Yale Law School
lillian goldman law library in memory of Sol Goldman
Annual Report 2023
Contents
Lillian Goldman Law Library 127 Wall Street New Haven, CT library.law.yale.edu
Edited by Femi Cadmus Contributors Jason Eiseman Rachel Gordon Kathryn James Alex Jakubow Julie Krishnaswami Caitlyn Lam Evelyn Ma Nicholas Mignanelli Lucie Olejnikova Fred Shapiro Dawn Smith Michael VanderHeidjen Yale Law School Office of Public Affairs Photography Femi Cadmus Gregg Chase Harold Shapiro Mara Lavitt Shana Jackson Design Gregg Chase, Yale Printing and Publishing Services Printing Yale Printing and Publishing Services Cover Images from the Race, Slavery, and Founders of Yale Law School Exhibit. Featuring sketches of the Amistad captives—Kezzuza, Suma, and Marqu, Kimbo, Pona, and Grabo. New Haven, by William H. Townsend, 1839–1840. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
5
From the Law Librarian
6
Research, Reference, & Instruction
7
Empirical Research & Data Services
8
Access Services
9
Foreign and International Law
10
Collection Development
12
Rare Books
14
Exhibits, Book Talks, and Other Events
16
Digital Collections
18 Media Highlights: Learning About Law and Tech 20 Media Highlights: Twins on the Bench 22
Technology at the Forefront
23
Selected Professional Activities
25
Transitions 2023
Yale Law School Founders, Samuel Johnson Hitchcock, Seth Perkins Staples, David Daggett, painted by Jared Bradley Flagg from the collections of Yale Law School. Schoolteacher Prudence Crandall, by Francis Alexander. Boston, 1834. Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University
2
lillian goldman law library
Revised December 18, 2023
From the Law Librarian
I am truly pleased to present you with our 2023 Annual Report covering activities
through summer 2023. The academic year started with the Law School’s contribution to the Yale & Slavery Research project—a major library exhibit on Race, Slavery, & the Founders of Yale Law School curated by Kathryn James and Fred Shapiro, which ran through the spring term. The activities of Yale Law School founders in an era of slavery were carefully examined through the lens of this painstakingly curated exhibit and a robust panel discussion. A full exhibit essay with illustrative images can be downloaded at https://perma.cc/282d-bmpc We also engaged with the Yale community and external audiences through a series of our regular offerings, including our Faculty Book Talks (which can be viewed on our YouTube channel), and the Yale Law Library Speaker Series. Our second Legal Information Symposium on the Legal Treatise, Past, Present, and Future, a hybrid event was well received and attended in the spring. A monograph of the Symposium to be published by Hein, is forthcoming in 2024. Our commitment to making legal information freely and openly available continued with several digitization efforts, such as our collaboration with LLMC Digital to digitize the speeches and remarks of the late Drew S. Days III, Alfred M. Rankin Professor of Law, and former Solicitor General of the United States. In the realm of instruction, I had the privilege of introducing a new law school course, Technology in the Practice of Law which has a feature story in this report. Our aging website was totally revamped and is now not only aesthetically pleasing but also a highly functional platform and intuitive gateway to our services and collections. On the staffing front, two of our long serving librarians departed the library to assume exciting new roles, Jordan Jefferson is now Director of the Lynne L. Pantalena Law Library at Quinnipiac University while Scott Matheson was named Superintendent of Documents at the Government Publishing Office (GPO). We were thrilled to welcome Rachel Gordon, Director of Library Operations, Nor Ortiz, Technology & Research Librarian, and Alex Jakubow, inaugural Director of our Empirical and Data Services department. Looking back on all of the exciting and impactful outreach activities of the past year, our entire staff collectively agree that we stayed true to our strategic mission and “our outstanding collections and exemplary services make the library a centerpiece of the Yale Law School experience.”
Warm Regards,
Femi Cadmus Law Librarian and Professor of Law 4
lillian goldman law library
annual report 2023
5
Research, Reference, and Instruction Research Instruction In the past 2022-23 academic year, the Research Instruction Team, led by Head of Research Instruction and Lecturer in Law Julie Graves Krishnaswami, has remained committed to a culture of teaching excellence, meeting students where they are—in the classroom, at the reference desk, in First Term Small Groups, or in a research workshop. As part of this commitment, our focus has been on equipping Yale Law students with the practical skills and the substantive and conceptual knowledge to conduct legal research as law students and as legal professionals. Cate Kellett, Julie Graves Krishnaswami, Evelyn Ma, John Nann, and Lucie Olenjnikova began the year by teaching the lesson How to Brief a Case to incoming students as part of the Law Library’s Orientation. Next, the same group (sans Cate Kellet) joined by Nicholas Mignanelli, Trezel Drake, and Michael VanderHeidjden taught Small Group Legal Research Instruction. Recognizing the importance of legal research for all students, the Research Instruction Team has continued to offer Advanced Legal Research (ALR) in both the Spring and Fall Semesters. John Nann taught the Fall 2022 course. Julie Graves Krishnaswami, joined by Lucie Olenjnikova for the first time, led the Spring 2023 Semester of ALR. To further support students engaged in specific doctrinal forms of research, John Nann also taught Research Methods in U.S. Legal History. In its inaugural semester, Library Director, Professor Femi
A New Department: Empirical Research & Data Services Projects and Consultations In January 2023 the library established a full-service empirical research and data services department with Alex Jakubow assuming the role of Director of Empirical Research & Data Services (read more about this in the Transitions Section). The Empirical Research and Data Services department contributed to 27 different data projects and consultations for students, faculty, and staff at YLS and beyond.
10 Student research projects Cadmus, led Technology in the Practice of Law (see story on page 18). Finally, Nicholas Mignanelli offered Introduction to Legal Research and Sources. Our work continues even when our teaching obligations are paused. We explored ways to incorporate Chat GPT into our research courses during this pause. We’ve also brainstormed how to engage with students about AI and LLMs (artificial intelligence large language models) so that all students understand the impact of this ubiquitous technology on law practice. Next, we are considering how to best prepare our students for the introduction of legal research’s first appearance on the Bar exam in 2024. We are excited that the Bar has recognized that research is a necessary and required skill for all types of law practice.
