As you begin a research project, remember to take advantage of one of our most valuable electronic resources, HeinOnline. Although best known for its Law Journal Library, a PDF-based collection of more than 1,400 law review/journal titles (in most cases beginning with the first issue of each), HeinOnline also offers archival libraries of federal and state primary law (including the CFR, the Federal Register, and the Statutes at Large), federal legislative histories, U.S. treaties, foreign and international law sources, and classic American law treatises. Each library is full-text searchable, and search results are PDF files that can be printed and downloaded.
Research
The Challenge is On!
Join us next Wednesday June 29 (and on any or all of the following Wednesdays through July 20), for the Mendik Library’s 2011 Summer Research Challenge! Hone your research skills and have some fun (and snacks) at the same time. Get all the details here.
Loislaw in Transition
Wolters Kluwer, the company that produces the Loislaw service for computer assisted legal research, has advised us of their intention to discontinue their program of free Loislaw access for law students, effective in June of 2011. Wolters Kluwer is developing an enhanced Loislaw product for law schools, and we in the Library will be reviewing this product when details are finalized.
In the meantime, NYLS students with registered Loislaw accounts will find that their accounts no longer provide research access in June. Loislaw had been an electronic legal research alternative during the summer, when Lexis and Westlaw student passwords are restricted. This will no longer be true. For details regarding summer password extensions and other summer research options, please click here:
New York Law Journal (and other ALM Publications) Moved to Lexis
As of May 1, 2011, you can no longer find the New York Law Journal, the National Law Journal, the American Lawyer, or any other ALM (American Lawyer Media) publication on Westlaw. Lexis has become the exclusive online provider for ALM publications (with the exception of ALM itself, which provides direct online access via subscription).
If you are looking only for the New York Law Journal, the best way to access it from the main directory page is States Legal – U.S. >> New York >> Search News >> New York Law Journal. If you’re looking for content in other ALM publications, go to Secondary Legal on the main directory page and click the link for ALM.
Coverage for the New York Law Journal begins as of August 1, 1991. (We have full coverage in microfilm back to March 26, 1888.) Lexis coverage for the National Law Journal begins as of January 3, 1983. Coverage for other publications varies.
One caveat to keep in mind, courtesy of New York Times Co. v. Tasini, 533 U.S. 483 (2001): Access to certain freelance articles and other features (e.g., photographs, classifieds, etc…) may not be available.
Please Help Us Serve You Better
Earlier this week, NYLS students received an email message from Camille Broussard asking for your participation in a short nation-wide survey on how law students research and why they choose the research methodologies they do. If you have not done so already, the Library would appreciate your taking the few minutes to complete the 12-question survey. The results are all anonymous but the researchers will be able to send us a summary of the NYLS responses. This information will be very helpful in how we plan our services, courses and workshops.
You can take the survey here.
Preparing for Your Summer Employment
Just a reminder that this coming Friday April 8, you can take your research skills up a notch (or two) by attending the annual Bridge the Gap Program, which this year is being held right here at NYLS. Registration has been extended until Friday and you can register at the door for no extra cost. All the details, including registration information and the schedule of sessions, are available here.
The program will enhance your research skills in a number of specific practice areas and it concludes with a panel discussion among a variety of law practitioners. Panel members will describe the typical expectations for summer law student employees, and offer advice on how to be successful in a summer law job.
Have You Tried Loislaw Yet?
Loislaw is a comprehensive, user-friendly, low-cost electronic legal research service. It offers access to a wide range of primary and secondary materials for federal as well as all fifty state jurisdictions. Secondary sources and bar association materials are somewhat limited in the law school edition. Loislaw also offers an electronic clip service, a citator (GlobalCite), and a variety of productivity features and services.
Once students register for Loislaw, they have access throughout their law school program. Service continues through summers and there is no restriction on use. Best of all, it’s available free to law students for 6 months following graduation. If you’d like help with Loislaw, stop by the Reference Desk or contact The Loislaw Support Group at 1-800-364-2512.
To sign up for Loislaw you need to get New York Law School’s code for registration. Once you have the code follow the instructions for registration found here. Look for the New to Loislawschool.com link.
New Look for Lexis
Lexis has just introduced a brand new interface. The change in look is not dramatic and after a few uses, you should feel right at home. The new design lets users experience the enhanced features at their own pace. To oversimplify, the gray background has become white and the top tool bar has moved over to the right side. The “Related Content” section in the left frame of the search results screen has case background information, related secondary source links, and tools to allow one to move easily around and within documents. Lexis has also introduced Lexis for Microsoft Office, a productivity tool that automates certain Lexis research tasks and frees users from having to leave a Word document or Outlook message to sign onto Lexis. It is now available on all Mendik Library computers and you can download it to your laptop or home computer (including Macs).
A New Resource for N.Y. Criminal Law
Researchers tasked with finding the legislative history of New York criminal statutes have long faced a daunting challenge. By far the best source of this history is found in the records of the Temporary Commission on Revision of Penal Laws and Criminal Code, a state agency that functioned between 1961 and 1970. Unfortunately, these published documents were not widely distributed to law libraries, nor was their research value generally recognized. As a result, few libraries hold this collection, and the few libraries that do are unwilling to lend documents from it. Thus the legislative history has been difficult to come by – until now.
The State Supreme Court Criminal Term Library for New York County has just released a digital collection of these records, available on its website:
http://www.nycourts.gov/library/nyc_criminal/library_resources.shtml
This free public resource is full-text searchable, and makes the documents accessible in PDF format. For the first time ever, the legislative history of most modern New York criminal law – substantive and procedural – will be easily accessible to researchers.
The DRAGNET Family Is Growing!
DRAGNET (Database Retrieval Access using Google’s New Electronic Technology) is a popular feature of the Mendik Library’s Website that searches more than 80 recommended Websites of interest to legal researchers. You can access DRAGNET directly from our homepage. Now we’re incorporating Google’s Custom Search feature into two other areas of our site.
First, for more than a year, we’ve been linking to approximately 150 online legal journals whose Websites offer free access to their current issue, and often back issues as well. We’ve now added a Google Custom Search bar that lets you simultaneously search the full text of all those journals. Second, we now employ the Google Custom feature to let you search the constitutions, statutory codes, and administrative codes of all 50 states simultaneously.
We’re continuing to develop and improve DRAGNET as well as adding to the collection of sources searched. We always welcome your suggestions.