Legal Writing and Research Commons^™

Where To Begin Researching Civil Rights Law, Rebecca Mattson

Law Library Faculty Works

In this article, the author discusses selected sources for researching civil rights law.

Splitting Hairs: What Subtle Distinctions Teach Us About Authority, Benjamin J. Keele

Library Staff Publications

Legal researchers constantly deal with issues of authority. Did the police have authority to search the car? Is this court of appeals decision binding authority on my case? What statutes are authoritative in my jurisdiction? These questions are important, and librarians often help find answers. The question of authority that librarians are best equipped to answer, however, is “How authoritative is this source?”

Open Access: Good For Readers, Authors, And Journals, James M. Donovan, Carol A. Watson

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Readers, authors, and even law journal publishers will all achieve their different but related interests by adopting open access principles. Readers of every kind will have more efficient access to the materials they need to pursue their intellectual and informational goals; authors will see their works read and cited by a broader audience; and law reviews and journals can raise their own profiles without injuring their revenue streams from fee-based sources. Open access works for everyone, and is the future of information creation and distribution.

Open Access: Good For Readers, Authors, And Journals, Carol Watson, James M. Donovan

Articles, Chapters and Online Publications

Readers, authors, and even law journal publishers will all achieve their different but related interests by adopting open access principles. Open access works for everyone, and is the future of information creation and distribution.

Cost Effective Legal Research, Mike Martinez Jr, Katy Stein

Law Librarian Scholarship

This article discusses free and low-cost legal research resources that can help reduce the cost of litigation. A lawyer using such resources must appreciate not only the advantages of such resources, but also the disadvantages.

Teaching Rule Synthesis With Real Cases, Paul Figley

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Rule synthesis is the process of integrating a rule or principle from several cases. It is a skill attorneys and judges use on a daily basis to formulate effective arguments, develop jurisprudence, and anticipate future problems. Teaching new law students how to synthesize rules is a critical component in training them to think like lawyers.

This article suggests how rule synthesis might be taught in one classroom session using real cases. It advocates a three-part approach. First, explain the nature of rule synthesis to the students. Second, do a whimsical exercise with them to show how rule synthesis works. Finally, …

Checklists: Not Just For Pilots Anymore, Diane B. Kraft

Law Faculty Popular Media

In this column for Kentucky Bar Association's magazine (B&B - Bench & Bar), Professor Diane B. Kraft discusses how using checklists can improve an individual's legal writing skills.

Book Review Of Finding The Answers To Legal Questions, Benjamin J. Keele

Library Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Law & Reference: Answering Legal Reference Questions, Wendy Moore, Maureen Cahill

Presentations

Answering legal reference questions can be challenging, especially when you are not doing it on a daily basis. More and more legal information is available freely on the internet, but sometimes it is hard to know what the best sources are and how to make certain you are not accidentally practicing law at the reference desk. This presentation provides exposure to helpful internet resources and discussion of effective strategies to help you answer legal related reference questions in a non-law library setting with skill and confidence.

Citation Advantage Of Open Access Legal Scholarship, Carol Watson, James M. Donovan

Articles, Chapters and Online Publications

In this study focusing on the impact of open access on legal scholarship, the authors examine open access articles from three journals at the University of Georgia School of Law and confirm that legal scholarship freely available via open access improves an article’s research impact. Open access legal scholarship—which today appears to account for almost half of the output of law faculties—can expect to receive fifty-eight percent more citations than non–open access writings of similar age from the same venue.

Citation Advantage Of Open Access Legal Scholarship, James M. Donovan, Carol A. Watson

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In this study focusing on the impact of open access on legal scholarship, the authors examine open access articles from three journals at the University of Georgia School of Law and confirm that legal scholarship freely available via open access improves an article’s research impact. Open access legal scholarship—which today appears to account for almost half of the output of law faculties—can expect to receive fifty-eight percent more citations than non–open access writings of similar age from the same venue.

Free Websites For Virginia Legal Research, Paul Hellyer

Library Staff Publications

It’s no secret that free websites give away content sold by high-cost subscription databases, but you might not know how useful free sites are. If you think there’s always a trade-off between cost and quality, think again. Some free resources for Virginia legal research are as good as—or better than—subscription sites. And some free resources aren’t quite as good as what you can buy, but are an option.

Should Laptops Be Banned? Providing A Robust Classroom Learning Experience Within Limits, Robin A. Boyle

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)
/="/">Technology abounds today’s law students. Laptops, iPods, iPads, and BlackBerrys are just a few of the newly developed modes of communication, notetaking, and music-storing devices that creep into our vocabulary – and students’ backpacks. Given the competitive nature of law school, students understandably bring laptops to class hoping to maximize their performance. Unfortunately for all involved, students use their laptops beyond the task of note-taking. The distractions that present themselves in class have led law professors to complain on various fora about the frequency of laptop use in the classroom. Some posit that students’ inappropriate use of laptops …

Research Beyond The Obvious: An Overview Of Uga Law Library Databases, Sharon Bradley

Presentations

Describes several useful specialized databases available to University of Georgia law students.

Legal Citation Without Fear, Maureen Cahill

Presentations

Shares tips for approaching and interpreting Bluebook instructions.

