The Goodson Blogson

The Goodson Law Library has subscribed to the Oxford Legal Research Library , a collection of Oxford University Press titles in four collection areas: International Commercial Arbitration, International Commercial Law, Financial and Banking Law, and Private International Law. Each collection can be browsed and searched separately, or across the broader ORLR interface. Titles in these collections include treatises, practice guides, and commentaries, such as Schlechtriem & Schwenzer's Commentary on the UN Convention on the International Sale of Goods (4th ed. 2016), Commentary on the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts (PICC) 2nd ed., Brexit and Financial Regulation (2020), and Sovereign Defaults Before Domestic Courts (2018). See the full title list . For help with accessing the Oxford Legal Research Library or other research resources, be sure to Ask a Librarian .

Yesterday, the White House announced the presidential pardons of 15 individuals and sentence commutations for 5 others. While several involved the more typical clemency for non-violent drug offenders, other recipients of a pardon have generated headlines and controversy: two were connected to the Robert Mueller investigation that resulted in the impeachment of President Trump, three more were former GOP congressmen convicted of financial wrongdoing, and four were former Blackwater contractors convicted of killing 14 civilians in Iraq. These latest acts of clemency have not yet been posted to the Justice Department's Office of the Pardon Attorney website , which includes information about petitions granted and denied during this presidential administration. It seems likely that the list may continue to grow during President Trump's remaining four weeks in office, as news sources have reported the president is considering preemptive pardons for his adult children and for close...

The compressed fall semester schedule means that finals are just around the corner! Law school exams are stressful even in the best of times, so law school exams in 2020 may require some additional support. Fortunately, the Goodson Law Library provides access to some resources that can help ensure your success. Online study aids can be invaluable ways to clarify difficult concepts from class or fill in gaps in your outlining. Current Duke Law students have online access to both the West Academic Study Aids Library and the Wolters Kluwer Study Aid Library . While both services offer online reading/searching and offline download, different study aid and outline series are available in each database. West includes the series Concepts and Insights, Hornbooks, Nutshells, Black Letter Outlines, Legalines, Sum and Substance, Law Stories, and many more. Wolters Kluwer provides access to the series Examples & Explanations, Glannon Guides, Emanuel Law Outlines, and more. If law school ex...

Back in mid-March, it seemed unthinkable that the coronavirus pandemic could possibly stretch into the winter holidays, even as many experts cautioned about the long road ahead. Today, states are reopening slowly, albeit with limitations on public gatherings in order to prevent new spikes in infection rates. With more folks likely to be completing their holiday shopping -- and shipping -- online, it would be prudent to get a head start on planning in order to ensure that your carefully-selected gifts arrive in time. The first (and hopefully last) pandemic edition of the Goodson Blogson's long-running guide to holiday gift ideas for lawyers and law students is here to help. Remote work (and school) is here to stay for at least a while longer, so maybe the lawyer or law student in your life could use an upgrade to their home office setup. Accessories like webcams, microphones, headsets, ring lights, and portable green screens have been in high demand since spring, and backorders a...

"As extra precaution against too much confidence as a result of improvement in the situation, the board in its daily statement issued last night urges the people of the city not to celebrate Hallowe'en night in the usual manner (by congregating) owing to danger from crowding in rooms and on the sidewalks." While this statement could just as easily be written today, it comes from a 1918 influenza briefing by the Durham City and County Board of Health, published in the October 31 issue of the Durham Morning Herald ( available to the Duke community via Newspapers.com ). Durham was no outlier -- officials around the country restricted public gatherings and Halloween festivities during the influenza epidemic of 1918, as CNN and History.com have both explored recently. The discouragement wasn't entirely successful -- only days later, the Nov. 3 society page of the Herald highlighted the "very bright and attractive Hallowe’en party […] given by the nurses of the Wa...

Most people associate voting with early November, specifically the first-Tuesday holiday known since 1845 as Election Day . However, the current pandemic as well as expectations of record voter turnout has brought renewed focus onto other methods of voting, including mail-in voting and early in-person voting. In North Carolina, for example, one-stop early in-person voting begins today , October 15th, and will last until October 31st. Issues surrounding voting this year, especially related to COVID-19, have made finding accurate information about the voting process all the more urgent. In response, the Goodson Law Library's Faculty and Scholarly Services Librarian Wickliffe Shreve has worked with the Government Relations Committee of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) to create a Voting Resources page as part of AALL's Advocacy Toolkit . The Voting Resources page has information and links to nonpartisan resources on information about state primaries, locat...

