paper — The Legalities of Legislatively Mandated Automated External Defibrillators in Educational Settings — was selected for presentation at the Education Law and Policy Forum conference in Athens, Georgia in September, and for publication in the third volume of the Education Law and Policy Forum in October.

Congratulations, Andy!

2007-07-08T12:55:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Roccer (rhymes with saucer). Aaron Call (class of 2007) sent us this photo that was taken when Roccer was a puppy and Aaron was a 1L student. Now Roccer is a full-grown Great Dane at 140 lbs., and Aaron is a graduate.

The SIU Law Dogs and Cats of the Week will appear only intermittently until we receive more photos. Thanks to everyone who contributed. If you are an SIU School of Law student, professor, staff member, alumnus, or friend of the law library, see our Call for Photos for instructions on submitting your dog or cat photo. To see photos of all previous Law Dogs and Cats of the Week, visit our Gallery of SIU Law Dogs and Cats, which you can find under Related Links in the sidebar.

The Featured Book

2007-07-06T11:37:00.000-05:00

Due to the AALL (American Association of Law Libraries) conference, Just Words: Law, Language, and Power will be the Featured Book for the next two weeks. Just Words was written by John M. Conley and William M. O'Barr and published by the University of Chicago Press.

“Is it "just words" when a lawyer cross-examines a rape victim in the hopes of getting her to admit an interest in her attacker? Is it "just words" when the Supreme Court hands down a decision or when business people draw up a contract? In tackling the question of how an abstract entity exerts concrete power, Just Words focuses on what has become the central issue in law and language research: what language reveals about the nature of legal power. Conley and O'Barr show how the microdynamics of the legal process and the largest questions of justice can be fruitfully explored through the field of linguistics. Each chapter covers a language-based approach to a different area of the law, from the cross-examinations of victims and witnesses to the inequities of divorce mediation. Combining analysis of common legal events with a broad range of scholarship on language and law, Just Words seeks the reality of power in the everyday practice and application of the law. As the only study of its type, the book is the definitive treatment of the topic that will be welcomed by students and specialists alike.” - Book Description

"From their careful analyses of discourse in legal settings as diverse as rape trials and divorce mediations, Conley and O'Barr demonstrate convincingly that power relationships pervade legal process. Just Words is both an engaging introduction to the study of legal anthropology, and a model for how such work should be done." – Lawrence M. Solan, Brooklyn Law School

Just Words will be available to borrow after Friday, July 20, 2007

Improve Your Legal Writing

2007-07-05T16:51:00.000-05:00

Wherever you are in your legal career, you can always improve your writing. But how can you find the time? Wayne Schiess has some suggestions for improving your writing, at his blog, Legalwriting.net. Prof. Schiess wrote the suggestions for busy lawyers, and you can use them too.

I have a couple of suggestions to add to those offered by Prof. Schiess. First, read blogs about writing. Besides Legalwriting.net, I recommend the (new) legal writer, Manage Your Writing, and the Illinois Trial Practice Weblog. Manage Your Writing is about business writing, but the principles apply just as well to legal writing. Evan Schaeffer writes on a number of practical topics, including legal writing, on his Illinois Trial Practice Weblog. Reading blogs about writing will take only a few minutes a day, and you will gain many helpful tips.

My second suggestion, if you are a law student, is to use Prof. Schiess's CALI lessons, Punctuation and Grammar Basics for Law Students and Punctuation and Grammar: Advanced. Your use of punctuation and grammar says a lot about you, especially if you use them poorly.

You cannot afford to submit a poorly-written document to a court, another attorney, a client, or a potential client. Do something to improve your writing now.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-06-29T13:30:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is The Supreme Court: The Personalities and Rivalries that Defined America by Jeffrey Rosen and published by Times Books.

“The Supreme Court is the most mysterious branch of government, and yet the Court is at root a human institution, made up of very bright people with very strong egos, for whom political and judicial conflicts often become personal. In this compelling work of character-driven history, Jeffrey Rosen recounts the history of the Court through the personal and philosophical rivalries on the bench that transformed the law—and by extension, our lives. The story begins with the great Chief Justice John Marshall and President Thomas Jefferson, cousins from the Virginia elite whose differing visions of America set the tone for the Court’s first hundred years. The tale continues after the Civil War with Justices John Marshall Harlan and Oliver Wendell Holmes, who clashed over the limits of majority rule. Rosen then examines the Warren Court era through the lens of the liberal icons Hugo Black and William O. Douglas, for whom personality loomed larger than ideology. He concludes with a pairing from our own era, the conservatives William H. Rehnquist and Antonin Scalia, only one of whom was able to build majorities in support of his views. Through these four rivalries, Rosen brings to life the perennial conflict that has animated the Court—between those justices guided by strong ideology and those who forge coalitions and adjust to new realities. He illuminates the relationship between judicial temperament and judicial success or failure. The stakes are nothing less than the future of American jurisprudence.” - Book Description

The Supreme Court will be available to borrow after Friday, July 6, 2007

SIU Law Student Publications

2007-06-29T05:22:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to SIU law students Nicole Kaufman (class of 2007), Levi Burkett (class of 2008), and Jennifer Uhles(class of 2008), each of whom had commentaries published in the April–June 2007 issue of the Journal of Legal Medicine.

Nicole L. Kaufman, The Demise of Medical Malpractice Screening Panels and Alternative Solutions Based on Trust and Honesty, 28 J. Legal Med. 247 (2007).
Levi Burkett, Medical Tourism: Concerns, Benefits, and the American Legal Perspective, 28 J. Legal Med. 223 (2007).
Jennifer M. Uhles, Unsound Ultrasounds?, 28 J. Legal Med. 263 (2007).

Current issues of the Journal of Legal Medicine are available on reserve in the law library and on Westlaw (password required).

Alternative Sources of Law-School Rankings

2007-06-26T10:30:00.000-05:00

The WSJ.com Law Blog today has entry today on The Alternative Law-School Ranking Scene. They list a number of alternatives to the U.S. News & World Report's law-school rankings, including the following:

Brian Leiter's Law School Rankings Website, by Prof. Brian Leiter, Hines H. Baker & Thelma Kelley Baker Chair in Law at the University of Texas School of Law.
Posner, Richard A., "Law School Rankings" (April 2005). Indiana U School of Law Symposium on the Next Generation of Law School Rankings Paper. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=703821.
Two blogs about law firm placement and law clerk placement that were spotlighted in the Wall Street Journal article, "Law Schools Also Ranked By Blogs Now," by Amir Efrati, which also included a list of other alternatives.

Yesterday, Et Seq., the Harvard Law School Library blog, suggested that prospective law students do their own comparisons using the 2008 Searchable Edition of the ABA-LSAC Official Guide to ABA-Approved Law Schools and the American Bar Association's 2008 "Official Guide to ABA-Approved Law Schools" data.

Grammar Girl to the Rescue

2007-06-25T15:27:00.000-05:00

If you would like to improve your writing, but you can't bear the thought of learning all those rules of grammar, Grammar Girl can help. Grammar Girl is really Mignon Fogarty, a professional writer whose podcasts help make learning about grammar fun.

The podcast's home is Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing, where you can download or listen to the Grammar Girl podcast episodes, read a transcript of an episode, and subscribe to the podcast. You can also record a question for Grammar Girl.

Grammar Girl has an audio book, Quick and Dirty Tips to Clean Up Your Writing, coming out on CD next month. You can download the book now at iTunes or audible.com.

QDnow also has other Quick and Dirty Tips for Doing Things Better, including Mr. Manners' Quick and Dirty Tips for a More Polite Life, Legal Lad's Quick and Dirty Tips for a More Lawful Life, and Money Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for a Richer Life.

Thanks to Prof. Schmitz for the tip.