Peer Editing: A Comprehensive Pedagogical Approach To Maximize Assessment Opportunities, Integrate Collaborative Learning, And Achieve Desired Outcomes, Cassandra L. Hill

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

What Great Writers Can Teach Lawyers And Judges: Precise, Concise, Simple And Clear, Douglas E. Abrams

Faculty Publications

Despite some imperfections across disciplines, advice from well-known fiction and non-fiction writers can serve lawyers and judges well because law, in its essence, is a literary profession heavily dependent on the written word. There are only two types of writing - good writing and bad writing. As poet (and Massachusetts Bar member) Archibald MacLeish recognized, good legal writing is simply good writing about a legal subject. "Lawyers would be better off," said MacLeish, "if they stopped thinking of the language of the law as a different language and realized that the art of writing for legal purposes is in no …

Truth, Justice, And The Libertarian Way(S), Gary S. Lawson

Faculty Scholarship

More than twenty years ago, I was commissioned to write an article – my very first scholarly article – on “the ethics of insider trading” (this was hot on the heels of the Ivan Boesky insider-trading scandal of the mid-1980s).1 After tracing philosophical debates concerning the morality of exchanges based on unequal information from Cicero and Aquinas through Henry Manne and Frank Easterbrook,2 I had to decide what I could responsibly say in a scholarly work as a matter of substantive moral theory about the practice of insider trading – and derivatively what it would be appropriate to say normatively …

Federal Register 2.0: Public Participation In The Twenty-First Century, Lauren R. Dudley

Legislation and Policy Brief

On July 26, 2010, the Office of the Federal Register and the Government Printing Office (GPO) launched “Federal Register 2.0,” a web version of the daily Federal Register.  As of now, the site is only a prototype; therefore, “Federal Register 2.0” is not yet an official legal edition of the Federal Register, and it will not become official until the Administrative Committee of the Federal Register (ACFR) issues a regulation granting “Federal Register 2.0” official legal status.  Once “Federal Register 2.0” becomes official, the website will allow the public to receive notice of proposed agency regulations, link to a separate …

Rookie Mistakes To Avoid, Edward R. Becker

Other Publications

I'm Ted Becker from the University of Michigan. My part of today's presentation is to fall on the sword. I say that because my topic is rookie mistakes to avoid. Many of us up here on the panel aren't rookies but I certainly am. I just completed my first semester of teaching transactional drafting so I'm new to the game, and then when it comes to mistakes, oh yes, there's a bunch of them that we can talk about. Because the semester just ended, these missteps are as fresh in my mind as they could possibly be, and I hope …

Working With Kf Modified: Changes And Enhancements, F. Tim Knight, Humayun Rashid, Darren J. Furey

Librarian Publications & Presentations

Provides an overview of the KF Modified classification scheme, introduces some recent editorial changes and enhancements, and includes some interactive cataloguing exercises.

The Perils Of Hyperbole, Diane B. Kraft

Law Faculty Popular Media

In this column for Kentucky Bar Association's magazine (B&B - Bench & Bar), Professor Diane B. Kraft makes suggestions about avoiding hyperbole in legal writing.

Animal Law Developments, Virginia C. Thomas

Library Scholarly Publications

No abstract provided.

Getting Into The Field, Jay A. Mitchell

Journal of Food Law & Policy

A group of students enrolled in a law school clinic wanders through a large farmers' market. They stop to chat with the proprietors of a farm that has sold vegetables at the market for many years. They visit with a cheesemaker and an apple grower. A second group learns about the economic costs of organic production from a farmer and talks with an olive oil producer. Both sets of students seem unusually attentive to their surroundings. That may be because the first group helped the sponsor of the market rework the market's rules and regulations, and the second developed a …

Low Cost Alternatives For Legal Research: Using Casemaker And Loislaw, Emily Janoski-Haehlen

Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Beating The Bluebook Blues: A Response To Judge Posner, Stephen M. Darrow, Jonathan J. Darrow

Michigan Law Review First Impressions

Judge Richard A. Posner's recent critique (The Bluebook Blues) of the maddening hypertrophy of The Bluebook is surely a refreshing voice of sanity for the multitudes of law students and legal professionals who have had occasion to consult it. Even at Harvard Law School, the home of its founding institutional sponsor, The Bluebook's labyrinthine rules annually aggravate a fresh crop of otherwise remarkably stoic future lawyers. But while many of Posner's observations regarding The Bluebook are astute, we posit that both form and uniformity are important for citations, and we suggest citation-formatting software as a means of maximizing the utility …

Unequaled Expertise: Childress And Davis's Federal Standards Of Review, Henry Deeb Gabriel

The Journal of Appellate Practice and Process

No abstract provided.

Abandoning Law Reports For Official Digital Case Law, Peter W. Martin

The Journal of Appellate Practice and Process

No abstract provided.

Does The Readability Of Your Brief Affect Your Chance Of Winning An Appeal?, Lance N. Long, William F. Christensen

The Journal of Appellate Practice and Process

No abstract provided.

Abandoning Law Reports For Official Digital Case Law, Peter W. Martin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.