Monthly Archives: May 2008

New rules rule

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We’re making room on the shelf here for an extra fat issue of the June 1, 2008 Federal Register.

The lead story in today’s New York Times reports on a memorandum sent to executive agencies by White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten on May 9th telling the agencies that “they have until June 1 to propose any new regulations. . . .”

Administration Moves to Avert Late Rules Rush
By CHARLIE SAVAGE and ROBERT PEAR
Some legal specialists said the White House’s deadlines for
proposing and issuing regulations would make it harder for
President Bush’s successor to overturn them.

The Times story notes that the order

. . . will affect only potential rules controlled by the Bush administration.  It does not apply to independent agencies or to pending regulations with deadlines imposed by federal statutes or court orders.  The memorandum also does not prevent agencies from continuing work on potential rules that are not intended to be made final until after the next president takes office.

An interesting and related article is John M. Broder, A Legacy Bush Can Control, The New York Times, Week in Review, Sunday, September 9, 2007, p. 1.

Just Research Book Review

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In an earlier post (see “Just Google It First,” below) I mentioned Just Research, a popular legal research text here at Stanford.  Below is a book review of this book, written by Stanford law student Raaj S. Narayan for our Advanced Legal Research class. 

Narayan ALR Book Review

Case Law Just Wants to be Free

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Case Law Just Wants to be Free

An Accelerating Trend

by Robert J. Ambrogi

Legal.Online column in May 2008 Oregon State Bar Bulletin

An excellent, must-read summary of the past, present and future of open access to court cases.

“. . . in the information age in which we now live, private control over the distribution of public case law seems anachronistic.”

Just Google It First

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It’s a variation on our class theme of “secondary first!”  But a Wall Street Journal Law Blog posting, “Advice from the Corner Office: Use Google; Avoid Grammar Gaffes,” offers some key tips from law firm partner Drew Barry and includes this good research advice:

Get Yourself Smart on a Subject, Fast: When they get assignments, he says, self starters “contextualize” the issue by “Googling stuff for fifteen minutes.” Lexis and Westlaw, he says, are fine for focusing on a point of law. But the peripheral vision provided by a Web search is also invaluable. It can yield relevant law journal articles, blog posts, plaintiffs’ lawyers sites, law-firm newsletters and the like.

In a way, he says, see-what-I’ll-find Internet research is akin to the old hard-cover legal research methods which, he says, are more than powerful electronic search engines “give a feel for the evolution of the common law.”

 

A popular legal research book here at Stanford is Just Research by Laurel Currie Oates and Anne Enquist; it includes many tips on ways to find good legal overviews using Google.

West Academic Advisory Board

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I am serving in the middle of a three-year term as a member of the West Academic Advisory Board.  We had our annual meeting last week in Minnesota.  Two jam-packed days of discussions and meals (the good people at West are incredibly gracious and thoughtful hosts).

 

There were 7 of us library directors in attendance, plus a whole host of people from West.

 

It’s a fun meeting, and we get a sneak peak at some new lines, products , services and service enhancements under development by West.  Oops, I mean Thomson West.  Oops, I mean Thomson Reuters!  And some of this new stuff might never see the light of day, either.  I can’t wait to show our students some of the new Westlaw features.  Our main agenda topics were “Law School Libraries – Today and Tomorrow” and “New Products and Ideas for Libraries and Professors.”  As related products do get rolled out, we will comment upon them at this blog.

 

I can’t write about what we did talk about (we all sign confidentiality agreements), but one topic that did not come up was the open access movement.

 

I thoroughly enjoyed my two days in Minnesota and look forward to next year, my last year of service on the board (each year new members rotate in and old ones rotate out).  There’s e-mail and newsletters and Wimba and blogs!, but there is still no substitute for in-person conversation, and never will be.

A Modest Proposal for Regulating Unpublished, Non-Precedential Federal Appellate Opinions

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“A Modest Proposal for Regulating Unpublished, Non-Precedential Federal Appellate Opinions While Courts and Litigants Adapt to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32.1″

Journal of Appellate Practice and Process, Vol. 9, No. 1, p. 17, Spring 2007

SARAH E. RICKS, Rutgers School of Law – Camden

Federal appellate courts are overworked. To handle their overloaded dockets, appellate judges have adopted a wide variety of measures intended to promote efficiency, including deciding approximately eighty percent of appeals in nonprecedential opinions.

