Legal research news from an Ottawa law librarian
Labels: Supreme Court of Canada
"Based on a comprehensive survey of citizenship and nationality laws of the countries of the world, this report presents information on the laws of those countries that allow acquisition of citizenship based on the fact of one’s birth in the territory of the country (jus soli, or birthright citizenship). In theory, the jus soli rule of citizenship stands in sharp contrast to the jus sanguinis rule, which grants citizenship only if one or both parents hold citizenship. In reality, the line between these approaches frequently blurs, as the various parent-based conditions for birthright citizenship listed in the table below illustrate."
"The research identified ninety-four countries that currently have, or previously had but recently terminated, laws granting citizenship by birth, with or without added conditions. A centuries-old principle of British common law that grew out of feudalism, the unconditional right to citizenship by birth was limited in many common law jurisdictions during the second part of the twentieth century. After exclusion of this right from British law by the 1981 Nationality Act, the application of the right changed in the British overseas territories as well. While jus soli was also a centuries-old tradition in Continental Europe, many of the civil law countries of Continental Europe opted for the jus sanguinis rule to determine citizenship in the nineteenth century, following the example of the Napoleonic Code. Today, however, a country’s jurisprudential tradition seems less determinative of its approach to birthright citizenship than geographic location: The report reveals that the vast majority of surveyed countries that currently grant unconditional birthright citizenship (all but six of thirty-three countries) are located in the Americas and the Caribbean."
Labels: comparative and foreign law, legal research and writing
"In 1997, Frank Houdek gathered responses to the request, 'Describe a single day in your law library life.' (...)
"Since 1997, various law librarians have recorded, in some form, a 'day in the life.' Perhaps most prominently, AALL held a 'Day in the Life' photo contest annually from 2005 through 2016. A 2007 issue of Law Library Lights was devoted to 'A Day in the Life of a Law Librarian.' (...)
"Why might we depict a day in the law library life to fellow legal information professionals or beyond? I suspect the main reason is that informing people about what we do relates to what we do in general: connecting people with information. Giving information about our daily work sheds light on services that can help people find legal information.."
"A side benefit of recording information about what we do is that we—and future readers—can learn about law librarians’ work over time. Using this and Houdek’s articles, one may compare law librarians’ activities in the 1910s, 1997, and 2018. And future legal information professionals may compare their workdays with prior days."
Labels: careers, law libraries
"In R. v. Sparrow, the Supreme Court of Canada considered for the first time the scope of section 35(1) of the Constitution Act, 1982, which recognizes and affirms the Aboriginal and treaty rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada. Significantly, the Supreme Court made it clear that the rights recognized and affirmed by section 35 are not absolute and outlined a test whereby the Crown may justify legislation that infringes on Aboriginal rights. In 1996, the Supreme Court, in a trilogy of cases dealing with commercial fishing rights (R. v. Van der Peet, R. v. N.T.C. Smokehouse Ltd. and R. v. Gladstone), laid further groundwork on how Aboriginal rights should be defined. The Supreme Court decreed that a purposive approach must be applied in interpreting section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982; in other words, the interests that section 35 was intended to protect must be identified. To define an Aboriginal right, one must first identify the practices, traditions and customs central to Indigenous societies that existed in North America prior to contact with the Europeans; to be recognized as an Aboriginal right, the practice, tradition or custom must also be an integral part of the distinctive culture of Indigenous peoples. The Supreme Court reiterated that section 35 did not create the legal doctrine of Aboriginal rights but emphasized that these rights already existed under common law. The Crown can no longer extinguish existing Aboriginal rights but may only regulate or infringe on them consistent with the test laid out in the Sparrow decision. The following is a summary of the cases mentioned above, as well as the decisions of the Supreme Court in R. v. Marshall, which considered a treaty right to a small‑scale commercial fishery, and Lax Kw’alaams Indian Band v. Canada (Attorney General), which examined the evolution of pre‑contact commercial fisheries."
Labels: aboriginal and Indigenous law, Library of Parliament, Supreme Court of Canada
"The Canadian Copyright Act allows the use of material from a copyright protected work (literature, musical scores, audiovisual works, etc.) without permission when certain conditions are met. People can use fair dealing for research, private study, education, parody, satire, criticism, review, and news reporting. In order to ensure your copying is fair, you need to consider several factors such as the amount you are copying, whether you are distributing the copy to others, and whether your copying might have a detrimental effect on potential sales of the original work."
Labels: copyright
"If you were paying attention to the last installment of the Canadian Law Blog Awards (aka Clawbies) this past December, you probably noticed that podcasts are more popular than ever. The top prize even went to a podcast this year!"
"Today’s tip is to expand your professional development horizons past print and in-person, and check out a podcast."
"A good place to start is with the outstanding productions that were mentioned in the 2018 Clawbies (...)"
Labels: podcasts
Labels: comparative and foreign law, legal research and writing
Labels: Charter, courts, criminal law, disability issues, firearms, government of Canada, legislation, Library of Parliament
"For library students and young librarians that might be interested in going into librarianship in a specialized area like law, what advice would you have? What kind of experience is important?"The Law Library of Congress is the world’s largest law library, with a collection of over 2.65 million volumes from all ages of history and virtually every jurisdiction in the world.
