Res Ipsa Loquitor: Volume 8, Number 5: February 1998

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Potpourri!

by Linda K. Fariss

The dictionary defines potpourri as a "miscellaneous anthology or collection." This month, instead of a lead article, here is a "potpourri" of information, hopefully, of interest.

Quiz Bowl Dates Change

Speaking of potpourri (it's one of the categories in the Law Library Interrogatories!), the dates for the Quiz Bowl have been changed to March 9-10, 1998. The date was changed to avoid the many conflicts that were arising with other events in the Law School (not to mention Mardi Gras!). So mark your calendar and get your teams together! Remember - law students, faculty and staff (except for Library staff) are eligible to participate. Teams should consist of four members plus an alternate. The entry fee is $50 (that's only $10/person) - or maybe you could get a rich benefactor to sponsor your team! All proceeds will be donated to the student activities fund. To learn more about the Law Library Interrogatories, check out the display in the Law School Lobby. To sign-up see Wendy Brim in the Library Office or stop by the Reference Desk.

Library Suggestion Box Goes Online

The Library Suggestion Box is now available through the Law Library website at a link under Library Services and Publications. You may also visit the Suggestion Box at the following address: http://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlib/suggest.html

Suggestions may be sent anonymously or you may use your email address. All "signed" suggestions will be answered. Some suggestions may be used in Res Ipsa Loquitur. You may, of course, continue to use the Suggestion Box located on the circulation desk in the Library.

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Laptop Room Now Available in Law Library

Do you have a laptop computer or are you considering buying one? If so, please remember that the Library now has a Laptop Room (Room 206E on the second floor of the Library) where you can hook your laptop up to the University's network. Using the University's network you can send and receive e-mail, use Lexis and Westlaw, access your student locker and browse the web. You must have an ethernet adapter to hook up your laptop. If you do not have an ethernet adapter card, the Library has twelve of them available for checkout at the circulation desk. Installation is easy - there is an instruction sheet provided with the adapter card. If you do run into technical problems, Dave Lankford is available to provide assistance. He is located in the Media Center of the Law Library (Room 208). So, to get the most out of your laptop, make sure you check out the Library's Laptop Room soon!

New & Noteworthy: From the Vault

On April 18, 1946, Grolier Club members and their guests were invited to the headquarters of the famed New York City bibliophiles' club, to attend the opening of an exhibition of original editions of "One Hundred Influential American Books Printed Before 1900." The exhibit's purpose, as dictated by the Club's Council, was to "prepare an exhibition of American books that would arouse in all who saw it a feeling of pride in the accomplishments of our countrymen." Not surprisingly the list of books includes some predictable classics: Poe's The Raven, Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, Melville's Moby­Dick, Thoreau's Walden, Whitman's Leaves of Grass, Alcott's Little Women, and Mark Twain's duo The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

What is a little more surprising is the number of law related titles found in "the 100." Perhaps influenced by the fact that two of the three members of the Selection Committee were lawyers, the list includes several trial reports (A Brief Narrative of the Case and Tryal of John Peter Zenger; Marbury v. Madison; Dred Scott versus John F. A. Sandford) as well as some important government documents (one of four known surviving broadside copies of The Declaration of Independence; a copy of the Northwest Ordinance; James Madison's personal copies of both an August 6, 1787 draft of the U.S. Constitution and his copy of the final September 17, 1787 document; an original copy of The Bill of Rights; and original copy of The Monroe Doctrine; and an original printing of the Emancipation Proclamation). Two other listed titles, of special interest to the legal community, were George Washington's personal copy of the complete collection of The Federalist and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.'s masterpiece, The Common Law.

While copies of all of these law­related titles are available in the Law Library, in one form or another, the only "original edition" we own is of Holmes' The Common Law. The Law Library's first edition of Holmes' work was presented to the Law Library by Law School Alumni, Karsten Schimdt ('59), in 1994 as the 500,000th volume added to our collection. One of the newest books on the Grolier Club's list (published in 1881), The Common Law quickly became a legal classic.

Upon its publication, the American Law Review called the book "extraordinary," "ingenious," and "brilliant." The Albany Law Journal referred to Holmes as "master of his subject" and said the book was "indispensable." Overseas, the reviews were equally, if not more, positive. The London Spectator called the book "the most original work of legal speculation which has appeared in English since the publication of Sir Henry's Maine's Ancient Law."

Unlike most books, the acclaim continued far past the early reviews. Eight years after its publication legal historian Frederic William Maitland wrote "for a long time to come [it] will leave its mark wide and deep on all the best thoughts of Americans and Englishmen about the history of their common law." Thirty­eight years later, W. S. Holdworth, Professor of English Law at Oxford, noted that "it is remarkable how well most of Holmes' opinions on points of legal history have stood the test of time during the ensuing period of active historical research." By 1935, the year of Holmes' death, Felix Frankfurter was calling The Common Law "the single most original contribution thus far to legal scholarship." More recent scholars have called it "a landmark in intellectual history" (Mark DeWolfe Howe), "a coldly passionate expression... a work of art" (Sheldon M. Novick), "one of the greatest works of American legal scholarship" (Joseph M. Bessett) and simply "the classic account of the great formative ideas of English law (Julius J. Marke).

The Law Library has several copies of The Common Law (KF 394 .H65), in addition to our first edition shelved in the Rare Book Room. If you would like to see the first edition copy, just ask a Reference Librarian.

