HeinOnline’s New Database: State Constitutions Illustrated

HeinOnline’s newest database is State Constitutions Illustrated, a collection of the constitutions of the 50 states of the United States along with related documents and resources. It literally contains the text of every constitution that has been in force for every single state with original, consolidated and current texts. It also has an extensive collection of documents from before statehood. It currently has nearly 10,000 historical and current constitutions and constitutional documents, and they are adding even more.

From the HeinOnline landing page, click on the top left gold drop-down list of databases. Find and select State Constitutions Illustrated:

To use the database, first go to the main landing page of State Constitutions Illustrated which displays a lovely map view. From there you can either click the desired state on the map, or select the state name from a drop-down menu. The black numbers on the map numbers along with color coding show the boundaries of the United States Courts of Appeals and United States District Courts. Once you have selected a state you can expand sections to view a constitution by date along with amendments and other related documents. It also links to scholarly articles.

There is an excellent LibGuide HeinOnline provides with tips for searching this database including a neat Venn Diagram search tool that shows you how search terms interact with each other visually. Check it out at https://libguides.heinonline.org/state-constitutions-illustrated/search.

Celebrate 1st Generation College Day with a Movie Screening in the Library TODAY at 3 PM

November 8 is National First Generation College Celebration Day!!

In recognition of the many first-generation students here at law school, the First Start Program is delighted to host a movie screening and discussion. We will be watching the documentary “First Generation”. The film screening will last about 1 hour, and will be followed by group discussions about first-generation student experiences. All law school students, faculty, and staff are invited to join us! Light refreshments will be served.

From the film’s website:

 “An award-winning documentary narrated by Golden Globe nominee Blair Underwood, First Generation tells the story of four high school students – an inner city athlete, a small town waitress, a Samoan warrior dancer, and the daughter of migrant field workers – who set out to break the cycle of poverty and bring hope to their families and communities by pursuing a college education. Shot over the course of three years and featuring some of our nation’s top educational experts (Richard Kahlenberg, The Century Foundation; J.B. Schramm, College Summit; Dr. Bill Tierney, University of Southern California), the film explores the problem of college access faced by first generation and low-income students and how their success has major implications for the future of our nation. It won “Best Documentary” at the Idyllwild International Festival of Cinema, and a “Special Jury Award for Social Impact” at the Napa Valley Film Festival. First Generation has been embraced far and wide as a tool to spark the conversation about what it takes to increase the college-going and success rate for low-income and first generation students.”

 

Throwback Thursday: The Grotius Collection & Our Library’s Tiniest Book

By Rachel Evans, Wendy Moore & Sharon Bradley

On a wild goose chase to locate a photograph from the 1950’s which we did not find (yet!) we explored the nether-regions of our library archives including the rare book room. It was there on a low shelf hiding in plain sight that we couldn’t help but pick up what is surely the tiniest book in the library: De mari libero et P. Merula De maribus (1633) The item is one of many in our special Grotius collection. You can view a complete list of items in the Grotius collection by browsing our libguide bibliography which links to works either online or in our library catalog.

Age 25 (1608)

Known of one of the fathers of International Law, Grotius was a Dutch scholar born in the late 1500’s in Holland. His first publication emerged in 1597 in the form of his own scholarly edition of the fifth century encyclopedic work of Martianus Capella: On the Seven Disciplines (liberal arts). Grotius made all the corrections, annotations, deletions and illustrations. One of most well-known works was first published in 1625: On the Law of War and Peace: Three books (De jure belli ac pacis libri tres). It was dedicated to Louis XIII, begun in prison, and intended to address the long running conflicts between Spain and the Netherlands (Eighty Years’ War/Dutch War of Independence,1568–1648) and between Catholic and Protestant European nations (Thirty Years’ War,1618-1648). Both of these conflicts ended after his death in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia.

The tale of his passing in 1645 is one of a shipwreck, when bound for Lubeck from Stockholm the ship he was traveling on was caught in a storm for several days. The ship was eventually destroyed and Grotius was found battered and washed ashore, but alive. He survives three days in the city of Rostock where his last words are:

“By undertaking many things I have accomplished nothing.”

Grotius’ legal works were cited extensively over time as authority in judicial decisions, diplomatic practice, and scholarly works in a large number of countries until the late nineteenth century. To learn more about Grotius, visit our libguide dedicated to his life and works including a timeline and portraits of this early scholar.