"I would encourage library students to start with internships in the public and/or private sector, to discover what they like, what kind of work and work environment motivates them. New law librarians should take a chance and try different roles–either functional ones within their library or leadership roles within an association."
"In my own career, I have been a cataloger, created back-of-the-book indexes, developed and created databases, assigned metadata, been a reference librarian, and I have worked for a legal publisher and many different types of libraries, both inside and outside the federal government. Also, I suggest novice librarians build a support network early on; you never know who may assist you later in your career. Finally, consider public service! Public service offers opportunities to apply your knowledge in ways that may surprise you, allowing you to stretch beyond single areas of law."
Labels: careers, government_USA, law libraries, profiles
Labels: Supreme Court of Canada
"to compile an initial list of selected unilingual decisions requiring translation. The ultimate aim of the project is to increase the number of court decisions available in both official languages in all provinces and territories and thus to ensure that caselaw emanating from all over Canada is accessible to all."People who are interested can fill out a Proposal Form with their suggestions of cases for translation.
"The project will favour the translation of court decisions which are more likely to have a serious impact on citizens’ private lives, notably in the field of family law and penal law. While decisions in these fields would be translated as a priority, other areas of law are certainly not excluded. We recognize that access to leading cases and landmark decisions in all fields of law is of paramount importance for the Canadian legal system."
Labels: legal research and writing
"The 90-page study presents data and commentary from 72 law libraries predominantly from the USA and Canada, about their use of artificial intelligence products in legal research and other applications. In addition, the study highlights how these libraries are educating their patrons in artificial intelligence approaches to legal research and organizational management. Survey participants also rate the impact and expected impact of artificial intelligence on various aspects of the legal profession including legal research, eDiscovery, law services marketing and other areas."Among the highlights:
Labels: IT trends, law libraries, legal research and writing, surveys
Labels: conferences, law libraries, library associations
"This webinar will explore recent developments in Canadian law that indicate a new trend toward imposing punitive measures at increasingly earlier stages of the prosecutorial process. The result is a potentially new field of criminal management some academics have dubbed 'pre-crime'. Pre-crime, which seeks to use the law as a technology of surveillance, is based upon ideas now seen as commonplace in the era of the 'war on terror'. Specifically, the need to ensure security at all costs, the proliferation of digital data, and the development of drones, social networking, and cloud storage to gather personal data. The webinar will be of use to anyone with an interest in criminal law, policing, and surveillance, as well as those interested in how areas of law, such as immigration, health, and anti-terrorism, are mobilizing the logic of risk and surveillance in new ways that emphasize precaution."The speaker will be Dr. Richard Jochelson, associate professor at the Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba.
Labels: continuing education, criminal law, library associations
"We are creating a database of regulatory requirements found in legislation and in the documentation of other regulatory-type bodies for about 40 jurisdictions. These are requirements to which our client must adhere in order to be considered in ‘good standing’. It is an absolutely massive project. Our database currently has nearly 30,000 entries, of which more than 17,200 entries impose requirements upon our client."
Labels: databases, law firms, library associations, profiles
"What is your professional history?(...)The Law Library of Congress is the world’s largest law library, with a collection of over 2.65 million volumes from all ages of history and virtually every jurisdiction in the world.
In 1967, I began my career of 50 years at Library of Congress as a cataloger (Shared Cataloging Division/Dutch-Scandinavian Section) with special assignments for law and Latin language materials. My first American publication, was an edition with commentary on Baldo degli Ubaldi (1137-1400), Consilium in casu privilegiorum Recanatensium, one of the stellar manuscripts in the Law Library. My article caught the attention of Werner Ellinger, the first law classification specialist and pioneer of the schedule Class KF Law of the US (1967). He was instrumental for my swift change to the Subject Cataloging Division, followed by a transfer to the “Class K Project,” as it was known then. From 1972 on, I developed the major part of the Library of Congress schedules for Class K-KZ (Law), as a knowledge organization system relating to all regions of the world, including ancient and religious systems of law, indigenous law, and the Law of nations. Since 1992, I have been the Library’s Senior Law Classification Specialist."
"How would you describe your job to other people?
This is not easily done without describing the objective of the job. As the Law classification specialist, my responsibilities are the planning, development, expansion and of the LC Classification for Law (Class K) for all countries and legal systems of the world, past and present. Class K encompasses civil & common law, Ancient, Roman & Religious law- the latter including Canon, Jewish & Islamic law – and Comparative and International law (...)"
"What is the most interesting fact you ever learned about the Law Library?
How extensive in subject, how numerous in tongues – country by country, and how rare the collections really are. You ask for Medieval and Canon law? You get it. You ask for Islamic and Jewish law? You get it. You ask for everything “international law”: the laws of war and peace; international commons, such as the high seas and Antarctica; the International Criminal Court and the Hague/Geneva humanitarian law, and the organizations safeguarding it? You get it."
Labels: catalogues, government_USA, law libraries, profiles
Labels: Supreme Court of Canada
Labels: current awareness, law libraries, library associations
Law library blogaliciousness from Ottawa since 2005. Accept no substitutes.
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As Michel de Montaigne would say, "Je vais au change indiscrètement et tumultuairement - mon style et mon esprit vont vagabondant de même" (Essais, III, 9, De la vanité): I go where my fancy leads me, but my fancy always leads back to the law