Duke and Sam Are Law Dogs of the Week

2007-06-23T08:53:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dogs are Duke and Sam. Susan Williams sent us this picture. Duke and Sam are Irish setters who were rescued from the pound when they were small and quite sick. They are now healthy, energetic, and, allegedly, "the terrors of Franklin county."

The SIU Law Dogs and Cats of the Week are on hiatus until we receive more photos. Thanks to everyone who contributed. If you are an SIU School of Law student, professor, staff member, alumnus, or friend of the law library, see our Call for Photos for instructions on submitting your dog or cat photo. To see photos of all previous Law Dogs and Cats of the Week, visit our Gallery of SIU Law Dogs and Cats, which you can find under Related Links in the sidebar.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-06-15T13:35:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Fathers’ Rights: The Best Interest of Your Child Includes You by James J. Gross and published by Sphinx Publishing.

“Millions of fathers are currently fighting for custody of their children. Many wonder if they will ever again be an important part of their children’s lives. Fathers’ Rights covers every aspect of the custody process, including protecting the parent/child relationship as a break-up occurs, determining when to settle and when to litigate and explanations concerning the court’s determination of a fair level of child support. This new edition updates the ever-changing laws in this area and expands into additional topics of importance concerning paternity issues and fathers serving in the armed forces. Numerous court cases are used as examples to illustrate relevant situations. An extensive list of resources including agencies, organizations and websites is included as easy reference for the reader.” - Book Description

Fathers’ Rights will be available to borrow after Friday, June 22, 2007.

Rico Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-06-12T12:48:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Rico. Georgeen Stevens sent us these pictures of Rico with her grandson, Jeffrey. Georgeen just completed her first year of law school here at SIU. Click on the small photo to see more of Jeffrey and Rico.

The SIU Law Dogs and Cats of the Week will be on a hiatus until we receive more photos. Thanks to everyone who contributed. If you are an SIU School of Law student, professor, staff member, alumnus, or friend of the law library, see our Call for Photos for instructions on submitting your dog or cat photo. To see photos of all previous Law Dogs and Cats of the Week, visit our Gallery of SIU Law Dogs and Cats, which you can find under Related Links in the sidebar.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-06-08T13:27:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Owning and Managing Forests: A Guide to Legal, Financial, and Practical Matters by Thom J. McEvoy and published by Island Press.

“Owning and Managing Forests is both an accessible overview of the privileges, rights, and obligations that accompany forest ownership and a guidebook to help active forest owners and managers use laws to their advantage and avoid the pitfalls of expensive and exhausting litigation... The book also describes the many different facets of trusts, changes in forestland taxation methods, and new licensing and certification options. Included, too, is a section on avoiding disputes and how to use alternative dispute resolution methods to avoid costly, troubling, and time-consuming court battles. Owning and Managing Forests provides clear and concise descriptions of often confusing concepts and difficult subjects, and addresses issues in a competent yet conversational tone. Anyone involved with owning or managing forestland will find the book an essential guide and reference.” - Book Description

Owning and Managing Forests will be available to borrow after Friday, June 15, 2007

Featured Resource: BNA Databases

2007-06-06T15:40:00.000-05:00

BNA has added five new databases to the "BNA All" law school package: Digital Discovery and e-Evidence, Corporate Compliance Library, Life Sciences Law & Industry Report, Medical Devices Law & Industry Report, and World Communications Regulation Report. You can access these databases from any computer connected to the law school network, including using your VPN if you are SIU Law faculty, staff, or student.

The law library subscribes to over 100 BNA databases on a wide variety of subjects. You can browse the complete list in alphabetical order or by subject. SIU Law faculty, staff, and students can sign up to receive BNA email summaries.

Dooley Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-06-04T10:15:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Dooley, who came to live with Candy Sue and me after Dakota died last fall. Dooley is very loving and gets along fabulously with Candy Sue. Click on the small photo here to see more of Dooley.

Shortly after we adopted Dooley, he was diagnosed with heartworm disease. He had to undergo an unpleasant and potentially fatal course of treatment. Just this week he had his final post-treatment heartworm test, which showed that he is clear of heartworms. Don't let this happen to your dogs. If you haven't already done so, have your dogs tested for heartworm and start them on heartworm prevention medicine. Learn more from the American Heartworm Society.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-06-01T10:48:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Open Source Licensing: Software Freedom and Intellectual Property Law by Lawrence Rosen and published by Prentice Hall PTR.

“Now that open source software is blossoming around the world, it is crucial to understand how open source licenses work—and their solid legal foundations. Open Source Initiative general counsel Lawrence Rosen presents a plain-English guide to open source law for developers, managers, users, and lawyers. Rosen clearly explains the intellectual property laws that support open source licensing, carefully reviews today’s leading licenses, and helps you make the best choices for your project or organization...” - Book Description

“I have studied Rosen’s book in detail and am impressed with its scope and content. I strongly recommend it to anybody interested in the current controversies surrounding open source licensing.” - John Terpstra, Samba.org; cofounder, Samba-Team

“Linux and open source software have forever altered the computing landscape. The important conversations no longer revolve around the technology but rather the business and legal issues. Rosen’s book is must reading for anyone using or providing open source solutions.” - Stuart Open Source Development Labs

Open Source Licensing will be available to borrow after Friday, June 8, 2007.

Research Tip: Use an Index

2007-05-31T21:18:00.000-05:00

Westlaw and LexisNexis are great resources for doing legal research. They have thousands of databases of full-text documents, including statutes, regulations, cases, and articles from law reviews and other legal periodicals.

But searching a full-text database can be time-consuming and frustrating. How many times have you run what seems like a very precise search in a full-text database of journals and law reviews, and ended up having to sort through hundreds of articles in which your search terms appear only in the footnotes.

One way to improve the relevance of your search results is to use a legal periodical index such as LegalTrac or WilsonWeb. Because these indexes typically search just the most important parts of articles, like the title and abstract, they are much more likely to retrieve articles you can use. You can use LegalTrac from any computer on the SIUC campus network, but you must be connected to the law-school network to use WilsonWeb.

Westlaw and LexisNexis also have legal-periodical indexes: both systems have Legal Resource Index, the database that LegalTrac searches, and Westlaw has Index to Legal Periodicals, the WilsonWeb database. The indexes link you to full-text articles available on the system you are using.

Indexes can save you time and improve the relevance of your search results. For more information see:

Patrick Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-05-27T04:44:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Patrick, shown here when he was between 3 and 4 months old. Heidi Ramos, who works as a staff attorney with the Elderly Clinic and as project coordinator of the Self Help Clinic, adopted him in January '07, from PAWS in Anna. His full name is Prof. Patrick O'Grady, Esq. Patrick is proud of his diverse (breed) heritage. He likes going for long hikes in the Shawnee Forest but gets impatient when his human friends lose their way.

To see photos of all previous Law Dogs and Cats of the Week, visit our Gallery of SIU Law Dogs and Cats, which you can find under Related Links in the sidebar. See our Call for Photos for instructions on submitting your SIU Law Dog or Cat photo.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-05-21T12:32:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Bioethical and Evolutionary Approaches to Medicine and the Law by W. Noel Keyes and published by the American Bar Association.