Three Faculty Events this Month Highlight New Books and Using Twitter

Faculty Book Celebration for Elizabeth Burch – Friday Nov. 8^th

•  at 11:45 AM in Classroom B
•  In celebration of Elizabeth Chamblee Burch‘s recently published book, Mass Tort Deals: Backroom Bargaining in Multidistrict Litigation, a panel discussion will be held featuring Burch and guest speakers Maria Glover from Georgetown Law and Teddy Rave from the University of Houston Law Center.

Faculty Brown Bag with the Law Library – Monday Nov. 11^th

•  at 12 Noon in Cheeley
•  Law Librarians Amy Taylor, Carol Watson and TJ Striepe present Twitter Best Practices for Academics sharing tips for why and how to use the social media platform as well as facilitating discussion about the pros and cons of Twitter.

Faculty Book Release for Andrea Dennis – Tuesday Nov. 12^th

•  at 6:30 PM at Avid Bookshop
•  In celebration of the recently published book Rap on Trial: Race, Lyrics, and Guilt in America with co-author Andrea Dennis.

You can find more faculty scholarship including book release celebrations in our Faculty Colloquia collection as well as our complete selection of Faculty Books in our online repository Digital Commons: https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/. You can also check most of the faculty books out from the law library collection, or find them in the faculty book display cabinet outside the School of Law Dean’s Office Suite.

ALA’s International Games Week in Libraries Paves the Way for Stressbusters

Each fall and spring semester as classes end and exams begin the library puts out an assortment of stressbusters to help encourage law students (as well as faculty and staff!) to give their brain a little break. Just a few moments of downtime, a coloring sheet, a puzzle or a brain teaser can make all the difference as you prepare for the weeks that come. This year for the first time ever the law library is participating in the American Library Association’s International Games Week!

Established in 2011 by the Games and Gaming Round Table (GameRT) of ALA, the event provides a venue for all types of libraries to host gaming in their library for their users. This year the week takes place November 3 through the 12th, and at UGA Law Library we are hosting video, board and card games Wednesday the 6th through Friday the 9th. We encourage law students, law school faculty and staff and librarians to come in a play one or more games with each other, or to bring your own games in.Tons of locations across the world including school libraries, academic and public libraries have registered. Check out the Google Map of participating libraries and get excited!

Of course, our classic stress busters are still on the way with exams just around the corner. Expect all the usual fun from our giant screen wordsearch games and our newest addition of study buddies beginning around reading days and throughout the weeks of exams.

Resource Spotlight: GALILEO’s Georgia Legislative Documents

At the reference desk we often get questions from attorneys related to legislative history. Sometimes they are searching for the O.C.G.A. from a specific year when a particular part of legislation was enacted. For one such question recently we were searching for a certain act from 1960. In this instance we recommend that you WORK BACKWARDS:

1.  Try the current version of the annotated code first
2.  If needed, use the index to find the right place in the current code (we have copies behind the reference desk in our Georgia Reference Collection)
3.  Then locate years, page numbers and previous section numbers for the act or section you are researching (section numbers can change over time and in this example the Lexis current copy of this section did not list sections far enough back in time to reveal what the section was in 1960)
4.  Finally, use GALILEO’s Georgia Legislative Documents Search to retrieve a copy of the legislation using the exact year and page number

• GALILEO’s Georgia Legislative Documents Search 1799-1999 
• More resources on researching an enacted Georgia Statute

Happy Birthday to the United Nations!

Today marks the anniversary of the UN Charter’s 1945 entry into force, celebrated since 1948 as United Nations Day. For those of you in New York, a celebratory special concert featuring the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra with the participation of Dana Al Fardan, Hala Al-Emadi and Aisha will take place today in the General Assembly Hall.

Here at the University of Georgia School of Law, we have many United Nations resources at our fingertips. The Louis B. Sohn Library on International Relations includes the personal collection donated by Professor Louis B. Sohn, who worked towards the formation of the United Nations in addition to serving many decades as a law professor at Harvard, Georgia and George Washington. This special collection holds many titles about or by the United Nations.

We also collect United Nations documents on a variety of subjects. These are housed in the Law Library’s basement.

Stop by our display in the Reference area to check out a variety of our UN-related materials and documents.

Just next door at the Main Library you will also find a United Nations Publications collection  that complements our holdings, along with access to the United Nations iLibrary database. Ask a Reference Librarian  for help with any of these materials!