Dick Vaughan
Acquisitions & Serials Librarian

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BOOK OF THE MONTH

Burlingame, Michael, editor. An oral history of Abraham Lincoln: John G. Nicolay's interviews and essays. Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University Press, 1996. E457.2.N67 1996.

This book is a collection of interviews conducted by John G. Nicolay, who was Abraham Lincoln's Chief White House Secretary. In addition, the book contains two previously unpublished essays written by Nicolay, one discussing the campaign of 1860, and the other concerning Lincoln's journey from Springfield to Washington to take the oath of office.

Lincoln first met Nicolay in 1856 in Springfield, Illinois. In 1857, Nicolay went to work as the clerk for Ozias Hatch, the Illinois Secretary of State (and staunch support of Abraham Lincoln). After Lincoln was nominated for President, he hired Nicolay to be his personal secretary, and then kept him on after he was elected President. After President Lincoln's assassination, Nicolay served as Consul in Paris, and as the Marshal of the United States Supreme Court. However, for 18 years (from 1872 to 1890), he mainly worked on his huge ten­volume biography of Lincoln. In preparation for writing this book, he and John Hay (Lincoln's Assistant Secretary) interviewed many men who knew Lincoln. These interviews were conducted through the 1870's and into the 1880's, and were done in both Springfield and Washington. However, when it came time to write their biography, Nicolay and Hay made little use of the interviews. Some details were suppressed due to concerns as to how the family (particularly Robert Todd Lincoln) would react. Also, Nicolay and Hay were mistrustful of human memory. Eventually the Springfield interview transcripts were deposited at Brown University in 1958, and the Washington interview transcripts were deposited at the Library of Congress in 1949.

The interviews themselves are a fascinating window into the personal and professional lives of Abraham Lincoln. The Springfield interviews discuss for the most part his life and law practice in Springfield, while the Washington interviews deal more with Lincoln's presidency. There are extensive endnotes and explanations. It is a very interesting book, and I recommend it.

Michael Maben,
Cataloging Librarian

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MUST SEE MOVIES

Dating back to the early days of the Silver Screen, Hollywood has always had a fascination with the legal profession. While the creative courtroom antics and oftentimes questionable professional ethics of the big screen's attorneys can be very entertaining, do they really provide us with a realistic view of the law? In the October issue of The National Jurist, several law professors interested in popular culture and the law were asked their opinions on what films were actually useful in a law school classroom. The article lists twenty-five "must see" movies for law students and explains why you should see them and what to watch out for while viewing them. Nearly all of the movies can be found in the Law Library's video collection.

According to the article, here are the twenty-five movies every law student should see.

  1. The Accused
  2. Anatomy of a Murder
  3. ...And Justice for All
  4. The Caine Mutiny
  5. Class Action
  6. Compulsion
  7. A Few Good Men
  8. The Firm
  9. Inherit the Wind
  10. Jagged Edge
  11. Kramer vs. Kramer
  12. Murder in the First
  13. My Cousin Vinny
  14. The Paper Chase
  15. Philadelphia
  16. Presumed Innocent
  17. Primal Fear
  18. Sleepers
  19. The Thin Blue Line
  20. A Time to Kill
  21. To Kill a Mockingbird
  22. Twelve Angry Men
  23. The Verdict
  24. Witness for the Prosecution

  25. and finally.... Star Wars (?!)

Nonie Watt
Head of Technical Services

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Lexis Now Available Through the Web

You can now access Lexis through the web. Point your web browser to http://lawschool.lexis.com/ and click on one of the three options for "Research": Get (like lexsee or lexstat), Cite (checks a cite), or Search (terms and connectors search screen). You will be prompted for a username and password. The username is your Lexis ID and the password is your last name. The web interface is different from the Lexis­Nexis 7.0 Software, but in some ways is easier to use.

The major drawback with accessing Lexis via the web is the lack of laser printing and dual column printing. Your print options are basically limited to the print options of your web browser. Print jobs cannot be directed to the Lexis laser printer on the second floor of the Library.

Lexis via the web may be useful to those of you traveling. You could access Lexis without having the software loaded on your laptop, and you could access it from any computer with Internet access.

Please contact me if you have any questions.

Juliet Smith
Electronic Services Librarian

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WORKING THE HALLS

New Faculty Publications:

Juliet Casper Smith. Criminal Law and Criminology: A Survey of Recent Books, 87 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 1066 (Spring 1998).

Happy Birthday to:

Pat Clark, in the Admissions Office, on February 1st.
Mary Edwards, in the Library, on February 4th.
Nonie Watt, also in the Library, on February 7th.
Professor Julia Lamber on February 27th.

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Please join us in wishing our February birthday bunch a wonderful day!

Welcome !

Amanda Burnham as the Director of Annual and Reunion Giving.

Hope you all have a great day!!!

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The Suggestion Box

Each month in this space Associate Director Linda Fariss replies to suggestions received by the Library)

Suggestion: A suggestion from Many of us!: Please turn the heat up in the library!! Many of us freeze in there on a daily basis. Especially, on the ground floor where all the tables are at. Other than that I really like the law library and the librarians there.

Response: Thanks for the suggestion and the compliment! We have recently had the heat (or lack of) checked in the Library and there were some problems found, among them a broken thermostat. Hopefully these repairs will make the Library warmer. Please let us know if the problems continue. You may also report things like this to the circulation desk or reference office. (This was our first electronic suggestion via the web!)