A panel of twelve prominent law­yers who teach film or are con­nected to the business chose what they regard as the best movies ever made about lawyers and the law in the August 2008 issue of the ABA Journal. The films represent thirty-one Oscar winners and another eighty-five nominations. The titles include not only the obvious, such as To Kill a Mocking­bird (1962), My Cousin Vinny (1992), A Few Good Men (1992) and Amistad (1997), but also some older titles, such as And Justice for All (1979), Judg­ment at Nuremberg (1961), Young Mr. Lincoln(1939), Compulsion (1959) and even the musical Chicago (2002). 

Read the rest of this entry »

By now, hopefully everyone has settled in for another good year at Valparaiso University School of Law. But, before you get too comfortable with Income Tax, Constitutional Law, Contracts or any of your other classes, I thought I would share some real world tales about legal research. Unless you are a new 1L, I’m sure most of you have forgotten, or at least attempted to forget, about legal research. Here now are some reminders that the legal research skills you have been taught will stay important in your professional life.

ans list serv asking how many law firms still actively subscribed to print digests. Out of 53 responses, only 3 firms did NOT still maintain print digests. Over half were still using both state and federal digests. What does this mean for you? It means that firms are still expecting their attorneys to use print sources or they wouldn’t be spending the large sums of money needed to maintain those print sources. Moral of the story, keep your print skills handy, you never know when you might need them.

authority verification was run and the order was issued, the Indiana Supreme Court accepted transfer on the Court of Appeals and vacated the decision. Now the local judge has the possibility that the original order that was issued will have to be reconsidered unless the Supreme Court decides to affirm. Moral of this story, remember to do authority verification early and often, and always, one more time just before the work product goes out the door. Even judges can fall prey to ignoring this warning.

that had not been updated to reflect the changes made to the law in 2007. A disclaimer on the web site informed viewers the guide was not updated. So, more careful research and voters would have had the opportunity to vote on redirecting room tax money to education, transportation and public safety. Moral here, no matter where you find your information, make sure you check the original source.

Finally, a quote from a private firm

attorney about his observations on legal

research.

“Legal research is a part of the larger issue of legal analysis and reasoning…The use of print materials seems to better stress and underscore the need for analysis. In contrast, on-line research is many times more mechanical (i.e., putting together search terms) and many topics are missed… [T]he emphasis needs to be on the analytical approach to a problem and then on where the answers are to be found.”

This quote was part of a conference on the future of legal research presented at Chicago Kent Law School in May of 2007. It sums up rather nicely what we hope you have learned here at Valpo Law.

From the Library by Mary Persyn

You may have seen the July issue of the Law Library newsletter, The Reporter, which described all of the changes that were taking place in the Law Library over the summer. These included converting some space on the second floor into faculty offices and removing the law reviews from the lower level of the Library and converting that space into a Reading Room for quiet study. The plan was to have all of the work done by the time orientation began on August 20. Read the rest of this entry »

As we come to the end of the academic year, I wish you goodbye and best wishes on behalf of the librarians and support staff of the Law Library.

For the 3Ls, good luck in your future careers. Remember that we are still here to help you with those complicated research questions that come along from time to time.

For the 1Ls and 2Ls, see you in the Fall. Have a good summer.

A final hint - If you are stuck for a place to begin your research, consider the Legal Research Engine from Cornell –

http://library.lawschool.cornell.edu/WhatWeDo/ResearchGuides/CLL-Legal-Research-Engine.cfm

Dean Persyn

By Beverly Burmeister
Cataloging Services

What Kind of Information – Expert or Not?

We interact with and utilize information everyday and will continue do so throughout our professional careers and lives. Determining whether the information available to us is accurate and authoritative, however, can be challenging. Libraries are often early adopters of new technologies and, therefore, assist users in finding and utilizing the best sources of information in various formats.

The internet has opened up many avenues for individual participation in content — from Wikipedia to YouTube to MySpace. This trend of anyone being able to develop content for the web has positive and negative aspects, and has made careful evaluation of sources of information imperative. When we use primary sources of online legal information, such as LexisNexis, Westlaw, or other reputable databases, the authorities of the sources are not in question. We also rely on the internet for other legal and non-legal information, however, as well and may simply assume that this information is also reliable.

Like most everything, the web is continually evolving and changing. There is evidence that more internet users are paying attention to whether information is accurate and authoritative, resulting in a shifting of user habits and preferences. In his article, Revenge of the Experts, Tony Dokoupil stated that the pendulum seemed to be swinging back to preference for information provided by experts, and that “some of the same entrepreneurs who funded the user-generated revolution are paying professionals to edit and produce online content.” One example is Google’s Knol, a planned Wikipedia-like website produced by authoritative sources which share ad revenue. According its website, Google is inviting a selected group of people to contribute to this new, free tool called “knol”, which stands for a unit of knowledge. The goal is to encourage people who know a particular subject to write an authoritative article about it. Although new ventures for Google and others joining this trend of utilizing experts, others such as About.com — which has experts in everything from gardening to alternative medicine — have been doing this for more than ten years.