“Bioethical and Evolutionary Approaches to Medicine and the Law is a comprehensive, scholarly analysis of bioethics and the development of its standards. This book provides an explanatory forum of ideas and innovative solutions covering the major medical, legal, and ethical issues that we face in the 21st Century. Beginning with a history of how these ethical dilemmas originated and progressed, the author provides you with facts, analysis and case law that will help you understand these issues and further identify how we can face them…Bioethics is a multidisciplinary field of law and one that can not be ignored. Bioethical and Evolutionary Approaches to Medicine and the Law provides you with timely analysis to help you understand current ethical issues in legal medicine, health law and policy, professional liability, hospital law, food and drug law, medical legal research and more.” - Book Description

Bioethical and Evolutionary Approaches to Medicine and the Law will be available to borrow after Friday, May 25, 2007

Gracie Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-05-19T07:34:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Gracie, a 1-1/2-year-old cocker spaniel who belongs to Akami Marik. Akami works in the Admissions Office. Gracie is full of energy, and she loves her toys, "Dingo" bones, and her chair. Click on the picture here to see more of Gracie.

Toby Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-05-13T03:58:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Toby, an American Cocker Spaniel who belongs to Rusty Allen. Susan Williams sent us this picture. She thinks that the sweet look on Toby's face is there to disguise any devious plans he is turning over in his mind. Click on the picture here to see a bigger picture.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-05-11T15:17:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is The Relationship Rights of Children by James G. Dwyer and published by Cambridge University Press.

“The book presents the first sustained theoretical analysis of what rights children should possess in connection with state decision making about their personal relationships which the state does in numerous aspects of family law, including paternity, adoption, custody and visitation, termination of parental rights, and grandparent visitation. It examines the nature and normative foundation of adults’ rights in connection with relationships among themselves and then assesses the extent to which the moral principles underlying adults’ rights apply also to children. It concludes that the law should ascribe to children rights equivalent (though not identical) to those which adults enjoy, and this would require substantial changes in the way the legal system treats children, including a reformation of the rules for establishing legal parent-child relationships at birth and of the rules for deciding whether to end a parent-child relationship.” - Book Description

The Relationship Rights of Children will be available to borrow after Friday, May 18, 2007.

Congratulations, Student Authors

2007-05-08T21:53:00.000-05:00

The following SIU Law students had their articles published the winter 2007 issue of the Southern Illinois University Law Journal:

Justin Chasco, Comment, Judge Alberto Gonzales? The Attorney General's Power to Overturn Board of Immigration Appeals' Decisions

Natalie J. Kussart, Comment, Reporting Medical Errors: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Stephanie Lindsay, Note, Dirty Water on a Daily Basis: Friends of the Earth v. Environmental Protection Agency

Michelle Sanders, Note, To Serve and Protect? Supporting Police Inaction over Domestic Violence Victim Protection in Castle Rock v. Gonzales

Shelby Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-05-06T04:36:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Shelby, a Shetland Sheepdog who belongs to Caitlin King. Caitlin is a first-year SIU law student. Click on the photo here to see more of Shelby.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-05-04T12:36:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Gypsy Law: Romani Legal Traditions and Culture edited by Walter O. Weyrauch and published by the University of California Press.

“Approximately one thousand years ago Gypsies, or Roma, left their native India. Today Gypsies can be found in countries throughout the world, their distinct culture still intact in spite of the intense persecution they have endured. This authoritative collection brings together leading Gypsy and non-Gypsy scholars to examine the Romani legal system, an autonomous body of law based on an oral tradition and existing alongside dominant national legal networks. For centuries the Roma have survived by using defensive strategies, especially the absolute exclusion of gadje (non-Gypsies) from their private lives, their values, and information about Romani language and social institutions. Sexuality, gender, and the body are fundamental to Gypsy law, with rules that govern being pure (vujo) or impure (marime). Women play an important role in maintaining legal customs, having the power to sanction and to contaminate, but they are not directly involved in legal proceedings. These essays offer a comparative perspective on Romani legal procedures and identity, including topics such as the United States' criminalization of many aspects of Gypsy law, parallels between Jewish and Gypsy law, and legal distinctions between Romani communities. The contributors raise broad theoretical questions that transcend the specific Gypsy context and offer important insights into understanding oral legal traditions. Together they suggest a theoretical framework for explaining the coexistence of formal and informal law within a single legal system…” - Book Description

Gypsy Law will be available to borrow after Friday, May 11, 2007

The ABA now has iPod-compatible CLE programs

2007-05-03T19:20:00.000-05:00

This is great! About a month ago, I finished writing an article on Podcasts and Podcasting for Law Librarians, which will appear in the August issue of Law Library Journal. I mentioned that not many CLE providers were making their programs available in MP3 formats, which can be played on portable audio devices. Today I discovered that the ABA offers several portable CLE options.

ABA-CLE programs are available:

on an iPod nano or video iPod preloaded with programming in selected practice areas;
as audio or video downloads in MP3 and MP4 format;
and as part of the monthly ABA-CLE Podcast series.

The ABA-CLE Podcasts series programs are complimentary. Program materials can also be downloaded for all types of programs.

Law Library Food Ban Temporarily Lifted

2007-04-30T11:46:00.000-05:00

Hear ye, hear ye! As the library’s way of trying to ease the burden of finals just a tad, effective Tuesday, May 1, 2007 through Friday, May 11, 2007, the food ban shall be lifted in the law library! Light snacks (cookies, candy, crackers, etc.) will be permitted. The law library only asks that you clean up after yourself and that you do not eat near or over library materials and equipment, since no one wants to use a book filled with crumbs and we don’t want the law library to look like a pig-sty or your freshman year dorm room-some of you know what we mean. So, enjoy a candy bar while you are studying for contracts or a cookie while you are reviewing your outline for trusts & estates! We hope this reprieve will make your exams a bit more bearable :) Good luck on your finals and congratulations 3Ls!!

Westlaw & LexisNexis: Summer 2007 Access

2007-04-29T13:51:00.000-05:00

Westlaw & LexisNexis: Summer 2007 Access
Unless you qualify (and register) under one of the categories below, your access to LexisNexis and Westlaw will be limited during Summer 2007 as follows:

Westlaw: Students will have 2 hours of access in June and 2 hours of access in July.
LexisNexis: Students’ LexisNexis IDs will be limited to career materials (as of June 1, 2007).
Full access to both services will generally resume August 1st, 2007.

Full Summer 2007 Access: You may be granted full access to LexisNexis and/or Westlaw during Summer 2007 if you meet one of the following criteria and register.

LexisNexis
To register, go to LexisNexis. Click on "Summer Access" and choose one of the following criteria:

Summer School
Moot Court Research
Law Journal research
Research Assistant for Law Professor
Non-Profit Externship (includes Public Interest position)
Unpaid Internship/Externship (or small stipend)

Westlaw
To register, click on the "Need Summer Access" link on the right when you sign-on to Westlaw. Register for Summer access online by May 31, 2007. After May 31 you will have to call Westlaw (800.850.9378).

For full access, you must be doing one of the following:

Summer School
Moot Court Research
Law Journal research
Law Journal research
Research Assistant for Law Professor
Public interest intern/externships

Questions? Contact Kara Grimme (SIU Westlaw Account Representative, kara.grimme@thomson.com) or Marantha Beatty-Brown (SIU LexisNexis Account Representative, marantha.beatty-brown@lexisnexis.com).

Ruger Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-04-29T10:14:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Ruger, a five-year-old German Shepherd who belongs to Tammi and Tom Pinski. Tammi is a first-year SIU law student. Click on the photo here to see a larger photo.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-04-27T16:00:00.000-05:00

This week's Featured Book is It’s Legal but It Ain’t Right edited by Nikos Passas and Neva Goodwin and published by the University of Michigan Press.