5 Faculty research projects 4 Survey projects for Law Library stakeholders
2 Research initiatives by YLS Research
Data Services focusing on the state of reproducible empirical scholarship in law and related social science fields
Project-based work spanned a wide array of different substantive domains, methodological approaches, and data tasks. The department welcomed several new faces this year, including an inaugural cohort of student data support assistants, a Research Intern co-managed with the Reference team, and a consulting Data Administration Analyst. Research Data Services has worked with closely with Law Library leadership, the Center for Open Science, and Yale ITS to bring an institutional subscription to COS’ Open Science Framework (OSF), a data repository, to the law school community. The advent of OSF at Yale Law School aligns with a broader push by the University to deliver Yale’s own instance of Dataverse, a data repository later in 2023. We have worked with research data service providers across the University on developing and testing the prototype, and we look forward to serving as a local resource for YLS data curation and depositing when the service launches. We are proud, not only of our ability to have developed collaborative procedures and workflows in relatively short span of time, but also of our department’s rapid growth and response to the empirical research and data needs among our core constituencies at YLS.
2 Research projects involving YLS legal clinics and fellows
2 Consultations with other administrative Research and Reference Services: Outreach Reboot At the Lillian Goldman Law Library, librarians across departments (instruction, technical services, and administration) contribute to research and reference services. Trezlen Drake, Rachel Gordon, Julie Graves Krishnaswami, Evelyn Ma, Nicholas Mignanelli, John Nann, Lucie Olejnikova, Nor Ortiz, and Michael VanderHeijden form the research and reference team. This year, with significantly improved public health conditions, the research and reference services team continued to increase availability for in-person assistance at the reference desk, librarian offices, and other spaces. One of the impactful ways we chose to reintroduce ourselves and our services to students after the pandemic, was in the form of a revived and rebranded dining hall reference outreach. This bustling space has proven to be an excellent way to directly reach students in an 6
lillian goldman law library
informal setting. Branded as Lattes with Librarians, we offered vouchers for a free hot beverage in the Ruttenberg Dining Hall, mid-afternoon every two weeks. Students would frequently approach us for assistance with in-depth research questions and on occasion casual conversations which can sometimes be challenging in the quiet and more formal setting of the traditional reference desk. While in the previous year, 70% of our interactions with patrons occurred via email or video meetings, this year saw that number lowered to 57%, as in-person interactions increased. In essence, we have fully reestablished pre-pandemic service points. Our diverse outreach efforts in virtual and in-person spaces have helped to ensure that students, faculty, and other library users have their research needs fully met.
departments around YLS
2 Non-YLS faculty research projects
from around the University (History, School of Management)
annual report 2023
7
Access and Document Delivery Services
Foreign and International Law
Collection Highlights
Outreach
While pivoting to digital access was paramount to ensuring relevance of the law library collections during the pandemic, maintaining print and online access remained important as we endeavored to accommodate changing research needs that accompanied hybrid work. We dovetailed print acquisitions of seminal international law commentaries with online access. Dual access provides scholars on campus and off-site with immediate access to these heavily circulated resources, while fulfilling our library’s commitment to preserving scholarly resources for future use. New e-resources under review included Annotated Leading Criminal Cases, vLex Latin America and vLex Caribbean add-on bundles, Elgar Encyclopedia of Comparative Law, and the Taiwanese legal database LawData. A one-time contribution was made to the East Asian Library’s acquisition of a historical Chinese Judicial Files database. In spring 2023, the Foreign and International Law Collection team helped review Professor W. Michael Reisman’s personal collection, for additions to our library collections of materials not normally acquired.
In late summer, we participated in the Latin American Journals and Serials project for AALL FCIL-SIS, updating Yale holdings of key sources, and helped coordinate a Graduate Students’ Movie Night in the fall.
Research Instruction and Support
Cesar Zapata, Collections & Access Coordinator and visiting Latin American Linkage tour group.
This academic year represented the first full year of complete access to the library’s print collection and physical space since the beginning of the pandemic. The Law Library processed over 2,000 interlibrary loan items and over 2,000 course reserve items. While digital collections remain an essential part of our collection, the demand for access to the Law Library’s unique print resources remains strong. With increasing foot traffic, circulation of print material increased by about 10% over the previous year.
8
lillian goldman law library
law materials circulated 2019-2020: 28,115 2020-2021: 6,802 2021-2022: 16,262 2022-2023: 17,881
In addition to for credit instruction, the Foreign and International Law team participated in informal research instruction offerings throughout the academic year. In early fall 2022, Fundamentals of Legal Research Workshop Series and Case Briefing class were offered during the Graduate Students’ Orientation week, Case Briefing Basics at the JD Orientation, and Small Group Legal Research training sessions for incoming students as 1L Small Groups convened. Associate Director of Foreign and International Law, Lucie Olejnikova offered research workshops to students enrolled in Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic and Project, the Capital Assistance Project, and helped moot the law school team, winner of the Northeast round of the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition. Evelyn Ma, Reference Librarian for Foreign and International Law, helped provide library orientations for Paul Tsai China Center visiting scholars, Yale Summer in Law students and visiting students for the law school Linkage program.