Authoritative sources produced by experts may be a trend on the internet; however, evaluating information sources — whether print or online — will continue to be a necessary step in determining source accuracy and reliability. In order to assist users, the Law Library includes links to good websites in the online catalog, Galileo. As you use Galileo to find information by subject or keyword search, you are able to access both print and online resources. As with print materials, the Galileo record for websites provides important information about the site, including who is responsible for the content. Samples of sites that we have included in Galileo are:

CongressLink – Developed by the Dirksen Congressional Center, this site provides information about the U.S. Congress, how it works, its members and leaders, and the public policies it produces. http://www.congresslink.org/

ASIL – This official site of the American Society of International Law contains a wide array of information of interest and use to international lawyers including: International law springboard (links to law lists, lawyers and other professionals, international organizations, treaties, U.S. government & foreign relations, directories, publishers, etc.), ASIL guide to electronic resources for international law (containing over 11,000 articles, links to selected official United Nations sites, links to lists groups and networks, links to treaties and authors), What’s online in international law (full text of ASIL newsletter), and full text of ASIL Insights. http://www.asil.org

The Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse – Developed by the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, this site has a collection of documents and information about civil rights cases in selected case categories across the United States. The categories include: Child Welfare, Election/Voting Rights, Immigration, Jail Conditions, Juvenile Institution, Mental Health Facility, Mental Retardation Facility, Nursing Home Conditions, Police Non-Profiling, Police Profiling, Prison Conditions, Public Housing, and School Desegregation. http://clearinghouse.wustl.edu/

The American Presidency Project – This site developed by the University of Colorado contains documents related to the study of the American Presidency, including public papers, annual messages to Congress, inaugural addresses, radio addresses, acceptance speeches, presidential candidates’ debates, party platforms, elections data, and an audio/video archive http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/index.php

First Amendment Center – Developed by Vanderbilt University, this site features comprehensive research coverage of key First Amendment issues and topics, a unique First Amendment Library, and guest analyses by respected legal specialists. http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org

FedStats – This site is a product of a multi-agency development effort led by the Interagency Council on Statistical Policy. It provides one-stop access to publicly available statistics produced by more than 70 U.S. government agencies, including Agriculture, Census, Education, Health and Human Services, Interior, Justice, Labor, Transportation, and Treasury. http://www.fedstats.gov

Libraries also assist users with evaluation of information sources. Before using a resource, it is important to ask these questions:

Who authored the information and what are their credentials?

Is the information up-to-date, complete and accurate?

Why is the information being provided? What is the purpose and point of view?

Guidelines for evaluating websites developed by the Christopher Center for Library and Information Resources can be found at: http://www.valpo.edu/library/user/evaluation.html.

Since the advent internet, both expert and non-expert content have become an integral part of our daily lives. The key to good information is being able to evaluate our sources to make sure the type of content serves our information need.

Resources

Tony Dokoupil, Revenge of the Experts, Newsweek Web Exclusive (March 6, 2008), http://www.newsweek.com/id/119091 accessed on March 13, 2008

Knol http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/encouraging-people-to-contribute.html accessed on March 24, 2008

About.com http://www.about.com/ accessed on March 18, 2008

Beverly.Burmeister@valpo.edu

By Sarah Holterhoff, Government Information/Reference Librarian

It’s a Small World After All…

Online Legal Research With a Global Perspective

We’ve all heard it—the world is shrinking, globalization is the new buzz word, and interest in foreign and international information of all sorts is growing rapidly. Legal information on the global front is needed by lawyers, legal scholars, and law students and it’s quick and convenient to look for it on the Internet. That brings us to some good news and some bad news… The good news is that today a wide array of websites offer reliable and free source material (primary and secondary) for foreign and international legal research. The bad news is that such abundant access has led to information overload, with resources scattered around the Internet in a disorganized fashion. This makes it difficult to locate the desired information and to determine if what you do find is reliable and authoritative.

But there is more good news…if you need to research foreign and international law online, there is an efficient way to get a head start: find a good, up-to-date online research guide. You will want one written by an expert, which lists and describes available resources and provides links to websites where they can be found. To locate such a guide, you can turn to two well-respected web sites which provide excellent, authoritative research guides: LLRX.com and GlobaLex.