“Many U.S. corporations and the goods they produce negatively impact our society without breaking any laws. We are all too familiar with the tobacco industry's effect on public health and health care costs for smokers and nonsmokers, as well as the role of profit in the pharmaceutical industry's research priorities. It's Legal but It Ain't Right tackles these issues, plus the ethical ambiguities of legalized gambling, the firearms trade, the fast food industry, the pesticide industry, private security companies, and more. Aiming to identify industries and goods that undermine our societal values and to hold them accountable for their actions, this collection makes a valuable contribution to the ongoing discussion of ethics in our time. This accessible exploration of corporate legitimacy and crime will be important reading for advocates, journalists, students, and anyone interested in the dichotomy between law and legitimacy.” - Book Description

“It's Legal but It Ain't Right chronicles the abuse of power and privilege by businesses that defy the strictures of law and limits of regulation. Contributors stretch the conceptual boundaries of corporate deviance across a wide range of industries at a time when standards of corporate social responsibility and good corporate citizenship are in flux.” - William S. Laufer, Professor, The Wharton School of Business

It’s Legal but It Ain’t Right will be available to borrow after Friday, May 4, 2007

Merlin and Lottie Are Law Cats of the Week

2007-04-22T10:03:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cats are Merlin and Lottie. They belong to Patty Lynn, who is a faculty secretary. Merlin is shown here. Click on his photo to see Lottie.

To see photos of all previous Law Dogs and Cats of the Week, visit our Gallery of SIU Law Dogs and Cats, which you can find under "Related Links" in the sidebar. See Submitting Your SIU Law Dog and Cat Photos for instructions.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-04-20T12:41:00.000-05:00

This week's Featured Book is Eminent Domain Use and Abuse: Kelo in Context, which was edited by Dwight H. Merriam and Mary Massaron Ross and published by the American Bar Association.

“This book is a comprehensive analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Kelo v. City of New London. It addresses the controversial and important question of when eminent domain may constitutionally be used to take property for projects that are not publicly owned and operated facilities, such as schools and town halls. The volume captures and conveys the context within which this debate is taking place as well as offers guidance concerning the Kelo decision itself and how it may be used.” - Book Description

“In the field of takings law, the two of us have rarely agreed about anything. However, we certainly agree that Kelo is an important decision whose impacts are yet to be fully seen. This book provides an excellent starting point for those who wish to deepen their knowledge of the field before leaping to conclusions about where we ought to go from here.” - Michael M. Berger, Partner, Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP

“Eminent Domain Use and Abuse, with its encyclopedic CD-ROM, is a complete research tool for anyone studying the background and effects of the Kelo decision. I commend the co-editors and ABA for the extraordinary effort before the decision and after to get this comprehensive book to market is such short order.” - Daniel R. Mandelker, Stamper Professor of Law, Washington University (St. Louis)

Eminent Domain Use and Abuse will be available to borrow after Friday, April 27, 2007

Listening to Podcasts

2007-04-20T10:39:00.000-05:00

I have been listening to quite a few podcasts recently, and I have written about some of them here. One of the reasons that I listen to podcasts is to learn something that I might not otherwise have time to learn. I can listen to a podcast while I am doing something else, such as walking, driving, or working around the house.

Although you can listen to podcasts on your computer, I find that I have to get out of my office and away from my computer, or I will start checking my email or filing papers and get distracted by something that requires more than superficial verbal attention. Most of the podcasts that I listen to are somehow related to law librarianship, which is a wonderfully broad field. Besides podcasts by and about law librarians, there are podcasts about the practice of law, legal issues, news and current awareness, continuing education, legal research, government information, management, and career development.

For a list of podcasts to get you started, see Podcasts and Podcasting for Law Librarians, a column I wrote for the September issue of Law Library Journal.

Law Library Open House

2007-04-19T10:38:00.000-05:00

Thanks to everyone who joined us for our Library Week open house yesterday. We had games, candy and bottled water, and five drawings.

Congratulations to Candle Wester-Mittan on a well-planned event.

Help on Your Summer Job

2007-04-16T11:07:00.000-05:00

With the end of the semester just weeks away, you may be thinking about how you can do a great job and impress your employer. Here are some tips to help you if your summer job includes legal research.

ZiefBrief, from the librarians at the University of San Francisco's Law Library, has PowerPoint slides, outline, handout, and worksheets on effective Boolean (Terms and Connectors) searching.

You can listen to Berring's Legal Research Podcast episodes to review topics that we covered in Lawyering Skills. You can also find overviews of topics that we didn't have time to cover, such as Local Laws (e.g., municipal ordinances). I recommend the episode on Legal Research Strategy, which pulls it all together for you. The podcast series supplements the Berring on Legal Research DVD set, which is on reserve in the law library at DVD 0024.

A good place to begin your research is in secondary sources, which can give you background and context for your topic as well as citations to primary authorities such as cases, statutes, and regulations. In Lawyering Skills we used legal dictionaries, encyclopedia, treatises, ALRs, and legal periodicals. Ask the lawyer who gives you an assignment for recommendations on where to start. If your employer has a law library, the librarian will also be happy to make a recommendation.

DavidMaister.com has podcast series on Career Development for professionals. The episode on Managing Your Boss begins with a discussion about how to receive assignments and an 11-point checklist to help you clarify each assignment and do what your boss expects. Even if you don't have time for the entire podcast, the first six minutes are worth a listen.

Evan Schaeffer, at the Illinois Trial Practice Weblog, provides the view from "the other end of the transaction" in Giving Legal Research Assignments to Others. He offers a helpful list of types of information that should be given with research assignments. If your boss forgets to give you information that would help you do the research, ask questions.

The SIU Law Library has research guides and links to recommended websites. You will have summer access to most of the electronic resources to which the law library subscribes if you connect with the Law VPN, so don't let your password expire. Westlaw and LexisNexis licenses limit use of student passwords to academic research. We will post instructions on how to register for summer access when we have them.

Unlike your Westlaw and LexisNexis passwords, you can use your CALI password over the summer. If you get an assignment on a topic that you haven't studied yet, check the CALI site to see if there is a lesson that will give you an overview.

The Curmudgeon's Guide to Practicing Law, by Mark Herrmann, is full of practical advice on the types of assignments a new associate is likely to receive, as well as general tips on succeeding in a law firm. Although some of the advice will only apply to permanent associates, at least the first half of the book also applies to summer employment. You can check out The Curmudgeon's Guide to Practicing Law in the law library at KF300 .H47 2006. See my previous post for links to excerpts available on the web.

(The image above is from from Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels: Into Several Remote Regions of the World pt. II, "A Voyage to Brobdingnag," ch. VII (Project Gutenberg EBook 2005) (Thomas M. Balliet ed., 1900 ed., originally published 1726).)

Lexxie Is Law Cat of the Week

2007-04-15T11:09:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cat is Lexxie, who belongs to Jane Miller and lives with three other Miller cats. Click on the photo here to see more.

More on eDiscovery

2007-04-14T09:38:00.000-05:00

After my previous post about eDiscovery, Prof. Basanta told me about an excellent article in the April issue of the Illinois Bar Journal: Scott A. Carlson and Ronald L. Lipinski, eDiscovery: A New Approach to Discovery in Federal and State Courts, 95 Ill. B.J. 184 (2007). The authors are partners at Seyfarth Shaw LLP in the litigation department and co-chairs of the firm's national eDiscovery practice group. Mr. Carlson is an SIU Law alumnus.

The Illinois Bar Journal available on the ISBA website to members only. The law library has recent issues on reserve at K9 .L52.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-04-13T10:31:00.000-05:00

The Featured Book of the Week is Vault Guide to Law Firm Pro Bono Programs by Vault Editors and published by Vault, Inc.