annual report 2023
9
Collection Development and Special Projects university presses such as Harvard University Press, Princeton University Press, and University of Chicago Press, among many others. The Law Library for the most part has not directly collected archival papers by Yale Law School professors or alumni or prominent external persons. In the recent past, we have provided funding for an archivist processing law-related papers for University’s Manuscripts and Archives the department. In the past year we Robert Bookman ’72 visited the library in fall 2022. Pictured standing in front of a collection acquired by collaborated with LLMC Digital to means of the Bookman Library Fund. provide open access to the Drew Days III Archive, encompassing speeches and other materials from Collection development is a critical foundation of our services former Yale Law professor Drew Days, the former Solicitor to faculty, students, and other researchers. Robust and creative General of the United States and first African-American head of collection development is particularly important at Yale Law the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. (See page 11) School. Our professors and students are actively engaged with Collection development is closely linked to collection scholarship and the research that informs scholarship. That management. Without much advance warning, in 2023 scholarship and research is often historical and comparative in we had to quickly determine which sets of books should be nature (involving the law of foreign jurisdictions). Therefore, sent to temporary storage. This project was necessitated our priorities include preserving historical publications and by the University Library curtailing, for the next four years, manuscripts, anticipating the needs of scholars and students the acceptance of thousands of our books for the Library stretching far into the future, and acquiring resources from Shelving Facility. Our selectors, Cate Kellett, Evelyn Ma, around the world. John Nann, Lucie Olejnikova, and Fred Shapiro, worked Print resources remain crucial to our mission as described diligently to accomplish the decision-making task in a above. However, e-resources continue to rise in importance in very short time-period. our collecting. During the 2022–2023 year, we acquired e-books from the De Gruyter company. This acquisition includes all of the Law e-books, not already owned by Yale, published by
Other e-resource acquisitions in the past year include: Brill Basilica Online [Roman law]
ProQuest Mass Incarceration and Prison Studies
Elgar Encyclopedia of Comparative Law Elgar Encyclopedia of Human Rights
ProQuest Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Law and Order in 19th Century America, 1636–1880
HeinOnline Labor and Employment: The American Worker
ProQuest Supreme Court Insight [modules for 1897–1932 and 1933–1974]
HeinOnline Voting Rights and Election Law
ProQuest Workers, Labor Unions, and the American Left in the 20th Century—Federal Records
HeinOnline Water Rights and Resources Collection Oxford Encyclopedia of EU Law
10
lillian goldman law library
vLex Latin American and Caribbean bundles of legal resources
Special Projects and Library Publications The work of the Collection Development department extends to Special Projects. In the year just ended, “special projects” assumed a very large importance in our work. In particular, preparation for the 2024 Bicentennial of the founding of Yale Law School was extensive and crucial to the Law School. Fred Shapiro oversaw the creation of an Historical Timeline of YLS, assisted by Nor Ortiz, Lucie Olejnikova, and Yuksel Serindag in other departments. Caitlyn Lam is making major contributions to the Bicentennial commemoration with digitization of relevant items, and Kathryn James will be producing substantial exhibits relating to Law School history. An example of publications emanating from the Law Library is that we have for over a decade partnered with the Cengage Gale company to create the Making of Modern Law digital legal history resources, one of the most important
legal-history digitization projects in the world. This year, we have continued to lend microfilm reels of records and briefs from the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to Gale as part of a Making of Modern Law module of federal Courts of Appeals briefs. Another library-related publication is the Yale Law Library Series in Legal History and Reference. This is a book series published by Yale University Press and presenting outstanding scholarship by our own faculty and other authors. It has been described by the Press as one of the “crown jewels” in their prestigious publishing program. The 15th book in the series, Oscar Wilde on Trial: The Criminal Proceedings from Arrest to Imprisonment by Joseph Bristow, was published in October 2022, and the 16th book, An Empire of Laws: Legal Pluralism in British Colonial Policy by Christian R. Burset, is forthcoming in September 2023.
Drew S. Days III Archive The Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale Law School is pleased to present the Drew Days III Archive in collaboration with LLMC Digital. This resource contains speeches, remarks, and interviews by Days. It can be found in LLMC Digital’s Special Focus Collections and LLMC Open Access thanks to sponsorship by Yale Law School. Drew S. Days III was a government official and legal scholar of rare importance and a person of rare charm. Born in Georgia, he later was quoted in an interview: “I rode segregated buses, and I was from the era with the segregated lunch counters and water fountains. I had a real feel for that. My mother was a schoolteacher, and she suffered from the fact that her aspirations were very limited because of segregation.” After being educated at Hamilton College and Yale Law School, Days served in the Peace Corps in Honduras. From 1967 to 1977, he was an attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, becoming first assistant counsel. His work for NAACP was notable enough that he was appointed as assistant attorney general for civil rights in the Carter Administration, the first African-American to head any of the divisions of the Department of Justice. In 1978, he successfully persuaded the DOJ to support affirmative action programs. Days joined the Yale Law faculty in 1981, later becoming Alfred M. Rankin Professor of Law. His professorial career was interrupted (1993–1996) by his return to government service as Solicitor General of the United States. The Solicitor General is the chief advocate for the federal government before the U.S. Supreme Court. The Yale Biographical Dictionary of American Law notes that “in 17 oral arguments before the Court, his soft-spoken, scholarly style of advocacy won praise. Days’s most notable victory during his tenure may have been U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton (1995), in which the Court held that states may not impose term limits on members of Congress.”
At Yale, Days taught courses in constitutional law and civil procedure. He was the founding director of the Orville H. Schell, Jr. Center for Human Rights. In addition to his academic career, he led the Supreme Court and appellate practice at the law firm of Morrison & Foerster. He himself might have been nominated for the Supreme Court had it not been for some controversies while he was Solicitor General. Yale Law School Dean Harold Koh explained, “Drew was committed to principle, not politics. It would have been easy for him to do the politically expedient thing to get ahead, but that was not in his DNA.” The speeches and other materials in the Drew Days III Archive range over the spectrum of his legal and scholarly activities. The time period covered spans 1977 to 2015. Digital availability of this Archive will be a boon to researchers of civil rights, other aspects of law and education, and the biography of this extraordinary individual. The Lillian Goldman Law Library is grateful to Drew Days’s widow, Ann Langdon-Days, and his administrative assistant, Alieta Lynch, for making the Archive possible.
annual report 2023
11
Rare Books
A letter from Seth Staples to Roger Sherwin Baldwin, discussing their retention as counsel for the defendants in the Amistad trial. New York, September 4, 1839. From the collections of Yale University Library’s Manuscripts and Archives Department and shown in facsimile in the “Race, Slavery, and the Founders of Yale Law School” exhibit this Fall.
Detail of a 16th-c. English indenture, shown at the “Hamlet’s Legal Documents” workshop in the Rare Book Room this January. From Bargain and sale from John Bellow of Great Grimsby, Lincolnshire, esq., to John Hambye gent. of London. [England], March 2, 1552. A recent acquisition.
Why may not that be the skull of a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillities, his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? Hamlet V:1, 100-102
“Sterling Law Buildings—The Law Library,” Yale Illustrated (New Haven: Yale Pub. Association, 1931). Displayed in the “Back to School” exhibit in the Rare Book Collection, Fall 2022. William Blackstone, translated by S.E. Desnitskii and A.M. Briantsev, Istolkovaniia anglinskikh’ Zakonov’ g. Blakstona (Moscow: University Press, 1780-1782). In 3 volumes. A recent acquisition.
