What Law Firm Librarians Want You to Know

Sue Altmeyer, Electronic Services Librarian, sue.altmeyer@law.csuohio.edu | April 03, 2008 – 11:41

(Update: Be sure to read the comments to this post by Christine Stouffer, Library Director at Thompson Hine)

If you will be clerking this summer, you will want to look at the library’s new guide: Getting Ready to Clerk: Resources and Tips for A Successful Summer Associate Research Experience.

You may also want to look at the following tips I gathered by speaking with local law firm librarians. Here is what the firm librarians want you to know:

1. “We have a lot of online services in addition to Lexis & Westlaw. Sometimes they can be a lot more cost-effective, especially when starting a project.”

What you can do — Take a look at Heinonline, BNA databases or RIA Checkpoint(tax) via the electronic resources page. Get a free student membership in the Ohio State Bar Association and get the Casemaker database for free. Look at the library’s Internet Legal Research Guide or Legal Research Workstation to discover free Internet sources. Ask the firm librarian about available databases before starting a project.

2. “There is a lot of electronic information that can not be reached by Googling.”

What you can do ….. Again, find out what databases the firm purchases. As far as information on the web, use search engines geared specifically to legal information such as Justia, FindLaw or Westlaw WebPlus (free for Westlaw subscribers). Find and bookmark sites that have relevant legal information, or are portals to legal information. Read The Invisible or Deep Web by U.C. Berkeley.

3. “Treatises and practice books can be a good starting place. Often students will want to hop on a case law database right away. These books collect the relevant cases and familiarize the researcher with the appropriate terms of art. While many of these books exist both online and in print, use the print versions if the firm has them.”

What you can do ….. Take a look at law library research guides to discover the titles in particular areas. Ask the firm librarian what treatise/practice book they would recommend.

4. “Before trying to do all the basic research yourself, check to see if an existing source has already done the work for you.”

Treatises, practice books, 50 state surveys on Lexis or Westlaw and compiled legislative histories are examples of resources that may have done the work for you.

5. “Know something about legislation, legislative history and administrative law. If you’ve never heard of the United States Code or the Code of Federal Regulations, then you’ve never heard of two of the most important tools of your chosen profession.”

What you can do …. Look at the Administrative Law Guide, Ohio Legal Research Guide and/or Legislative History Research Guide ,specifically Acts and Statutes. Ask a law school librarian to show you statutory and/or administrative sources.

6. “Don’t forget about basic sources such as Ohio Jurisprudence (“OJur”), American Jurisprudence (“AmJur”) and the West’s Digest.”

What you can do …. For a super quick review of law library resources, see Law Library 101: Using Your Law Library to be a Successful Law Student.

CALI Lessons also provide a review of legal research concepts. For more legal research tutorials, see Tutorials and Instructional Research Guides.