LLRX.com is a website devoted to all areas of law, including foreign and international, as well as legal technology. It has been in existence for over ten years and its original name of Law Library Resource Xchange has now been shortened to the LLRX acronym. The site contains thousands of articles written by respected lawyers, technologists, and librarians, which has led it to be consistently named as one of the top legal websites on the Internet.

Let’s say you need a research guide on Croatian law. If you go to LLRX.com, you would start with the heading “Legal Research” and select “Foreign & Comparative Law.” That link would take you to a page offering various subcategories. Under “Comparative and Foreign Law” you could scroll down to find a guide to “The Croatian Legal System” from 2002. This guide could also be located by typing the word “Croatia” into the search box (located on the top of each page). Guides on the site are listed in reverse chronological order, so the Google search function is helpful for quickly locating a guide on a particular topic, such as Islamic law or the federal civil code of Mexico.

Among the recent additions to the foreign and international resources on LLRX.com are Israeli, Australian, and European Union law research guides. Common features of the guides are numerous links and frequent updating. Some of the guides cover a narrowly-defined research topic, such as intellectual property law in the Russian Federation or the validity of Turkish private law contracts. LLRX is an easily-navigated and well-managed site that contains a wealth of reliable information—on foreign and international law and much more.

GlobaLex is an electronic library of foreign, comparative, and international research guides, created and maintained by the Hauser Global Law School Program at New York University School of Law. It can be found at: http://www.nyulawglobal.org/globalex/. Begun only three years ago, GlobaLex now links to more than 100 guides on a variety of topics and jurisdictions, written by respected authors who are experts on their topics. The site is organized into four sections and is easy to navigate. The foreign law research section includes links to guides from more than 80 foreign jurisdictions, listed alphabetically by country name. If you are interested in knowing more about Pakistan’s constitution and Supreme Court which have been in the news recently, check out “A Legal Research Guide to Pakistan.”

Turning to the international law research section, you’ll find that it’s organized alphabetically by topic, such as “international environmental.” The author of “A Basic Guide to International Environmental Legal Research” is Valpo Law grad Heidi Frostestad Kuehl (J.D. 2000 and now a law librarian at Northwestern University School of Law). There is also a section on comparative law research and a new section about building collections of foreign and international legal materials.

A search box which is powered by Google is also available on the site. A key feature of GlobaLex is the provision for emailing questions or comments directly to the author of each guide, making the research process more collaborative. At this point, GlobaLex is particularly useful for researchers interested in the legal systems of Eastern and Central European countries, for which research guides have previously been unavailable. Site creator and editor Mirela Roznovschi plans to continue adding new research guides as they become available, particularly ones about law in various African and Latin American countries.

When you need to research foreign and international law online, don’t start from scratch. If you take the time to locate a current and authoritative online research guide to the jurisdiction or topic of interest, you’ll have a much better chance of success.