Hamlet’s “tenures” and “tricks” were a highlight of this year’s Rare Book and Manuscript Collection program, featuring in a Spring workshop on “Hamlet’s Legal Documents.” The workshop showcased examples of the types of legal document listed by Hamlet in the play’s famous “gravedigger” scene. Bargains, warrants, and other recent acquisitions were on view, including several English seals and signet rings dating from the 13th through the 18th century. The year began with a “Back to School” exhibit, on display for the Law School’s student orientation. This exhibit featured highlights of the collection, including Batman’s Yale Law diploma, as drawn by Sal Amendola in his original art for the Batman comic strip.
12
lillian goldman law library
The Fall semester saw the opening of the “Race, Slavery, and the Founders of Yale Law School” exhibition. Drawing on the Yale Law School and Yale University historical collections, the exhibit centered on two law cases: Seth Staples’ engagement in the Amistad trial and David Daggett’s involvement in the Prudence Crandall case, with its later influence on the Dred Scott decision. The exhibit featured a panel discussion, introduced by Dean Heather Gerken and Law Librarian and Professor of Law, Femi Cadmus, with invited panelists Susan Gibbons, Michael Morand, and exhibition curators Fred Shapiro and Kathryn James. A Spring exhibit turned to the medieval and early modern European law treatise, in support of the symposium led by the
Lillian Goldman Law Library. As the academic year came to an end, the Rare Book Collection hosted an exhibit on George Bundy Smith ’62 and Inez Smith Reid ‘62, to commemorate the unveiling of a Yale Law School portrait of these twin siblings, justices, and alumni. Other events this year included “Incarceration & Imagination,” a pop-up exhibit on the Beinecke Library mezzanine, organized with Professor Judith Resnik; “Legal Information & Book History,” a Fall series organized with Nicholas Mignanelli; numerous class visits, ranging from John Langbein’s “History of the Common Law” to the Latin American Linkages scholars’ program to the Rare Book Librarian’s own graduate seminar in the English Department. This June, twelve students arrived
at the Yale Law School for Rare Book School, a week-long intensive seminar taught by Kathryn James and Mike Widener on “Law Books: History and Connoisseurship.” Highlights of this year’s acquisitions included: a complete copy of the rare Russian edition of William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (Moscow: 1780-1782); a set of trial drawings for the New York Daily News coverage of the Hines racketeering trials, 1938-1938; a manuscript account book kept by John Davenport, Jr., begun in 1787 and documenting his early law practice, including work for clients Timothy Dwight, Joel Barlow, and others; and an 18th-century English poaching case, in original documents.
annual report 2023
13
Exhibits, Book Talks, and Other Events EVENTS
SPEAKER SERIES
EXHIBITS
Panel Discussion accompanying the exhibit Race, Slavery, & the Founders of Yale Law School: Yale Reckons with Slavery, Moderated by Femi Cadmus, Law Librarian & Professor of Law. Introductory remarks by Dean Heather Gerken. Panelists Susan Gibbons, Vice Provost for Collections & Scholarly Communication, Michael Morand, Director of Community Engagement, Beinecke Library, Kathryn James, Rare Book Librarian, & Fred Shapiro, Associate Director, Collections & Special Projects
Aslihan Bulut, Law Librarian of Congress, “A Conversation with Aslihan Bulut, Law Librarian of Congress,” Moderated by Femi Cadmus, June 2023
Race, Slavery, & the Founders of Yale Law School, Kathryn James and Fred Shapiro, September 2022 to March 2023,
The Trials of Constance Baker Motley, Film Screening with commentary by Filmmaker, Joel Motley, Chairman Emeritus of the Board of Human Rights Watch and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, November 2022.
Ariel Scotese, Associate Director for User Services, D’Angelo Law Library, University of Chicago, “Using the ACRL Framework to Incorporate Critical Information Literacy into Research Guides,” June 2023
Lillian Goldman Law Library Second Legal Information Symposium The Legal Treatise: Past, Present, and Future
Caroline Osborne, Director of the Law Library and Professor of Law, “Creating the Scholar’s Narrative,” April 2023 Janet Odetsi Twum, Law Librarian, Ghana School of Law, “A Conversation with Janet Odetsi Twum,” October 2022 Risë Nelson, “Conversation with Risë Nelson,” Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility, Yale University Libraries, October 2022
The Lillian Goldman Law Library, with the generous support of the Oscar M. Ruebhausen Fund at Yale Law School, held its second legal information symposium: “The Legal Treatise: Past, Present, and Future,” at Yale Law School on Friday, March 24, 2023. The eminent legal historian John H. Langbein, Sterling Professor Emeritus of Law and Legal History at Yale Law School, opened the symposium with a keynote address entitled “The Rise and Fall of Legal Academic Treatise Writing in the United States.” This symposium featured 15 authors representing 11 institutions who presented 12 papers on four panels. Each panel was organized around a theme designed to interrogate an aspect of the treatise as a form and genre. These themes consisted of “historical and comparative perspectives,” “authorship,” “identity,” and “transition.” 14
lillian goldman law library
Lynn Kilgore, Senior Competitive Intelligence & Marketing Analytics Manager, Baker Botts, LLP, “Competitive Intelligence Overview,” September 2022 Arabella Yip, Senior Associate General Counsel, “Everything you wanted to ask the Office of the General Counsel”, September 2022
On Being On: Authority and the Legal Treatise, Kathryn James, March to April 2023 Twins on the Bench, Shana Jackson and Kathryn James, April to August 2023 Back to School: Highlights from the Rare Book Collection, Kathryn James, August 2022 Constitutionalism: Global and Comparative Perspectives Nicholas Mignanelli and Lucie Olejnikova, Fall 2022 Showcasing the Scholarship of our Recent Graduate Alumni, Evelyn Ma, Fall 2022 New Approaches to International Law, Evelyn Ma, Spring 2022 Facing Life: Featuring the Visiting Room Project Julian Aiken, Ariane Lewis, Evelyn Ma, Lucie Olejnikova, and Kayla Vinson accompanying the Facing Life Symposium, Spring 2023 International Law Treatises Unbound, by Evelyn Ma and Lucie Olejnikova Spring 2023 accompanying the Legal Treatise: Past, Present, and Future symposium.