The Goodson Law Library has recently subscribed to the National Consumer Law Center's NCLC Digital Library . This campus-wide database includes full-text access to 22 e-book titles on consumer law topics, including: debtor rights, mortgages & foreclosures, credit & banking, deception & warranties, and consumer litigation. A how-to guide for consumers on Surviving Debt is also included in this subscription. The Quick Start Guide contains tips and tricks for searching and browsing the digital library. Recent updates to online editions as well as significant law changes in the last six months are marked with blue or red flags, respectively. As the guide cautions, the database's search features differ from research services like Lexis and Westlaw, but it is possible to develop proximity searches and exclude unwanted words using the NCLC search syntax. A separate "Advanced Pleadings Search" link is available to limit results only to sample documents included...

The coronavirus pandemic has forced a reckoning nationwide about the administration of bar examinations, usually offered two times a year in each jurisdiction. While about two dozen states did hold a late-July, socially-distanced bar exam in person, other states postponed to a planned September administration, which some jurisdictions postponed again in favor of a remotely-administered online exam to be held on October 5 and 6 (see chart at the National Conference of Bar Examiners ). Concerns have grown over the possibility of technical issues with the upcoming online bar exam, with a number of test-takers reporting problems with practice exams and difficulty in obtaining remote support . Michigan's online bar exam, held in late July, experienced widespread technical issues which the State Board of Law Examiners later blamed on a hacking attempt. Whether or not next week's online examination faces similar technical issues, it seems certain that conversations about alternative...

The Friday night announcement of Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death prompted national mourning. Over the weekend, hundreds gathered on the steps of the United States Supreme Court, and at courthouses around the country, to celebrate the life of this trailblazing jurist. This week, the Justice will lie in repose at first the Court steps, and then at the U.S. Capitol. To learn more about Justice Ginsburg's remarkable life and career, the Duke University community can access the 2018 documentary film RBG online. Additional biographical resources can be found in the Duke Libraries catalog with a subject search for "Ginsburg, Ruth Bader" . The "Available Online" filter will limit your results to e-books and video links; the Duke community may also request circulating print materials via Takeout service. Justice Ginsburg's death has prompted not only an important national conversation about filling a vacant Court seat during a presidential elect...

This Thursday marks the 233rd anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution. Constitution Day and Citizenship Day are recognized together, as described in 36 U.S.C. § 106(b) to "commemorate the formation and signing on September 17, 1787, of the Constitution and recognize all who, by coming of age or by naturalization, have become citizens." While the restricted library building access and quarantine protocols mean we can't provide our usual pocket Constitutions to visitors for the time being, the Government Publishing Office's Constitution of the United States with Index and the Declaration of Independence, Pocket Edition is available as House Doc. 112-129 (be sure to select "Booklet" if printing!). The text of the Constitution is also available in the Organic Laws of every print or electronic version of the U.S. Code , in the Library of Congress's Constitution Annotated site, and as a high-quality scan at the National Archives . To lear...

Members of the state bars or bar associations in all fifty states enjoy free access to at least one online legal research service as a benefit of membership. Generally, these membership benefits provide access to either Fastcase or Casemaker ; a few states offer access to both. These services each include state and federal case law, statutes, and regulations; each also offer some unique content courtesy of partnerships (law reviews through Fastcase's partnership with HeinOnline; foreign and international content on Casemaker via vLex). Both services have been in the bar benefit market for many years, and occasionally jurisdictions will switch platforms. Today marks the first day of Fastcase's partnership with the Alabama State Bar , announced back in May. Members had previously received access to Casemaker. The Goodson Law Library has tracked these changes to the landscape on our page Legal Research Via State Bar Associations . Current partnership lists for each research se...

Yesterday, attorney Andrew S. Fleischman observed on Twitter : "Law schools teach you how to write briefs by having you read opinions. Which is a bit like learning to cook by reading restaurant reviews." Many law students would likely agree with this sentiment for just about any legal subject, as they work to piece together disparate holdings from their casebooks in order to form a bigger picture of the law. Enter study aids , which can provide an overview and introduction that presents the law more clearly than a casebook. These titles range from basic introductions or casebook-keyed outlines to more in-depth discussions of a particular subject. The Goodson Law Library provides electronic access to several law-related study aid collections, accessible to current members of the Duke University community. West Academic Study Aids Library includes more than 500 study aid titles. Available series include Nutshells, Hornbooks (and Concise Hornbooks), Sum & Substance, and...