Need information on your candidate in the Presidential 2008 Election?Have you been watching the Republican and Democratic debates? Do you think Bill Clinton is teaming up with Hillary against Barack Obama? Is your favorite candidate still running or have they dropped out of the race?While ten years ago people got their political information mainly from newspapers and television, people now use the Internet as a major source of information. Each candidate has his or her own website as well as various political organizations. With the growth of weblogs and other social networking, people often use YouTube and MySpace in this decade.There are a number of Internet sites with useful information about the 2008 presidential candidates, election and the political process. Many of these resources include RSS feeds and public forum or blog comments from members of the general public. This article highlights some sites you may find interesting and useful.· Campaign Legal Center “Representing the public interest in enforcement of campaign and media law.” This nonprofit nonpartisan center follows and initiates legal action on issues, including campaign finance, election law, political communication and ethics. The site includes a blog, weekly reports and links to related articles from court cases and legislation. Access: www.camlc.org/.· Federal Election Commission This site provides information about legal and regulatory rules relating to federal campaign finance issues. Its searchable Disclosure Database is the original source of all the campaign finance data provided by other groups. The FEC also delivers a campaign finance page (http://www.fec.gov/DisclosureSearch/mapA.do) with an interactive map showing how much money certain states have contributed to the cause.Access: www.fec.gov/index.shtml/.· Politico and Campus Politico “Meet and Track the Candidates” This extensive political news site from Capital News Company covers the presidential campaign and other political events and issues. The site includes an extensive list of websites for each candidate, video clips and an open forum for commentary. Campus Politico focuses on college-age voters and includes links to social networking sites and downloadable widgets that provide updated blog postings from Politico writers. Access: http://www.politico.com/campuspolitico/· “The 51^st State: The State of Online” This article by Laura Gordon-Murnane appeared in the November/December issue of Searcher and has been made publicly available. The article provides a listing of the technological and social features that are available on presidential campaign websites as of late summer 2007 and analyses how candidates, media and voters are using these tools.Access: http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/nov07/Gordon-Murnane_51stState.pdf/.· Pollster “All about Polls” Political polling permeates the political season, yet rarely is provided with any context beyond the basic horse race results. Pollster tracks, aggregates, and analyzes political polls (including presidential, congressional and gubernatorial races). The site provides links to other polling and survey research groups and resources, and has a very helpful FAQ page that explains how political polling is done. Access: http://www.pollster.com/.· CampaignMoney This site allows visitors to find campaign finance data, including searching for contributions by zip code, individual name or address and political action committees, as well as post opinions about candidates. Special reports include contributions made by celebrities, industries, companies and more.Access: http://www.campaignmoney.com/· Project Vote Smart One of the first political information sites on the Web, Project Vote Smart provides an extensive amount of information about elected officials, including voting records (congressional and legislative), special interest group performance evaluations, campaign finance data and issue positions from the Political Courage Test (formerly known as the National Political Awareness Test). The site also provides general political information, including voter registration information, information on statewide ballot measures and links to other resources.Access: http://www.vote-smart.org/.· Fact Checker The goal of this Washington Post site is to “shed as much light as possible on controversial claims and counter-claims involving important national issues, such as the war in Iraq, immigration, health care, social issues, the economy and the records of the various presidential candidates.” The 2008 Campaign includes videos, political blogs and information on each candidate, including financial data. The Post’s information seems to be very balanced.Access: http://factcheck.org/.· Open Secrets Look up who and the amount they donated to candidates, how much money was raised and spent on campaign finances and the personal finances of candidates. The Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) supplies campaign finance information to other political information services, but its own website, Open Secrets, covers more territory. In addition to data about campaign contribution donors and recipients, lobbying and advocacy group spending, the site includes databases covering financial disclosure, the revolving door between door between industry and government agencies and congressional travel. CRP’s online newsletter “Capital Eye” provides news and analysis articles about the role of money in politics.Access: http://opensecrets.org/.· Politifact A project of the St. Petersburg Times and CQ (Congressional Quarterly), this site uses scorecards, fact sheets and articles to review claims made by candidates (the Truth-O-Meter) and attacks from opponents (the Attack File). The site includes ratings on some claims, using a six-point scale that ranges from “True” to “Pants on Fire.” They also offer a twice-weekly e-mail service that delivers “meter readings” to your e-mail box. Access: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/.(Information found at Lorena O’English, Election 2008 Resources, 69 College & Research Libraries News, 1 (Jan. 2008).Submitted by Gail Hartzell, Acquisitions and Serials Librarian, gail.hartzell@valpo.edu

From the Law Library

By Steven Probst, Educational Services Librarian

Despite the fact that law students will be in full exam preparation mode on reading day (Tuesday, December 11th), most will probably still notice some wonderful changes taking place to their surroundings in the library. On that day, five Valparaiso University undergraduate photography students will be coming to hang their own original photographs on the second floor of the Law Library. These photographs were specifically commissioned from the students by Dean Persyn this past August.

Following two successive summer construction projects in the library which renovated the upstairs computer lab and created additional office space, several library staff members noted an overabundance of empty wall space within the library in need of livening up. As we are always trying to make the library surroundings as comfortable and enjoyable as the effective study of law will permit, we felt some new artwork would add a nice touch. However, an ad hoc committee thrown together to investigate the purchase of new artwork quickly learned what may seem obvious: art is expensive. With limited resources at its disposal, the committee opted to consult an expert on how to get the most art bang for the library’s buck: V.U. Professor of Art Aimee Tomasek. Professor Tomasek, in hearing our problem, suggested that the library hire students in her advanced photography class for the job. Given that she felt her students could provide ten original photos matted and framed for what we were prepared to spend on three or four framed poster prints, we readily agreed to this proposal.

Since August, these students; Heather Benson, Sherry Duffy, Erika Lusthoff, Sharayah Schram, and John Williamson have been working on this project in conjunction with a road-trip assignment that is a usual requirement of their advanced photography class. Each of them has been busy traveling around Northwest Indiana and the Chicago area in search of subjects to photograph that would be suitable for display in the Law Library. The only instruction provided to students in advance was that the subjects should either be law-related or depict the area surrounding Valparaiso University.

In mid-November, several staff members from the library met with these students and reviewed their work in order to select which prints would be framed and displayed within the library. It was obvious in meeting with the students that they had taken this project very seriously and that they had put a great deal of time and energy into the assignment. Each student had an abundance of excellent photos to choose from which made the decision-making process rather difficult. However, two photos from each student were eventually selected for display and they will soon be here for your enjoyment. Please take a study break at some point during your preparations for finals and enjoy the new artwork.

Good luck on your exams, and enjoy the holidays and a well-earned semester break! We’ll see you next year in the library.