BOOK TALKS Taisu Zhang, The Ideological Foundations of Qing Taxation: Belief Systems, Politics, and Institutions, March 9, 2023
Fred Shapiro, The New Yale Book of Quotations, November 16, 2022
Robert C. Ellickson, America’s Frozen Neighborhoods: The Abuse of Zoning, February 16, 2023
Akhil Reed Amar, The Words That Made Us: America’s Constitutional Conversation, October 26, 2022
Jake Mazeitis ’23 et al, The Prophet of Harvard Law: James Bradley Thayer and His Legal Legacy, January 23, 2023
Anthony Kronman, After Disbelief: On Disenchantment, Disappointment, Eternity, and Joy, October 12, 2022
annual report 2023
15
Digital Collections Services Digital Collections Since the library’s first mass digitization project with the historic Litchfield Law School student notebooks in 2015, our digital collections have expanded significantly. In the years following, we invested in digital collections development with the setup of an in-house imaging studio, implementation of a digital preservation system, partnership with the Internet Archive Archive-It web archiving program, and integration with the university library digital collections environment. In addition, the digital collections unit works with cataloging & metadata services to update cataloging records to meet evolving standards, create structural metadata, and add rich contextual metadata. These ongoing efforts culminated in a steadily growing repository of digitized images, exploration of web archiving initiatives, and launch of the law library’s Aviary audiovisual streaming platform. Today there are over 500 digitized objects from the law library in the YUL Digital Collections database and a small but growing selection of audiovisual recordings in Aviary. This year, newly added content spotlights some of the donations and contributions of law school alumni and faculty.
Photograph taken during the Russ Meyer Film Festival at Yale Law School, March 1-2, 1970, New Haven, CT: Yale Law School Film Society, c 1970. From Yale Law Library, Yale Law School Film Society Collection of Posters, Photographs, and Audio Recordings.
16
lillian goldman law library
Pomeroy, Benjamin, 1787-1855. Manuscript notes of lectures by Sylvester Gilbert at his law school in Hebron, Connecticut. Notebook. Hebron, Connecticut, [1811?]. From Yale Law Library.
From a collection of legal-themed postcards donated by Lois Montbertrand ’85, a selection of digitized postcards are now available online, with more to be added in coming months. Printed in France, Germany, Great Britain, and the United States, these postcards are often whimsical depictions of women, children, and animals in various legal themes, offering a glimpse of the law in popular culture throughout the late 19th to mid 20th century. In 1967, law school students Hugh Moore ’69, Michael Gross ’68, and Richard Hughes ’70, cofounded the Yale Advocate, a student run newspaper that remained active until 1970. The Advocate offers a unique glimpse into the perspectives of law school students in the late 1960s. More than 50 years later, Hugh Moore donated his rare copies of the Advocate to the law library. Digitized copies of the nearly complete run of 21 issues are now available. The Yale Law School Film Society in 1969–1972, under the directorship of Robert Bookman ’72, organized popular film screenings and guest speaker events with prominent film directors. Decades later, Allen Bentley ’70, former treasurer of YLSFS, donated memorabilia from the society’s activities
including photographs from the Russ Meyers Film Festival, movie screening posters, and audio cassette recordings of speaker panels. Online streaming of the recordings and their transcripts will be made available through Aviary in addition to digitized photographs and posters. Legal Affairs, considered to be the first general interest magazine about the law, was born from the initial vision of former Sterling Professor of Law, Boris Bittker. The magazine was launched in 2002 under the auspices of the law school before later becoming an operationally independent, nonprofit organization in 2004. During its years of operation from 2002–2006, Legal Affairs published 24 issues in print and online through the legalaffairs.org website, receiving widespread recognition and numerous accolades for journalism. Following the dissolution of the organization in 2020, Legal Affairs donated its remaining assets to Yale. This year, the Library fulfilled our commitment to digitize and make accessible the complete print run of the magazine and archive the now defunct legalaffairs.org website. Notably the archived website includes 74 debates from the web-only featured Debate Club. Thanks to Shana Jackson, Senior Administrative Assistant, and her long institutional memory, we recovered from the hidden corners of our vault, 175 audio cassette recordings of over 70 oral history interviews. These interviews
Smith, Jeffrey. Cover art. Legal Affairs, NovemberDecember 2003.
were coordinated in 1999 by former visiting lecturer and researcher, Mary Clark, as a part of her project to document the legal history of Yale law women. This year, we completed digitization of the recordings and are working to make a selection open for research. Some of this material will continue to remain closed for the time being. We continue to digitize material from our rare book collection. Among recently digitized material is a 750-page volume of manuscript notes from Sylvester Gilbert’s law school in Hebron, Connecticut, among one of the first private law schools, taken by one of its students, Benjamin Pomeroy. The Pomeroy notebook is one of the only notebooks from Gilbert’s school known to have survived. In addition, a few recent rare book acquisitions were digitized, including the John Davenport Jr. account book, 1787–1793 and City of New Haven Debtor Court cases manuscript, 1794–1805. In December 2022, our digital collections program welcomed a new technical assistant, Tyler Lanigan (see Transitions section). We thank Joanne McCarthy, who served in this inaugural position from 2015–2022, for her substantial contributions towards the creation of these collections and our success over the years.