Today marks the centennial of the ratification of the Amendment XIX to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing: "The right of the citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." On August 18, 1920, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the amendment, which had passed in both chambers of Congress during the summer of 1919. The National Archives include a high-resolution image of the House Joint Resolution at its America's Founding Documents site for the U.S. Constitution . To commemorate the occasion, the New York Times has published Suffrage at 100 , a series of articles exploring the fight for women's right to vote and the stories of those left behind by it. As the articles note, Native American women and Asian immigrants were excluded due to citizenship laws of the era, while Black Americans faced discriminatory measures such as poll taxes in much of the country. For more informatio...

Law students who are finishing up the Legal Research Bootcamp sessions have likely already completed the module on Congress.gov and Regulations.gov . The session on Regulations.gov mentioned that the content of the "classic" site was being migrated to a new "beta" site, which would launch officially at some time in the future. Well, as is true for many of us during these times, it appears to be officially "Blursday" for Regulations.gov. Starting recently, Thursday is "Beta Day," meaning that the only version of Regulations.gov that you will be able to access every Thursday is the beta. If you try to access the classic site on Thursdays, you will automatically be redirected to the beta one. This will be true even if you click on "For the official site, visit www.regulations.gov " link at the top of the beta site. Although you can easily access the classic site on any other day of the week, if you did attempt to use it on a Thurs...

This week's Legal Research Bootcamp session on dockets came at just the right time! Whether you’re a law student enrolled in the online bootcamp or not, you may be interested in several important changes to major resources for researching court filings. Last week, the federal court site PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records) unveiled a redesign to its home page and informational sections, the first such cosmetic change in more than ten years. (The PACER database in which users search for and retrieve case filings was not part of this redesign.) Legal blogger Bob Ambrogi outlines the changes , which include improved navigation, new accessibility tools, and a mobile-friendly design. The site also provides easy access to PACER's fees and billing information . PACER requires account-holders to have a payment method on file, although users are not charged unless they accrue $30.00 of charges (at a cost of $0.10 per page) during a billing quarter. Members of the Law S...

People-finding research can take many forms: locating needed contact information; tracing your family history; finding background on a client, judge, opposing counsel, expert witness, or even the forgotten inventor of the rape kit . The increased online availability of public records has made this research easier than ever before - which can present ethical dilemmas related to "doxxing" unsuspecting persons, such as those mistakenly identified as criminal suspects whose information is posted on the internet. The following people-finding resources should only be used for legitimate and responsible research purposes. One powerful research resource that is available to the Duke Law community is the Locate a Person (Nationwide) database within Lexis Advance . To reach it, log in to the Lexis research system and choose "Public Records" from the menu in the top left corner. You can conduct searches for people, including options to search addresses and limit by dates of...

The Goodson Law Library is pleased to announce the new Race, Oppression and Social Change Resource Guide , which provides links to e-books and streaming video that are available through the Duke Libraries. Developed by Casandra Laskowski , Technology and Research Services Librarian and Lecturing Fellow, the guide includes tabs on various topics such as the history of racism and inequality in America, institutional structures that contribute to oppression, specialized topics such as the criminal justice system and healthcare, exploration of marginalized identities, guides to allyship and advocacy, and resources for educators. This guide is accessible from the library Research Guides page. Its contents will be updated regularly, and title suggestions are welcomed at ref@law.duke.edu . A tab of Duke Libraries Catalog Subject Headings provides access to additional resources, which can be filtered to e-resources by using the "Available Online" checkbox. In response to increa...

Do you suffer from page fright ? When you're drafting a legal document for the first time, having an example (or "form") to go by can alleviate writer's block. Of course, you will have to edit any forms to reflect the specifics of your client's case or transaction, but starting with a form can save you time and help you avoid mistakes and omissions. Last week , we highlighted the SEC's EDGAR (Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval) system as a notable source of information about publicly traded companies. Did you know that EDGAR is also a goldmine of forms for transactional drafting? Issuers are required to file "material contracts" as exhibits to their EDGAR filings, and you can repurpose those agreements as sample documents when you are drafting. (When agreements from completed transactions as used as forms, they are often called "precedents." ) If you have a specific precedent in mind, the SEC's Company Filings sear...

Did you know the same company that makes Sunlight dish detergent also makes Axe cologne, or that Starbucks owns an insurance company in Vermont? Ever wonder which law firms represent the Disney Company? Finding company information is a useful skill, whether you are looking to make a good impression in an interview, conducting due diligence as you prepare your client for a merger, or trying to come up with some decent trivia questions. Fortunately, there is a lot of information you can learn about companies, and much of it is accessible for free. If it's a publicly traded company, check out EDGAR , the Securities and Exchange Commission's free company search website. Track down the latest 10-K form, and see what surprises await. This is the annual report, where you will find everything you could want to know, including a list of subsidiaries, a rundown of the past year's performance, and projected income for the coming year. If you want to see how a company has been impac...