“Service to clients who cannot afford legal counsel has always been an ethical imperative of lawyers. During the last few decades, large U.S. law firms collectively have devoted increasing resources to pro bono work, and nearly all have developed their own unique culture of service and methods of administration. This book was developed to provide law students and lawyers with the essential objective information necessary to meaningfully evaluate these firms' pro bono cultures and activities. Through an exciting partnership with New York University School of Law and pro bono coordinators at firms across the country, Vault brings you more than 140 descriptions of the inner workings of these firms' pro bono programs. Addressing such issues as typical pro bono assignments, recent pro bono clients, special training and supervision for pro bono cases, and average number of hours devoted to pro bono work, this guide gives you the real story behind the glossy firm pro bono materials. A must-have for all law students and lawyers who feel a legal career is not complete without giving back to those in need.” - Book Description

Vault Guide to Law Firm Pro Bono Programs will be available to borrow after Friday, April 20, 2007

Oral Arguments

2007-04-13T09:16:00.000-05:00

As you prepare for your oral arguments, you may want to listen to oral arguments in real cases:

U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments at the OYEZ Project (click on "Cases" then year and case name);
Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals Oral Argument recordings;
Florida Supreme Court oral arguments;
Indiana Supreme Court and Court of Appeals oral arguments;
North Dakota Supreme Court oral arguments;
Wisconsin Supreme Court oral arguments.

And here is some advice from judges:

Daniel H. Bromberg, Keep Oral Arguments on Target: Appellate Judges Have Plenty to Say About What They Expect—and Need–from Advocates, 29 Natl. L.J. S1 (Feb. 19, 2007) on Westlaw (password required) or on 2nd floor with the newspapers;
Evan Schaeffer, Arguing Motions: Work Hard to Connect the Dots, The Illinois Trial Practice Weblog, Feb. 24, 2006;
Bench & the Bar, an interview with three judges about what they look for in an attorney and what they expect, The Legal Talk Network: Lawyer 2 Lawyer, Mar. 7, 2007.

Congratulations, Law Journal Editors

2007-04-12T12:50:00.000-05:00

The rest of the editors for the 2007–08 Southern Illinois University Law Journal Board of Editors were announced today:

Lead Articles Editor: Luke DeSmet
Research Editor: Jeff Wright
Articles Editors: Andrew Fisk, Amy Ragan, Ryan Straw, Matt Thompson, Jennifer Walsh
Casenote and Comment Editors: Chris Blaesing, Natalie Gregory, Jessica Reese, Craig Runyon, Derek Ruzicka

They join the previously announced executive committee of the board, Amber Jeralds, John Persell, and Jessie Mahr. Congratulations, all!

Vote Tuesday

2007-04-11T16:18:00.000-05:00

Next Tuesday (April 17) is the Consolidated General Election in Jackson County. We have posted the lists of candidates on the easel near the front door of the law library.

You Need to Know About E-Discovery

2007-04-09T10:08:00.000-05:00

Two recent changes have lawyers discussing electronic discovery with renewed interest. On December 1, 2006, amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure became effective. The new rules provide specific procedures for discovery of electronically stored information (ESI).

In late November, Microsoft began release of its Vista operating system. The higher-end versions of Vista have at least three features that will affect e-discovery: shadow copies of all versions of files, increasing significantly the amount of potentially discoverable ESI; close tracking of each user’s activities on the system; and encryption that may make forensic examination impossible.

If you have been ignoring discussions of e-discovery, assuming that it will not apply to the types of cases you handle, check out the podcasts and articles below:

Lawyer2Lawyer: The Misconceptions of E-Discovery (Mar. 29, 2007), Legal Talk Network (33.1 min.).

Litigation Podcast: Ten Rules for Managing Electronically Stored Information (Mar. 29, 2007), ABA Section of Litigation (4.6 min.).

Conrad J. Jacoby, Separating E-Discovery Myths from Realities (Mar. 18, 2007), LLRX.com.

Craig Ball, Microsoft Brings an Altered Vista to EDD (Mar. 14, 2007), Law Technology News.

Dennis Kennedy, Evan Schaeffer & Tom Mighell, Incorporating EDD into Your Depositions — the 5Ws of EDD Depositions (Mar. 2007), DiscoveryResources.org.

For further information see:

Captain Jack Sparrow Is Law Cat of the Week

2007-04-08T10:49:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cat is Captain Jack Sparrow ("Jack"), who belongs to Brittany Ledbetter, a first-year law student. Jack earned his pirate name by his tendency to sit on shoulders. He is about 20 months old. Brittany found Jack after he was seen crawling into the engine of her car. He has no tail, but a great personality. His favorite activities include chasing a laser pointer dot and sneaking out the front door to eat the grass. Brittany told us that Jack had great ambitions to be the Law Cat of the week. Click on the photo to see a larger photo of Jack.

Berkman Center for Internet & Society Podcasts

2007-04-07T09:57:00.000-05:00

The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School "is a research program founded to explore cyberspace, share in its study, and help pioneer its development." As part of its mission, the Berkman Center hosts lectures and discussions by professors, scholars, attorneys, activists, and other experts on a wide range of topics relating its mission.

The Berkman Center makes audio and video recordings of these lectures and discussions available for free at MediaBerkman. Recent podcasts have included:

“Napster's Second Life? Regulatory Dynamics of Virtual Worlds” with Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger, Associate Professor of Public Policy, Kennedy School of Government
“Does Participatory Culture Lead to Participatory Democracy?” with David Weinberger, Research Fellow, Berkman Center
“Copyright and Access to Knowledge” with Mary Wong, Professor of Law, Franklin Pierce Law Center
“Opening Up to Open Access: What Can Other Disciplines Learn from the Sciences?” with Gavin Yamey, Senior Editor, PLoS [Public Library of Science] Medicine

The recordings are usually a little over an hour, but you can download the audio to your MP3 player and listen while you take a walk, ride a stationary bike, or just relax. So download a podcast and learn something interesting while you take a break.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-04-06T12:45:00.000-05:00

This week's Featured Book is Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution by Stephen Breyer, Associate Justice on the United States Supreme Court, and published by Alfred A. Knopf.

“This book, based on the Tanner lectures on Human Values that Justice Stephen Breyer delivered at Harvard University in November 2004, defines the term “active liberty” as a sharing of the nation’s sovereign authority with its citizens. Regarding the Constitution as a guide for the application of basic American principles to a living and changing society rather than as an arsenal of rigid legal means for binding and restricting it, Justice Breyer argues that the genius of the Constitution rests not in any static meaning it might have had in a world that is dead and gone, but in the adaptability of its great principles to cope with current problems...” - Book Description

“A brisk, lucid and energetic book, written with conviction and offering a central argument that is at once provocative and appealing. . . . Deserves a place of honor in national debates, now and in the future, about the role of the Supreme Court in American life.” - The New Republic

“Active Liberty will likely influence not only public debate but also how lawyers craft their cases.” - The Wall Street Journal

Active Liberty will be available to borrow after Friday, April 13, 2007.

SIU Law Student and Faculty Publications

2007-04-05T11:14:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to SIU 3L students Sam Wright and Michael Ruel, each of whom had commentaries published in the January–March 2007 issue of the Journal of Legal Medicine. Professors Basanta and Kapp also contributed articles, and Professor Behan contributed a book review.

Michael D. Ruel, "Vanity Tax": How New Jersey Has Opened Pandora's Box by Elevating Its Moral Judgment About Cosmetic Surgery Without Consideration of Fair Health Care Policy, 28 J. Legal Med. 119 (2007).
Samuel L. Wright, Protecting the Right to Medical Treatment from the War on Terror: The Status of Guantanamo Bay Detainees, 28 J. Legal Med. 135 (2007).
W. Eugene Basanta, Consumer-Driven Health Care: Legal and Policy Implications, 28 J. Legal Med. 1 (2007).
Marshall B. Kapp, Patient Autonomy in the Age of Consumer-Driven Health Care: Informed Consent and Informed Choice, 28 J. Legal Med. 91 (2007).
Christopher W. Behan, Bioethics and Armed Conflict: Moral Dilemmas of Medicine and War, 28 J. Legal Med. 163 (2007) (book review).