A decree nisi with custody of the children! Postcard. From Yale Law Library, Legal Postcards Collection.
annual report 2023
17
Media Highlights
Learning About Law and Tech, Hands (and Headsets) On Original publication date December 2022
This fall, in a classroom at the Lillian Goldman Law Library, Jerry Ma ’25 sat with a virtual reality headset strapped to his head, thinking about the future of the law. “It’s one thing to read a bunch of blog posts or law review articles about how these different technologies might influence the course of legal thought or practice,” he said, “and another thing entirely to slap on a VR headset and see for yourself.” These are the moments that Law Librarian and Professor of Law Femi Cadmus wanted to create in her new experiential class, Technology in the Practice of Law. Simply put, Cadmus said, “the goal is to build up technologically competent lawyers.” That means not only familiarizing students with the tools and software they’ll have to know as attorneys navigating today’s hybrid work culture, but also encouraging them to think deeply and broadly about how technology and the law influence one another. “It’s practical and doctrinal,” she said. “We connect both.” Cadmus approached the class as an important extension of her role as a law librarian. “Typically, we teach legal research, because the best lawyers are usually the best researchers,” she said. “But we have not been teaching the technology component.” It’s an essential gap to fill now that technological fluency and research skills are so tightly coupled, Cadmus explained. And just because young lawyers have grown up with technology doesn’t mean they always understand how it works under the hood. She sought to make Technology in the Practice of Law as hands on as she could, bringing in guest speakers, allowing students to test drive AI-driven knowledge management and analytics platforms—and, yes, giving them some time to play around with those VR headsets, all while talking about the possibilities of incorporating virtual reality into evidentiary proceedings or meeting with clients in the metaverse. “I saw them having fun—and then evaluating the devices and the implications for introducing that technology in the practice of law,” Cadmus said. “It was that intersection of the very practical and fun with the very serious implications that made this class a joy.” For Brett Greene ’23, the direct applicability of the class to his future work—he plans to practice tax law after graduation—was especially welcome. Not only did he and his fellow students get a chance to use software that will likely 18
lillian goldman law library
be part of his everyday life as an attorney, he met the people who help administer that software for law firms and contemplated the larger issues posed by the technology. For example, “if all of your client’s files are kept in the cloud, legal ethics rules mean you have a responsibility to make sure they’re secure,” Greene said. “This is something that I, as a future lawyer, have an affirmative obligation to learn about.” Greene’s final project focused on AI-assisted legal bill review, an increasingly common practice among both firms and clients. Understanding how the software works gave him insight into how to be most effective in the future. “Billing is obviously very important to legal practice,” he said. “If the software is flagging vague billing entries, what can you do to make clear the value added in each billing entry? That’s important for the firm.” Ma, too, enjoyed melding experiential learning with high-level issues. “I think the benefit of courses such as this is you’re not at the level of abstraction that a lot of law school doctrinal or theoretical courses operate on,” he said. “You are actually learning about a specific thing that you can feel and touch and experience as an end user.” He was especially intrigued by the course sessions that covered AI and machine learning. “AI models can do things that even six months ago, I would have told you we’re at least a decade away from that level of ability,” he said. With machine learning software now able to closely mimic human writing — including legal writing — lawyers “are not going to be able to just stay in our lane and focus on the autonomous body of doctrine,” Ma said. “Whether we like it or not, we’re going to have to contend with what emerging technologies are going to bring to bear on the legal sector,” and he’s thankful Yale Law School has “a class exploring exactly what I just described.” Cadmus acknowledged that she can’t predict the specifics of how lawyers will use technology. Through her class, she’s making sure “whatever they’re going to do, that students have this awareness, they understand the pitfalls, they understand the advantages, and they can leverage technology in a way that is beneficial.”
“ I think the benefit of courses such as this is you’re not at the level of abstraction that a lot of law school doctrinal or theoretical courses operate on. You are actually learning about a specific thing that you can feel and touch and experience as an end user.”—jerry ma ’25 “ The goal is to build up technologically competent lawyers. That means not only familiarizing students with the tools and software they’ll have to know as attorneys navigating today’s hybrid work culture, but also encouraging them to think deeply and broadly about how technology and the law influence one another.”—femi cadmus, law librarian & professor of law annual report 2023
19
Media Highlights
Exhibit Honors Siblings George Bundy Smith ’62 and Inez Smith Reid ’62 Original publication date May 2023
Inez Smith Reid ’62 (left) and George Bundy Smith ’62 (center) at Judge Reid’s confirmation ceremony.
A string of pearls, a weathered Bible, and an assortment of family photos paint a storied portrait of two distinguished Yale Law School alumni in “Twins on the Bench,” an exhibit now on view in the Lillian Goldman Law Library. The exhibit offers an intimate look at the lives of George Bundy Smith ’62 and Inez Smith Reid ’62, twin siblings who were the only Black students in their class. Born in New Orleans, Louisiana and raised in Washington, D.C., when the city was still segregated, both Smith and Smith Reid would end up serving as judges after pursuing different careers following law school. Smith worked alongside Constance Baker Motley at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and served on 20
lillian goldman law library
the New York City Civil Court, New York State Supreme Court (as well as its Appellate Division), and as associate justice of the New York Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court. Smith Reid spent the first decade of her career in education, teaching in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and later at other colleges including Barnard as a professor of political science. While teaching at Barnard College, she was deeply beloved by her students and had a profound impact on their lives. “She was my favorite teacher in the whole wide world,” said Enola Aird ’79. “[She is] the teacher who had the greatest impact on my life, and the lives of so many other Barnard graduates.”
The Smith siblings together. Standing: Sidney R. Smith, Jr.; Seated: Inez and George.
Following her career in education, she spent time in private practice and in prominent government positions, including as corporation counsel for the District of Columbia. In 1995, she was nominated to serve as an associate judge of the D.C. Court of Appeals, retiring in 2017. The exhibit includes a photo of Judge Smith swearing in his sister during her confirmation ceremony. The idea for the exhibit came from Shana Jackson, who works in the Law Library and has familial ties to the late Judge Smith via marriage. “I just wanted to make certain that they weren’t overlooked within the Law School’s history, and I felt as though a spotlight needed to be shined on them,” she said. Jackson, who affectionately refers to Smith as “Uncle George,” first proposed a commemorative portrait of the twins in 2019. The portrait was unveiled on April 16, 2023 at the Law School and hangs in SLB Room 120. To complement the portrait, Jackson worked with Law School Rare Book Librarian Kathryn James to co-curate a corresponding exhibit. The two started the curation process by compiling a collection of Smith’s belongings, a portion of which Jackson kept in her house after his passing, and from there James began researching the twins, their careers, and their family life to find other artifacts. With additional items donated by Alene Smith (Judge Smith’s widow) and Judge Smith Reid, Jackson and James were able to bring the exhibit to life. James described learning about the twins through her research and in listening to Jackson’s history of the family. “It was such an interesting, moving, and fascinating experience to learn about Judge Smith first, and then to realize this whole history that unfolded for me through working with Judge Smith’s collection in Manuscripts and Archives and with the family papers,” James said. A core item in the exhibit is the initial study for the commemorative portrait, which was painted by artist Ashlynn Smith—the grandniece of the twins, and granddaughter of
the twins’ older brother Sidney Smith Jr.—and based on a photograph of the three siblings in the family home. The original photograph can also be found in the exhibit. As siblings with a lifetime of accomplishments as well as a deep commitment to family, it was important to Jackson and James that the exhibit honored the twins’ greatness in addition to showcasing their humanity. James found the familial items particularly moving, describing them as a “glimpse into the powerful family life of someone who was an important figure as an activist and as a judge.” One item that James felt was important to include in the exhibit was a string of Reid’s “everyday pearls” (as Judge Reid described them, in a note included in the exhibit) that she wore everywhere, including to the grocery store. “She discussed her pearls in an interview for an oral history, and they seemed such a powerful token of her conscious self-presentation,” said James.