Ahmaud Arbery was jogging in south Georgia when he was pursued and shot by several white men. Breonna Taylor, an EMT from Louisville, was shot multiple times in her bed by police officers executing a surprise "no-knock" warrant. In Milwaukee last month, George Floyd died after a police officer placed a knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes. These brutal and horrifying deaths of Black citizens are recent high-profile examples of a long history of injustice and inequality. These deaths, along with murders and law enforcement abuses that have taken place before and since, have generated widespread public protest as well as calls for justice, accountability, and police reform. As demonstrations and calls to action continue to grow, many activists and organizations have developed resource and reading lists for people who wish to educate themselves about the history of inequality and racism in America, as well as proactive next steps toward reforming unjust systems. One compre...

The COVID-19 pandemic has had implications across multiple fields: health, education, politics, and law. It has also affected all of us, in some way, personally. As it touches on nearly every aspect of our lives, the amount of information related to the outbreak can be overwhelming. We are inundated with claims from news, social media, friends, colleagues, and more. Most concerning for many is finding resources on the outbreak and the virus that are reliable. In response, the Goodson Law Library's Faculty and Scholarly Services Librarian Wickliffe Shreve has created a new research guide on COVID-19 Resources , now available on the library website. The new guide covers sites dedicated to health, government, international, and legal resources on reactions to and studies of the pandemic. It also focuses on work on COVID-19 produced by the Duke community, in particular the Duke Law community. For law students, faculty, and members of the legal profession familiar with the major leg...

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its opinion in Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org Inc. , with a 5-4 majority ruling that the non-binding annotations in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated were not eligible for copyright protection under the government edicts doctrine. As the New York Times noted , the voting blocs were not the typical 5-4 ideological division: Chief Justice Roberts’s majority opinion was joined by Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh. Justice Thomas wrote one dissenting opinion, joined by Justice Alito in full and Justice Breyer in part. Justice Ginsburg authored a separate dissenting opinion, which was also joined by Justice Breyer. SCOTUSblog includes photo illustrations of vote alignment by both ideology and seniority , each demonstrating the unusual alliances in this case. The Code Revision Commission of Georgia had contracted with LEXIS to prepare the revisions; annotations were drafted by Lexis staff as a work-for-hire. Lexis sells h...

Today would have been the library's ninth annual National Library Week Alumni Author event, with featured speaker Randolph J. May (B.A. 1968/J.D. 1971) of the Free State Foundation. While the global coronavirus pandemic has indefinitely postponed our planned event with May to discuss his new book (with co-author Seth Cooper), Modernizing Copyright Law for the Digital Age: Constitutional Foundations for Reform , we still wanted to recognize May, as well as to celebrate our many Duke Law alumni who have published books on a wide variety of topics, both legal and non-legal. Books by Duke Law School alumni are marked in the Duke Libraries Catalog with the collection name "Alumni Authors." The items are still shelved by their Library of Congress call number, rather than in a separately-located collection, to aid the discovery of works on a particular topic. You can view recordings of our eight past Alumni Author event speakers on the National Library Week at the Goodson ...

Whether you're continuing at Duke Law next year or graduating this May, your access to legal research services like Westlaw , Lexis Advance , and Bloomberg Law will change. All Students Many of the temporary resources for textbooks and eBooks listed on the Library's Working Remotely site will expire at different times this summer. Lexis Digital Library (textbooks, treatises, study aids): May 24 Wolters Kluwer textbooks via VitalSource : May 25 West Academic textbooks: June 1 Wolters Kluwer online study aids : June 30 Online Bluebook codes: 60 days from registration Continuing Students For rising 2Ls and 3Ls, your Law School research access generally continues uninterrupted over the summer. Lexis Advance and Bloomberg Law both allow student usage over the summer for educational as well as for commercial purposes. (However, check with your employer before using your Law School accounts for paid work – many employers prefer that summer associates avoid using th...

This weekend would have marked the 23rd Annual Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, a world-renowned celebration of nonfiction filmmaking. Although this year's festival was canceled due to the global coronavirus pandemic, the festival website continues to provide information about the selected 2020 feature-length and short films that would have been a part of this year's festival . Festival organizers have also shared a list of past Garrett Scott Documentary Development Grant Award winners (a prize that brings first-time documentary filmmakers to the festival) with information about where their films can now be streamed. Current members of the Duke University community have access to a number of resources for streaming documentary films, beyond your own consumer subscriptions to platforms like Netflix and Hulu. If you'd like to host your own documentary film festival this weekend, here are some options available with a NetID, featuring some favorite titles fr...