Current issues of the Journal of Legal Medicine are available on reserve in the law library and on Westlaw (password required).

PowerPoint Videos and Sharing

2007-04-04T22:15:00.000-05:00

If you have attended many presentations for which the speaker used PowerPoint slides, you have probably seen some presentations that made good use of PowerPoint and too many that did not. For a humorous look at bad PowerPoint, watch Life After Death by PowerPoint, a video by comedian Don McMillan.

Another video, Le Grand Content, makes an almost surreal examination of "the omnipresent Powerpoint-culture in search for its philosophical potential. Intersections and diagrams are assembled to form a grand 'association-chain-massacre', which challenges itself to answer all questions of the universe and some more." See a review at Presentation Zen.

Finally, check out SlideShare, a fabulous site for sharing your presentation slides or viewing what other presenters are doing. You can also use SlideShare to embed your presentation in a blog or website. Search by topic tag, or browse the Latest, Most Viewed, Featured, Most Commented, Most Favorited, or Most Zinged. Enter the World's Best Presentation Contest, or vote on your favorites, by April 23.

Congratulations, Moot Court Competitors

2007-04-02T10:42:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to the SIU Gibbons National Criminal Procedure Moot Court Team, who competed in Newark this past weekend. The team, comprised of 3L students Tim Geiger, Adam Ghrist, and Matt Rokusek, advanced to the quarter-final round.

Adam Ghrist was named the Second Best Oralist in the preliminary rounds of the competition.

Roy Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-04-01T11:00:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Roy, a six-year-old miniature schnauzer who is the apple of Lisa David's eye. Lisa works in Career services and tells us that Roy's favorite food is chicken and he loves to ride in the car. Click on the photo here to see more of Roy.

Google Maps Now Has Swimming Directions

2007-03-31T15:28:00.000-05:00

... or someone with a sense of humor.

Ask Google Maps for driving directions from New York, NY, to Dublin, Ireland, and you will receive painstakingly detailed directions. Step 23 — of 85 — tells you to "Swim across the Atlantic Ocean 3,462 mi." Distances are shown in miles all the way to Dublin. The return trip shows distances in kilometers, requiring you to "Swim across the Atlantic Ocean 5,572 mi."

This item has been going around the blogs. I saw it on Boing Boing.

Podcasting the Law in Plain English

2007-03-29T20:20:00.000-05:00

Nolo is a publisher of law books, legal forms, and legal software for nonlawyers. Although the books are written in plain language, they are thorough enough for a lawyer or law student to use to get a quick overview of an unfamiliar legal topic. The law library has many Nolo books in its self-help collection, which you can borrow with your law library card.

Nolo also provides free information through “Your Legal Companion” pages and Nolo Podcasts, covering a variety of topics in the areas of Business & Human Resources; Patents, Copyright & Art, Wills & Estate Planning; Property & Money; Family Law & Immigration; and Rights & Disputes. Nolo also makes transcripts of its podcasts available.

In the podcasts, authors of Nolo books answer common questions in their areas of expertise. Recent podcasts have included:

This Week's Featured Book

2007-03-28T16:57:00.000-05:00

To celebrate April Fools' Day, our Featured Book of the Week is Lawyers: Jokes, Quotes, and Anecdotes, edited by Patrick Regan and published by Barnes & Noble.

“Lawyers are everywhere, and it seems you can't make a move - in your family, business, or personal life - without them. Whether you make money with the help of a lawyer or lose it, get convicted or acquitted, you'll find Lawyers: Jokes, Quotes, and Anecdotes soothing relief in a love-hate relationship that baffles just about everybody, including lawyers. This collection of true stories, great jokes, and witty (if sometimes sardonic) quotes will give any client or lawyer a lighthearted perspective on the ins and outs of the legal profession.” - From the Publisher

Lawyers: Jokes, Quotes, and Anecdotes will be available to borrow after Friday, April 6, 2007.

The Importance of Proofreading---and Some Tips

2007-03-27T19:16:00.000-05:00

The other night I heard a student telling another how she had avoided a proofreading calamity. During class that night, each student had to get up and argue in support of a motion they had previously turned in. The student realized that she had inadvertently left out the word "not," so she covered her error by arguing the other side of the case. Of course, in the real world, you can't just switch sides.

The student's story reminded me of an unemployment case I attended years ago. The woman seeking unemployment benefits was a law student who had been fired for incompetence by her law-firm employer. Although several errors were given as grounds for her firing, the beginning of the firm's lack of confidence in her abilities stemmed from a near-perfect memo she had prepared. Howevere, she had left out the word "not" in the subject line of the memo. Although the remainder of the memo correctly stated the law, the most prominent sentence was wrong because of one little word.

The difficulty of proofreading is that when you try to proofread something on which you have been working for a long time, you sometimes see what you meant to write, instead of what you did write, so you can miss important errors. I try to avoid this problem by not working on the project for a day or two before my final proofreading. Some people proofread in a different font or font size than they have used while writing. Others find that printing the document forproofreading, instead of reading it on the screen, does the trick.

Eric Waltmire recently posted his tip for How to Proofread Perfectly. Eric recommends having your computer read the document to you while you read along. See Eric Waltmire's Blog for details. (Eric is an SIU Law alum.)

New law librarian blog: All-Purpose BiblioBlawg

2007-03-26T08:04:00.000-05:00

Meg Kribble, a reference librarian at Nova Southeastern University Law Library, has launched the All-Purpose BiblioBlawg. Meg has been a law librarian for about a year and has many interesting ideas. Listen to her give a tour of Second Life for Jim Milles on Check This Out! episode 59 and see her photos on Flickr.

In addition to law, librarianship, and legal research topics, future topics may include felines by the names of Rufus and Emma, second-sock syndrome, politics, Battlestar Galactica, Mac enthusiasm, video links, other amusing or enlightening topics. I can't wait. See Meg's introductory post for more information and subscribe to the All-Purpose Biblioblawg.

Congratulations, Meg!

Ragsdale Is Law Cat of the Week

2007-03-25T08:57:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cat is Ragsdale, who belongs to Carla Chatham, who works in the law library. Ragsdale lives with Bonnie & Clyde, Mini, and Chief. Click on the photo to see more images of Ragsdale.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-03-23T14:45:00.000-05:00

Flying Solo: A Survival Guide for the Solo and Small Firm Lawyer, edited by K. William Gibson and published by the ABA is this week's featured book.

“Newly revised and completely updated, the fourth edition of this comprehensive guide includes practical information gathered from a wide range of contributors, including successful solo practitioners, law firm consultants, state and local bar practice management advisors, and law school professors. All the contributors share tips and advice that can be easily implemented in your solo or small-firm practice. This classic ABA book first walks you through a step-by-step analysis of the decision to start a solo practice, including choosing a practice focus. It then provides tools to help you with financial issues including banking and billing; operations issues such as staffing and office location and design decisions; technology for the small law office; and marketing and client relations. What's more, the final section on quality of life issues puts it all into perspective. Whether you're thinking of going solo, new to the solo life, or a seasoned practitioner, Flying Solo provides time-tested answers to real-life questions.” - Book Description

“Bill Gibson offers a blueprint formula for building a successful personal injury practice. Loaded with valuable tips, strategies, ideas and solutions, this book is a 'must-have' for solo practitioners and small personal injury firms. You'll turn to it time and again for Gibson's helpful guidance, as well as for his 'ready-to-use' letters, worksheets and forms. I wish it had been available when I started my practice.” – Philip H. Corboy, Corboy & Demetrio Chicago, IL

Flying Solo will be available to borrow after Friday, March 30, 2007 and is on display on top of the first shelves to the left of the Rare Book Room.