“ Both judges knew that what they were doing was significant, and…they inhabited that role through their careers.” Jackson intends to continue honoring the legacy of Reid and Smith, possibly with a documentary or by donating some of the exhibit material to the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. She noted, “the exhibit only touches upon some things; it doesn’t nearly gather all that there is to be gathered.” “Twins on the Bench” is on view on the second level of the Lillian Goldman Law Library through July 31.
Commemorative portrait of the twins by artist Ashlynn Smith, based on a childhood photograph.
annual report 2023
21
Technology at the Forefront
This past year has been a period of significant technological advancement for the Yale Law Library. Our commitment to leveraging cutting-edge technology to enhance our services and support our students and faculty has never been more substantial. In the fall, we partnered with Law Librarian and Professor of Law, Femi Cadmus to offer a pop-up tech lab for her Technology in the Practice of Law class. The class encourages students to think deeply and broadly about how technology and the law influence one another, making it hands-on with guest speakers and allowing students to test-drive AI-driven knowledge management and analytics platforms while discussing the possibilities of incorporating virtual reality into evidentiary proceedings or meeting with clients in the metaverse. The pop-up tech lab had 3D printing capabilities, virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) glasses. This lab provided students with an immersive, hands-on learning experience that pushes the boundaries of traditional legal education.
We are also exploring the latest artificial intelligence (AI) technology advancements. AI has the potential to revolutionize legal research and practice, and we are committed to staying at the forefront of this exciting field. Our team is currently researching and testing various AI tools, intending to integrate the most promising ones into our services to enhance the research capabilities of our students and faculty. Jason Eiseman, Director for Library Technology and Planning, and Nor Ortiz, Technology and Research Librarian, are tracking AI trends in law libraries. Outreach efforts included the publication of an article on generative AI in the American Association of Law Libraries, AALL Spectrum Magazine and presentations at two national conferences on AI in law libraries. This year was an exciting step forward in raising the bar for technology resources and services at the Yale Law Library. By investing in key technology upgrades, implementing innovative new systems, and staying up to date with cutting-edge advancements, the library is well-positioned to be a leader in academic law libraries for the digital age.
New Website This year’s most significant achievement was the comprehensive redesign of our website, a project in collaboration with Message Agency. This was not merely a cosmetic update but a complete overhaul to improve accessibility, functionality, and user experience. The updated site features a streamlined
design, improved navigation, and a responsive interface that scales nicely to mobile devices. The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, with users praising the site’s ease of use and the wealth of information available at their fingertips.
Selected Professional Activities
TREZLEN DRAKE
CATE KELLETT
NICHOLAS MIGNANELLI
Incubator presentation, Lutie A. Lytle Black Women Law Faculty Workshop and Writing Retreat, Penn State Dickinson Law, June 2023
Indexer for the Hispanic American Periodicals Index (HAPI)
Coordinator, “Unmasking Bias in Casebooks: From Theory to Praxis,” AALL Annual Meeting, July 2022, Denver Colorado
Keynote Speaker, “Beyond Performativity: DEI/B in Law Libraries.” 37th Annual Conference, Caribbean Association of Law Libraries (CARALL), Barbados, March 2023 DipLawMatic Dialogues: AALL FCIL-SIS Member of the Month, February 2023 Moderator, “So You Wanna Advocate For Yourself at Work”, ALL Professional Engagement, Growth, & Advancement SIS (PEGA-SIS) Webinar, November 2022 “A Woman of Color Reflects on the DEI and De-Credentialization Debate,” AALL RIPS-SIS Law Librarian Blog, December 20, 2022. JASON EISEMAN Generative AI and Machine Learning in Law Libraries, AALL Spectrum (May/June 2023), with Nor Ortiz. Speaker: Conference for Law School Computing (CALI), The Other Ones: Exploring Alternative AI Tools for Enhancing Your Work, Penn Carey Law, June 2023
Government Documents Roundtable (GODORT) liaison to the Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access (CC:DA) AALL liaison to the Subject Analysis Committee (SAC), Acting Chair of the Connecticut GODORT, AALL liaison to the Library of Congress Genre/Form Terms (LCGFT) Chair of the Heads of Cataloging of Large Academic Law Libraries Roundtable YUL ILS Metadata Advisory Group (MAGILS), YUL Authorities and Identities Advisory Group
Presenter, Critical Legal Research: Teaching Social Justice-Oriented Research in Clinic, Clinical Legal Education Association’s Teaching Justice Webinar Series. November 2022
Speaker, When Two Worlds Collide: Using Catalogue Records as Metadata.” AALL Annual Meeting, July 2022, Denver Colorado
Chair, Steering Committee for the Yale Legal Information Symposium, “The Legal Treatise: Past, Present Future.” 2023
CAITLYN LAM Member, Yale University Library Web Archiving Working Group. Member, Yale University Library Metadata for Digital Assets Advisory Group. Yale University Library Digital Special Collections Advisory Group, ex-officio.