Courts and litigants currently are adapting to new Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32.1, which prohibits courts from restricting the citation of non-precedential opinions. Whether it is constitutional for federal appellate courts to issue non-precedential opinions is outside the scope of this essay. Putting the constitutional question aside, as a practical matter, at least for now non-precedential opinions should not be eliminated in favor of universal publication of opinions as precedent. That would be a dramatic break from several decades of federal appellate court practice. Moreover, universal publication as precedent would risk repetitive rulings and increased need for en banc overruling of inconsistent circuit precedent.

However, as an interim measure, and without ruling out future structural reforms, this essay proposes that federal appellate courts modify their internal operating procedures or local rules. Circuit courts should expressly confer persuasive value on non-precedential opinions, provide specific criteria to guide the publication decision, and permit anyone-not just parties-to move the court to reissue a non-precedential opinion as a precedential opinion. The proposed modifications would help to better ensure that non-precedential opinions are consistent with precedential opinions from the same circuit, that like cases are treated alike, that issues resolved at the appellate level need not be relitigated before district courts, and that nonprecedential opinions truly are limited to repetitive applications of settled law.

Source: LSN Litigation & Procedure Vol. 9 No. 52,  05/30/2008

Stories from the trenches: Getting by with a little help from our friends

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Sometimes it’s not what you know, but who you know.  Or, more accurately, whose contact information you can find.

This morning we received a request to track down some government reports that were the subject of a FOIA request a few years ago.  Initial web browsing was unsuccessful, so I took a decidedly low-tech approach (at least by today’s standards) and picked up the phone.  I called both the organization that made the initial request and the attorney who represented them in a subsequent lawsuit.  Within twenty minutes my call had been returned and the reports were sent poste haste, via e-mail.

This is not the first time that an attorney or organization has jumped in to help out by sending hard to find items our way.  One of our favorite tips to give students in our Advanced Legal Research class is to reach out to individuals when searching in their favorite spots does not pan out.  Today it payed to practice what I preach.

Below is a link for the requested items.  Included are memorandums and reports from the Department of Defense and their Threat and Local Observation Notice reporting service relating to surveillance of college campus activities surrounding the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy of the United States military.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell FOIA Documents

Grant opportunity for human rights clinics working in Spain and Latin America

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If your law school runs a clinic that promotes human rights in the Iberian peninsula or Latin America, you may wish to apply for the King of Spain Human Rights Prize (III Premio Rey de España de Derechos Humanos).  A panel composed of government officials and administrators form the University of Alcalá will award €30,000 to the winning organization. Applications, in Spanish,  are available online at http://www.defensordelpueblo.es/resoluciones/convocatoria_III_premio.pdf.  Deadline for submissions is Sept. 15, 2008.  ¡Buena suerte!

 

Tools of the Trade, part III

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While we eagerly await the arrival of our Foreign, Comparative and International Law Librarian, we continue to field requests for trainings and materials in these areas of law.  These requests have grown as the law school expands its clinics and programs into increasingly global concerns.

When faced with the daunting task of finding Namibian law online or sources for Chilean ocean policies, I have had the comfort of turning to a source that offers expertly written and exhaustive research guides for almost any area of foreign/international/comparative law.  A project of New York University Law School, Globalex offers the novice researcher a great starting point for research ranging from finding the sources of laws in another country to tracking down bi-lateral trade agreements.  It has quickly become a favorite bookmark of mine.

Bloomberg Law Reports – Good stuff for current awareness

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We now receive Bloomberg Law Reports.  I’m not one to plug publishers, but I must say that I have received extremely favorable responses to these reports.  I forward them to faculty and they have consistently told me that the quality of the reports is extremely good. 

Here’s what we get (with a few faculty responses noted):

Bloomberg Law Reports®- Antitrust & Trade

this looks interesting and better organized than competitor publications.  I would love it if you could send me these

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Bankruptcy Law

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Corporate Law

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Employee Benefits

Bloomberg Law Reports® — Health Law

This looks great! Thank you!

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Insurance Law

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Intellectual Property

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Labor & Employment

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Litigation

Bloomberg Law Reports – Mergers & Acquisitions

This is quite interesting.
It would be useful to see it regularly.

 

 

Bloomberg Law Reports® – Securities Law

They arrive weekly as nice PDFs.

And they all come with this note:

For more information on BLOOMBERG LAW™ (BLAW) and the Bloomberg Professional service, please contact Amy Wilson at awilson15@bloomberg.net or Sebastean Leoni at sleoni2@bloomberg.net.

so if you’re interested in learning more, I suggest contacting one of these Bloomberg reps.