Oregon Legal Research BlogHow does one teach about the Three Branches of Government? Let us count the ways:
Published on:
Schoolhouse Rock and Legislative History?
Articles Posted in General Legal Research Resources
Published on:
More “Let’s Kill All the Law Libraries”: Virtual Law Libraries and Chief Justice Roberts
To continue my Oregon Legal Research blog post on Let’s Kill All the Law Libraries ….
What’s a “Virtual Law Library?” Lots of people throw the term around, but who knows?!
* Could it be Justia? The Public Library of Law? Would it be Findlaw? Could it be LexisOne?
Published on:
Oregon Revised Statutes, Copyright Dispute, and Legal Research
Jack Bogs Blog points us to a NYT story, the latest on public access to law and the Oregon dispute:
He fought the law and … he won.
I posted about this Oregon Revised Statute dispute here and here.
Published on:
Let’s Kill All the Law Libraries
For the past 20 years, at least, law school deans, legislators, law firm managers, lobbyists, jail and prison managers, among others, have been asking why their organizations need law libraries, and heaven forbid, law librarians. After all, “isn’t all the law online?”
My brief response is:
1) No, it’s not all online; only a fraction of it is, and most of that is just online versions of (allegedly official and current) primary sources and a lot of very bad “legal advice”. In other words, the easy-stuff is online, but not the right-stuff (that treatise, that superceded statute, that legislative history, etc.). And, if you don’t know how to use these primary sources in any format, print or otherwise (i.e. do legal research!), woe to those of you who try to make sense of these materials, e.g. the Oregon Laws, online.
Published on:
How Do I Find Federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Briefs?
A complete answer to this question depends on where you live. IF you are in a city with a federal court library or, lucky you, in a city where a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Library is located, you may have a few other options.
You may also have access to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (official name) briefs that are available on Westlaw or Lexis.
In time the briefs may appear on PACER (and a few may be there now, but I’ve not ever seen one there myself).
Published on:
“I can’t remotely use this law journal”: Technology (and reference interviewing) in the Law Library
In the good old days (uh, maybe not so good), this statement meant something very different from what it means today. In fact, it could be a test of how reference desk-qualified you are. Those library staffers who don’t see both meanings need some retraining.
“I can’t remotely use x law journal?”
Speaking of seeing “both (all!) meanings,” don’t forget these classics: Old Woman or Young Woman or the Vase or Face.
And Mona, from the Exploratorium online collection.
Published on:
LegalLinks from OSB: Small Claims, Animal Law, Legal Myths, and MORE
If you haven’t tried out the streaming video at the Oregon State Bar’s (OSB) website, now’s the time to make yourself comfortable and settle in for 30 minutes of some good old fashioned law-learnin’. Think how much smarter you will be afterward!
Topics include animal law, small claims, landlord-tenant law, police stops, charitable giving, legal assistance for military personnel, consumer bankruptcy, immigration law, bicycle law, and MORE.
There are no bells and whistles with these videos, and you might need some coffee or tea to give yourself a boost, but you will be so much wiser after listening to these. And they are only 30-minutes, which I know is a lifetime in this world of 25 second u-tube moving pictures. But lower your heart rate, live longer, impress your friends, your dates, your parents even!
Published on:
How to Read a Case
From BoleyBlogs, and not just for law students:
Published on:
Federal Law Preempts Oregon Law
For you non-lawyers out there, yes this sometimes happens. Lawyers really do learn useful things in law school and know things mere mortals don’t! (But not everything, so it doesn’t hurt to do your homework.)
From the OSB Litigation Section Newsletter (and they put it online – thank you!), July 2008 issue, this article by Caroline Harris Crowne & Julia E. Markley: “Federal Arbitration Act Preempts Oregon’s Legislature’s 2007 Amendement to Oregon Arbitration Act.”
“… In 2007, the Oregon legislature imposed a restriction on certain kinds of arbitration agreements that flies in the face of U.S. Supreme Court case law. ORS 36.620(5), part of Oregon’s version of the Revised Uniform Arbitration Act (“OUAA”), now requires that, in order for an arbitration agreement between an employer and employee to be valid, either the employer must give the employee two weeks’ notice before the first day of employment that an arbitration agreement is required as a condition of employment or the arbitration agreement must be entered into upon a “subsequent bona fide advancement” of the employee….” (full article from here, p. 4)
Published on:
Nolo Press Blogs
As if there wasn’t already more great legal research info than we could use in a lifetime, Nolo Press is now blogging (thanks to Law Librarian Blog for lead):