Member, Research4Life Global Online Access to Legal Information (GOALI) Committee Member, Steering Committee, “The Legal Treatise: Past, Present Future Symposium” 2023 Member, Law Archive Steering Committee. 22
lillian goldman law library
“Artificial Intelligence, Legal Research, and Judicial Analytics,” co-written with the Honorable John M. Facciola, Magistrate Judge for the U.S. Court for the District of Columbia, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) JOHN NANN
EVELYN MA RACHEL GORDON
Presenter, “First Contact: Law Librarianship, the Triple Helix Dilemma, and the Overlooked Foundation of CRT in LIS” with Grace Lo, Stanford Law Library Workshop Series (Virtual), January 2023
Member, AALL FCIL-SIS Schaffer Grant Fundraising Committee. Book Review: Bioinformatics, Medical Informatics and the Law, Edited by Jorge L. Contreras, A. J. Cuticchia and Gregory J. Kirsch, ISBN 9781839105944 (Edward Elgar, 2022). International Journal of Legal Information, 50(3), 135-136.
Member, Law Librarians of New England Service Committee. Member, Yale University Library Unified Discovery Advisory Group.
annual report 2023
23
Selected Professional Activities
LUCIE OLEJNIKOVA
DAWN SMITH
Member, AALL FCIL-SIS Website Committee, Chair.
Member, AALL Continuing Professional Education Committee.
Member, FCIL-SIS Strategic Plan Taskforce.
Co-chair of the YUL Advisory Committee of Library Staff Diversity and Inclusion.
Secretary, ASIL International Legal Research Interest Group (ILRIG). Editor-in-chief, GlobaLex
NOR ORTIZ
Speaker, DEIB Leadership at Every Level: Leading your Library with Intention, AALL Webinar, February 2023.
“Generative AI & Machine Learning in Law Libraries,” AALL Spectrum: Legal Tech Trends in Law Libraries, May/June 2023, with Jason Eiseman.
Speaker, Collection Development and Acquiring with a Conscience. AALL Annual Meeting, July 2022, Denver Colorado
Law Archive C0-Administrator
University of North Texas Department of Information Science Outstanding Alumni Award, 2022.
FRED SHAPIRO “The Most-Cited Legal Scholars Revisited” as the keynote paper in the book The Role of Citation in the Law, edited by Michael Chiorazzi. Annual list of the most notable quotations of the year disseminated by the Associated Press and covered by thousands of media outlets. Consultant to the Oxford English Dictionary on legal terms Consultant to the Making of Modern Law digital legal history products.
YUKSEL SERINDAG Member, Lillian Goldman Law Library, YLS Bicentennial Task Force. Secretary/Treasurer, Southern New England Law Libraries Association (SNELLA). Member, Research4Life Global Online Access to Legal Information Committee (GOALI)
24
lillian goldman law library
Participant, & Inaugural Cohort: Emerge at Yale Staff Leadership Development Program
Transitions 2023
New Librarians and Staff RACHEL GORDON
Rachel Gordon joined the Law Library as the Director of Library Operations in October 2022. Rachel has a J.D. from the University of Tennessee, an M.B.A. from Mercer University, a M.L.S. from Drexel University, and B.A.s in International Studies and Diplomacy and Foreign Affairs from Miami University. Prior to joining the Lillian Goldman Law Library, she was the Associate Director for Public Services at the Duke Law Library and worked for a major legal publisher.
ALEX JAKUBOW
MICHAEL VANDERHEIJDEN Past President, Executive Board of the Law Librarians of New England (LLNE). Chair, LLNE Bylaws committee. Chair, LLNE Strategic Planning Committee. Legal Information Services to the Public Special Interest Section Nominations Committee.
lex Jakubow joined the Law Library as the Director for Empirical Research and Data A Services in January 2023. Alex earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from Rutgers University and holds a dual B.A. in History and Political Science from the University of Richmond. Alex was most recently Associate Director of Empirical Research and Data Support Services at Duke Law where he established the Duke Law Data Lab, a hub for concierge data services to faculty and other law school stakeholders. Prior to Duke, he co-directed the Legal Data Lab at the University of Virginia School of Law. Alex has taught classes in political science and research methodology at Rutgers University, California State University San Marcos, New Mexico State University, and the University of Virginia.
Law Archive C0-Administrator
CESAR ZAPATA Provided library tours to a variety of groups including new Yale Law School staff, a group of law students visiting from Argentina, Yale University Library staff “Nooks and Crannies” committee, the Linkages law school group, and many other individual VIP tours
TYLER LANIGAN
Tyler Lanigan joined the Law Library Digital Collections team in December 2022 as Digital Collections Services Assistant, where he digitizes collections material, creates digital objects metadata, and coordinates the digital imaging workflow. Tyler was most recently Catalog Assistant at Yale University Library.
NOR ORTIZ
Nor Ortiz joined the Lillian Goldman Law Library in the role of Librarian for Technology and Research in August 2023. He provides technology assistance across the library and co-maintains the library’s website. He also provides reference and research services to the Yale Law School community. Nor previously was the Research and Instructional Services Librarian at the Duke Law Library. He received his JD and MSLS from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
annual report 2023
25
Transitions 2023
Departures JORDAN JEFFERSON
Jordan Jefferson was named the Director of the Lynne L. Pantalena Law Library at Quinnipiac University in August 2022. Jordan spent 10 years in different positions in the law library. She was Associate Director for Library Operations, Outreach, and Engagement, and had also served as Associate Director for Research and Instructional Services.
SCOTT MATHESON
Scott Matheson was named the Superintendent of Documents at the United States Government Publishing Office (GPO) in October 2022. Scott was the Associate Law Librarian for Technical Services at the Lillian Goldman Library for 10 years. Prior to this role, he had served beginning 2001 in various roles both in the Law Library and University Library.
ERIC SONNENBERG
ric Sonnenberg, Archivist for Legal Collections since January 2017, moved into a E regular continuing appointment at Yale University Manuscripts & Archives effective January 2023. Eric worked on several significant projects while at the Law Library including the Ronald Dworkin and George Bundy Smith papers. Stephen Reinhardt papers and additions to the Patricia Wald papers. Of special note are the extensive born-digital materials in the Ronald Dworkin papers consisting of over 1 Terabyte of digital files. As Eric describes “the process throughout has involved collaboration and experimentation while developing new workflows, as born-digital processing of such a large and complex collection is unprecedented in MSSA”.
26
lillian goldman law library
Yale Law School
lillian goldman law library in memory of Sol Goldman
P.O. Box 208215 New Haven, CT 06520-8215 203.432.1600 library.law.yale.edu