Justia Tracks Regulations

2007-03-23T07:59:00.000-05:00

Just last month I posted an item about the free tools for lawyers and other legal researchers that Justia had been adding to its site, and now they have added another.

Justia Regulation Tracker allows you to search, browse, and track Federal Register documents. You can subscribe to an RSS feed of all documents from a specific federal agency or refine the feed's focus to a particular type of document, such as rules, administrative orders, notices, proposed rules, executive orders, and proclamations. You can also run a search and subscribe to a feed of regulatory documents containing your search terms.

ABA Litigation Podcast

2007-03-20T05:52:00.000-05:00

The American Bar Association's Section of Litigation has a podcast of "practical tips, tactics, and interviews with today's leading trial attorneys." Each biweekly episode is less than ten minutes long—a very easy way to pick up some practical tips.

Download episodes of the Litigation Podcast: Tips & Tactics for the Practicing Trial Lawyer or subscribe via iTunes or a newsreader or podcatcher. For example:

Appellate Practice Tip of the Week: "Clearly"

2007-03-19T06:53:00.000-05:00

The North Dakota Supreme Court posts an "Appellate Practice Tip of the Week" on its website, along with other helpful information for attorneys and members of the public. This week's Appellate Practice Tip is:

The word "clearly" is no substitute for authority or logic.

There are also tips specific to the record, stays, briefs, the appendix, mootness, oral argument, petitions for rehearing, and the Administrative Agencies Practice Act. Some other Appellate Practice Tips to consider as you finalize your brief:

Never use many words when a few will do. A longer brief is not necessarily a better brief.
Make sure cases and statutes are cited correctly. Make sure cases cited are still good law.
At the end of your brief, state clearly and concisely what specific action you are seeking from the appellate court.
"Always use your computer's spell check, and never trust it." —Steve Wilbers, Minneapolis Star Tribune
Proofread. Then proofread again.

Miller Cats Are Law Cats of the Week

2007-03-18T07:22:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cats are Verona, KiKi, and Jasmine, who belong to Jane Miller's family. Jane works in the law library. When she sent me this photo in December, they only had three watch cats. We will feature the newest Miller cat in a few weeks.

More Moot Court Congratulations

2007-03-17T06:02:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to the two SIU teams who competed in the McGee National Civil Rights Moot Court Competition at the University of Minnesota March 1–3.

The 3L team of Nate Bailey, Marty Offutt, and Erica Stanmar made the "sweet 16" seeded tenth but was narrowly defeated by the team that went on to win the competition. Nate, Marty, and Erica had fifth best brief out of 40, and Marty Offutt was ranked third best oralist.

The 2L team of Brady Barke, Natalie Gregory, and Jason Leonard went 2 and 1 on oral argument scores in the preliminary rounds. Natalie Gregory was ranked fifth best oralist.

This Week's Featured Book

2007-03-16T11:10:00.000-05:00

Inheritance Law and the Evolving Family by Ralph C. Brashier and published by Temple University Press is this week's Featured Book.

“Nontraditional families are today an important part of American family life. Yet when a loved one dies, our inheritance laws are often stingy even towards survivors in the nuclear family. With humor, enthusiasm, and a bit of righteous outrage, Ralph C. Brashier explores how probate laws ignore gender roles and marital contributions of the spouse, often to the detriment of the surviving widow; how probate laws pretend that unmarried couples—particularly gay and lesbian ones—do not exist; how probate laws allow a parent to disinherit even the neediest child; and how probate laws for nonmarital children, adopted children, and children born of surrogacy or other forms of assisted reproductive technology are in flux or simply don't exist. A thoughtful examination of the current state of probate law and the inability of legislators to recognize and provide for the broad range of families in America today, this book will be read by those with an interest in the relationship between families and the law across a wide range of academic disciplines.” - Book Description

“This is an enlightening survey of American inheritance laws. Brashier outlines how our laws differ in troubling ways from common features of inheritance laws in other countries and also notes how our laws have largely not yet adapted to unmarried partner relationships. He makes sensible recommendations about how our laws should be changed.” - J. Thomas Oldham, John H. Freeman Professor of Law, University of Houston Law Center

Inheritance Law and the Evolving Family is on display on top of the first shelves to the left of the Rare Book Room and will be available to borrow after Friday, March 23, 2007.

Research Guides on Administrative Regulations

2007-03-16T05:41:00.000-05:00

Comparing the Publication of Federal Statutes and Regulations;
Steps In Using the Code of Federal Regulations;
Comparing the Publication of Illinois Statutes and Regulations;
Researching Illinois Administrative Regulations;
Steps In Using the Illinois Administrative Code [IAC];
Introduction to Researching Administrative Law (audio and transcript) Duration of audio: ~5.3 minutes.

You can find more Research Guides, Research Tips, and other resources through the SIU Law Library website.

Mind-Mapping Articles

2007-03-15T05:53:00.000-05:00

I recently wrote a column on mind mapping for Law Library Journal. I received some nice feedback from other librarians, as well as references to two additional articles:

Click on the map above to see the mind maps I used for our 2006 Lawyering Skills classes.

Audio Research Guide on Practice Aids

2007-03-14T17:02:00.000-05:00

We have added an audio research guide on practice aids to the SIU Law Library website. Listen to Introduction to Practice Aids. Duration of audio: ~10.5 minutes. Outline with links and Transcript of the recording.

Congratulations, Moot Court Competitors

2007-03-13T18:52:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to the two SIU Law teams who competed in the Midwest Moot Court Competition, sponsored by the Illinois Appellate Lawyers Association, in Chicago last weekend.

Joe Roark and Nick Williams, who teamed with Jamie McCarthy in the preliminary rounds, made it to the final round, and the team's brief placed third. Joe Roark was named best oralist in the competition.

Jennifer Kelly, Greg Odom, and Sarah Ward advanced to the semi-final round before being defeated by the winning team.

Well done, students!

Break the Procrastination Habit

2007-03-12T09:28:00.000-05:00

Do you procrastinate? Would you like to stop? Check out “Avoiding Procrastination,” a recent podcast episode of David Maister's Career Development series. This 15-minute audio recording is full of suggestions for controlling procrastination—a challenge for many professionals—and getting things done. As Prof. Maister explains, “A completed assignment that is adequate is better than the ‘best thing you've ever done’ that exists only in your head.” You can download this podcast and listen to it on your MP3 player or on your computer.

I discovered DavidMaister.com recently while writing an article about podcasts. David Maister is an author, speaker, consultant, and former Harvard Business School professor. His podcast is designed as a Business Masterclass. Each masterclass is a series of short podcast episodes dealing with various professional business topics. The series currently available on the site include Career Development; Strategy in Professional Businesses; Managing Professionals: Attitudes, Skills and Behaviors; and Marketing Professional Services. The site also has a blog, called “Passion, People and Principles,” and other materials for business professionals.

Bobby Is Law Cat of the Week

2007-03-11T10:42:00.000-05:00

This week's SIU Law Cat is Bobby, who belongs to Nate and Sharon Bailey and lives with Chipper, a previous SIU Law Dog of the Week. Bobby was rescued as a newborn kitten, along with his brother Murphy, and is named after Bobby Cox of the Atlanta Braves. Click on the photo here to see more pictures of Bobby.

Featured Book of the Week

2007-03-09T15:21:00.000-06:00

This week’s Featured Book is Law & Internet Cultures by Kathy Bowrey and published by Cambridge University Press.

