The Goodson Blogson

This weekend marks the sesquicentennial of the U.S. State Department publication Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) . The “thorough, accurate, and reliable documentary record of major United States foreign policy decisions and significant United States diplomatic activity” ( 22 U.S.C. 4351 ) has undergone many changes since its debut on December 3, 1861, when it mostly reprinted correspondence between State Department officials on then-current matters of foreign policy. Beginning in 1925, FRUS took on more of a historical perspective, covering events which occurred decades prior, and scholarly analysis began to appear alongside the correspondence. The publication of FRUS is now mandated by the United States Code , although the State Department has a little trouble meeting the 1991 requirement that a FRUS volume should appear “not more than 30 years after the events recorded” (the latest volume, published in 2011, concerns 1973’s Arab-Israeli conflict). FRUS is available in...

Driving to Grandma’s house for Thanksgiving dinner? There’s no better time to check out the AAA Digest of Motor Laws , a free compilation of state laws related to motor vehicle ownership and operation. The source is browseable by individual state, as well as by category: Is your window tint too dark for a neighboring state’s comfort? Do you need to put away that radar detector when you cross state lines? And even though you know you shouldn’t , can you legally use a cell phone or send a text message behind the wheel, wherever you may roam? The American Automobile Association added this long-running 50-state survey of vehicle laws to its website this summer (once upon a time, we received print editions in the libraries), and plans to expand the online service in the future with Canadian law and also comparative search tools. Note that the site links to undated summaries of the relevant state law, rather than the text of the actual statutes: to confirm the accuracy of the informati...

Yesterday afternoon, the Government Printing Office and the National Archives and Records Administration announced the public release of President Richard Nixon's Watergate grand jury testimony . Federal grand jury proceedings typically remain secret, but last September historian Stanley Kutler petitioned the U.S. District Court in D.C. for the Nixon transcripts’ release, citing their substantial research value. On July 29, Chief Judge Royce Lamberth granted the petition, agreeing with Kutler in his 15-page order that “[t]here is no question that the requested records are of great historical importance…[disclosure] would likely enhance the existing historical record, foster further scholarly discussion, and improve the public’s understanding of a significant historical event.” The grand jury records have been reviewed and some information has been redacted from the public release in order to protect the privacy of certain named individuals. Still, even a redacted release is u...

Around this time of year, the Goodson Blogson features links to unique sources of holiday gifts for lawyers and law students (see 2009 and 2010 ). Though many of these sites have appeared in our past roundups, their selections of merchandise often change from year to year, and are worth a second (or third) look this holiday season. Many D.C.-area government attractions maintain online gift shops with a wide range of law- and government-themed gifts, which can be perfect presents or stocking-stuffers to the lawyers and law students in your life: The Supreme Court Historical Society Gift Shop includes its latest entry in their annual holiday ornament series , Court-themed greeting cards , and a variety of office doodads like bookends, scale of justice clocks, and decorative statues. The U.S. Capitol Historical Society Gift Shop also offers holiday ornaments , in addition to stationery, framed posters and artwork, and (for some reason) decorative baseballs . (Note to our students: b...

The Goodson Law Library now provides campus-wide electronic access to the complete set of the Recueil des Cours (Collected Courses of the Hague Academy) through HeinOnline . Previously, Duke users needed to consult the print set in the library’s Periodicals collection and had electronic access to only a small subset of the publication (1923-1937) through the Gallica Periodicals database . The Hague Academy is a major research center for the study and teaching of international law, and its “Collected Courses” ( Recueil des Cours ) are drawn from its famous summer class series. Top international law scholars visit the academy to deliver lectures on public and private international law topics, which are then published in a volume of the Recueil des Cours . Each volume contains the courses for that year, in the language in which they were delivered (generally, either French or English). To locate Collected Courses on a particular topic, the individual courses are indexed in the Index t...