Yesterday, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced a 90-day extension of federal income tax payments for 2019, due to the global coronavirus pandemic ( story at CNN ). Despite the extension of time to pay federal taxes owed, Mnuchin recommended that taxpayers still attempt to complete and file their 2019 returns by the normal April 15 deadline. [ UPDATE 3/20 : The deadline to file has now been extended to July 15 as well, per an updated announcement by Secretary Mnuchin .] (The extension also does not apply to states, which must set their own deadline extensions for tax filing; California has already changed its payment and filing deadline to June 15.) Taxpayers whose income was at or below $69,000 in 2019 may qualify for the IRS Free File service, which offers online tax preparation assistance and free e-filing for federal taxes. The Free File Online Lookup Tool helps taxpayers identify available free online filing offers that are appropriate for their tax situation. If y...

The global response to the spread of novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has been swift and drastic, with most universities and other public spaces closing temporarily in an effort to "flatten the curve" of new infections. For information on Duke University's response, check https://coronavirus.duke.edu/ ; the Law School information page can be found at https://law.duke.edu/about/coronavirus-response . Experts agree that "social distancing," which encourages people to self-isolate as much as possible at home, is key to preventing further transmission. While schools transition to online learning and many workers shift to remote employment, that leaves the question of how to spend free time in an age when most restaurants and non-essential services are shuttered for the foreseeable future. Here are some resources to brighten your time at home. Read a good book: Current members of the Duke University community can access thousands of e-books via the Duke Libraries Ca...

Sure, grades are a good enough reason to put in the hours of research and writing on a seminar class paper. But what if all that hard work could earn you even more than a top grade? You might consider reworking past or current research projects for a law student writing competition . Many organizations sponsor writing contests for current law students, and most offer cash prizes as well as potential publication opportunities. How can you identify potential writing competitions for your project? The T.C. Williams Legal Essay Contest Catalog , maintained by the University of Richmond Law School, is the most comprehensive listing of law student writing competitions. The website features several useful searching and sorting options, including the ability to sort by subject matter, deadline, and even prize amount. The American Bar Association also maintains a list of Writing Competitions , which includes some contests not currently featured on the Richmond list. (This is likely because ...

Over the next week or so, you may notice library staff members taking notes about where our users are sitting (or standing, in the case of our sit/stand desks). It's no cause for alarm – we're conducting an assessment of library space usage, in order to identify patterns (such as the most popular places, times of day, and furniture types), and to help inform future space planning projects. No individually-identifying information is being recorded or reported, just tallies of where and when library visitors are using our space at certain times of day. Consider our space assessment a warm-up, of sorts, to another important counting project taking place this spring: the 2020 Census . A decennial requirement from Article I, section 2 of the U.S. Constitution , Census data helps to determine such critical matters as congressional seats in the House of Representatives and federal funding distribution for public services. Everyone living in the United States and its territories is...

Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit will hear arguments in the ongoing litigation about the cost of PACER, the U.S. government's repository of federal court filings. PACER , or Public Access to Court Electronic Records, operates behind a paywall of $0.10 per page for searches and document retrieval. Charges are capped at $3.00 per document, and individual users are not billed unless they incur more than $15.00 in charges during a billing quarter. While the costs of PACER were designed to support the system’s infrastructure, critics have noted that PACER's annual income (more than $145 million) far exceeds the actual operating costs. As The New York Times reported over the weekend , several consumer groups have filed suit over PACER costs. The complaint highlighted practices of overcharging or double-charging individual users, and also challenged the judiciary's practice of using excess PACER income for costs unrelated to the maintenance of the court...

The Goodson Law Library has recently subscribed to Gale Primary Source's new database, The Making of Modern Law: Landmark Records and Briefs of the U.S. Courts of Appeals, 1950-1980 . The eleventh library in the Making of Modern Law series expands access to online court records and briefs with more than half a million pages of content spanning three decades. Materials may be searched by keyword, browsed by jurisdiction, or explored in the Topic Finder. A "Term Frequency" tool allows researchers to conduct textual analysis. Coverage varies by jurisdiction, but the First through Tenth Circuits as well as the D.C. Circuit are represented (the Eleventh Circuit was formed from part of the Fifth in late 1981, one year past the database’s cutoff date). The "Circuits" browse menu shows the source libraries and approximate number of pages available for each jurisdiction. Coverage is currently strongest for the Second Circuit and D.C. Circuit, each with about 225,000 pa...