“Law & Internet Cultures raises the profile of socio-political questions about the global technology and information market. It is a close study of communication flows, networks, nodes, biopolitics and the fragmentations of power. It brings to life the role played by personalities, corporate interactions, industry compromises and the regulatory incompetencies affecting the technological world we all live in….This book is for readers interested in intellectual property law, information technology, cultural studies, globalisation and mass communications.” - Book Description

“It is a fascinating and enjoyable read, which has the hallmarks of a book which can be read in one sitting, although to write this risks undermining its scholarship and complexity, because it is a book which should be read closely, one which will reward return readings. … a fascinating book. It is an important one also, because of the way it engages deeply with Internet law, and the ways in which law shapes, and is understood and used by, Internet communities.” - Legal Studies

Law & Internet Cultures is on display on top of the first shelves to the left of the Rare Book Room and will be available to borrow after Friday, March 16, 2007.

SIU Law Journal Executive Board

2007-03-09T05:11:00.000-06:00

Congratulations to the recently elected 2007–08 executive committee of the Southern Illinois University Law Journal:

Editor in Chief — Amber Jeralds
Managing Editor — John Persell
Survey Editor — Jessie Mahr

Rose Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-03-04T05:05:00.000-06:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Rose, an Olde English Bulldogge, who belongs to Jennifer Walsh, a 2L. Jennifer got Rose for Christmas. She is 9 months and just adorable. Click on the photo here to see more of Rose.

Announcing the SIU Law Library Featured Book

2007-03-02T09:49:00.000-06:00

Each week the Law Library will showcase a book from our library to highlight our vast collection of print resources. The Featured Book is on display on top of the first shelves to the left of the Rare Book Room.

Our first Featured Book is The Lincoln Family Album by Mark E. Neely Jr. and Harold Holzer and published by the Southern Illinois University Press.

“The Lincoln Family Album offers a rare and revealing glimpse into the private life of Abraham Lincoln and the first family. Showcasing original and previously unpublished photographs collected and preserved by Mary Todd Lincoln and four generations of descendants, the volume includes pictures displayed in a family album when the Lincolns lived in the White House…” - Book Description

“Neely and Holzer supply a sprightly and incisive commentary that sometimes softens the melancholy of this archive of an extinguished family.” - The Illinois Historical Journal

“[T]here occasionally comes a book which … drives home the point of the sacrifices all Americans mad during the great conflict. The Lincoln Family Album is one of those volumes. The reader cannot help but be drawn by the book’s text and striking use of photos to develop the great trauma suffered by the first family of the United States.” – The Civil War News

The Lincoln Family Album will be available to borrow after Friday, March 9, 2007.

Bonnie and Clyde Are Law Cats of the Week

2007-02-25T05:27:00.000-06:00

This week's SIU Law Cats are Bonnie and Clyde, who are brothers. Carla Chatham, who works in the law library, adopted them when they were 6 weeks old. Bonnie & Clyde live with Chief, Mini, and another cat who will appear here in the next few weeks, so stay tuned. Click on the photo here to see more photos of Mini.

Looking for tax forms?

2007-02-22T14:39:00.000-06:00

If you are doing your own taxes this year, you may want to check out the IRS Forms and Publications page. The forms and instructions are listed by number and are in PDF. Additionally, the IRS has other helpful information. Including, if you qualify, how to file electronically for free.

Tax forms for Illinois are also available online.

Research Guides on Legislative History

2007-02-20T04:36:00.000-06:00

As you begin work on your appellate brief, you may want to add some legislative history research to the research you did for your trial brief. The following research guides may help:

Federal Legislative History: Documents & Sources / prepared by Frank Houdek.
Using CIS/Annual for Federal Legislative History Research / prepared by Frank Houdek.
Using LexisNexis Congressional for Federal Legislative History / prepared by Diane Murley.
Comparing Federal and Illinois Legislative History Research / prepared by Frank Houdek.
Illinois Legislative History Research / prepared by Frank Houdek.

You can find Research Guides, Research Tips, and more resources through the SIU Law Library website.

Bailey Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-02-18T06:14:00.000-06:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Bailey, a miniature pinscher. He belongs to Natalie DeLong, who is a first-year SIU law student. Click on the photo here to see more of Bailey.

More Good Stuff from Justia

2007-02-16T19:56:00.000-06:00

I have blogged about Justia before, but not nearly as often as I should have, considering how frequently they release a new free tool for lawyers. Justia is a company that designs and optimizes law firm websites, lawyer blogs, and other online legal marketing. It also has many free information, public-interest, and pro-bono projects, including:

Stanford Copyright & Fair Use Center, which provides an overview of copyright and fair use, primary and secondary sources, resources for librarians, and information on current issues and pending legislation;
Recall Warnings, a collection of over 50,0000 recalls of autos, consumer products, food and drugs from U.S. government agencies;
US Supreme Court Center, a searchable and browseable database of all U.S. Supreme Court decisions, with links to secondary sources, online databases, and mp3 audio of Supreme Court oral arguments from Oyez.org;
Dog Law, a joint project of Nolo, Justia and Little Sheba the Hug Pug;
BlawgSearch and Blawgs.FM, finding tools for law blogs and legal podcasts, respectively; and
Legal Marketing Blog, with tips on legal website design, search engine optimization, and marketing for law firms.

This week I learned about the Justia Federal Court Filings Site, which lists new civil case filings in U.S. District Courts with links to Pacer, as well as blog, news, finance, and web searches on the party names. Search new cases by State, Court, Lawsuit Type, or Party name, and subscribe to RSS feeds to track new cases automatically, without having to rerun your search.

Another recent change at Justia is the home page, which has become a portal to legal information. It has articles and other content in a variety of legal practice areas, as well as a directory of links to U.S. state and federal laws, courts, government websites, forms, and more.

Zeus Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-02-11T08:39:00.000-06:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Zeus, a miniature pinscher puppy. Zeus belongs to Megan Jackson Orso, who is a first-year SIU law student. So far this semester, Zeus has chewed on the power cord for Megan's laptop and PDA. He also snacked on the corners of her ALWD manual. He is a handful. Click on the picture here to see more pictures of Zeus. He is asleep in almost all of them, because that is the only time he holds still long enough for a picture.

The Meaning of Legal Research Terminology

2007-02-09T15:57:00.000-06:00

Legal research terms can sometimes be confusing. If you can't remember the difference between a cited case and a citing reference, between primary authority and mandatory authority, or between session laws and a statutory code, check the law library's Glossary of Legal Research Terms or one of the references listed at the bottom of that page, all of which are available in the law library or on the web.

We recently added Elyse H. Fox, The Legal Research Dictionary: From Advance Sheets to Pocket Parts (2d ed., Leg. Info. Serv. 2006) (KF 240 L43 2006).

Don't Trivialize Your Client's Case

2007-02-05T11:42:00.000-06:00

This week's Appellate practice tip from the North Dakota Supreme Court should be applied to trial court briefs as well as to appellate briefs:

"Raise only important issues. Trivial issues detract from important ones."

New Legal Research Search Engine from Cornell University Law Library

2007-02-04T20:52:00.000-06:00

Cornell University Law Library has developed a new legal research search engine that searches "approximately 20 different web sites that either prolifically publish guides, or index and link to guides." The resaerch engine was announced on law-lib by Julie Jones, Research Attorney and Lecturer in Law Cornell Law Library, who indicates that the search engine can also be added to one's Google home page.

Ginger Is Law Dog of the Week

2007-02-04T09:38:00.000-06:00

This week's SIU Law Dog is Ginger, who belongs to Dave Wood's daughter, Katie. Dave is a 3L.

Interested in Copyright Law?

2007-02-02T17:55:00.000-06:00

For those interested in copyright law, you may want to check out Professor Lawrence Lessig's blog. Professor Lessig is a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and founder of the school's Center for Internet and Society.

He has a terrific post on Orphan Works Reform which discusses the U.S. Copyright Office's 2006 report and proposal on Orphan Works, along with Professor Lessig's comments and his alternative proposal.