Yale Law School

lillian goldman law library

in memory of Sol Goldman

biennial report 2007–2009

design
Yale YPPS
photography
Robert Lisak, William K. Sacco, Harold Shapiro
 message from the director
It’s my pleasure to present the biennial report of the Lillian Gold-
man Law Library covering the two year period 2007-2009. As with
our earlier annual reports covering the previous two years, this docu-
ment is intended to present an overview of the library’s major activi-
ties and provide a point of comparison for the future. This combined
two-year report is meant to bring the series current and will be fol-
lowed by regular annual reports beginning in 2010.
As we approach the end of the first decade of the 21st Century and
are well into the digital age, those of us involved in the daily life
of the Yale Law Library have no doubt about its relevance in fulfill-
ing the central mission of the Law School. Our library has played a
central role at the Yale Law School from the time of its founding,
and this continues to be the case now, where our lovely renovated
space provides a place for students to conduct independent study
and research, access the ever more complex web of legal informa-
tion resources in a wide array of digital and print formats and benefit
from expert guidance of law librarian specialists on how to most ef-
fectively devise a research plan and mine our resources.
Library use by Yale law students continues to increase: a survey of
students last year indicates students spend more time in the library
than the classroom, and by all measures, the use of the Yale Law
Library continues to increase every year. The library provides what
architects often refer to as a third place, separate and distinct in na-
ture from the home or classroom: it’s a social place similar to a café
or a lounge, but one that speaks the language of independent study
and research. Enter the Yale Law Library on any evening, and you are
likely to find the Reading Room full with students, surrounded by
mounds of books and computer print-outs, working away on a note-
book computer.
While challenged by current budget realities, we are committed
to maintaining the historically strong research collections of the
library, including its impressive rare book and foreign and interna-
tional collections. At the same time, we pride ourselves in providing
our faculty and students with access to the richest array of online
legal information possible, supported by cutting edge technologies
and the help of expert librarians.
In order to better showcase our extensive collection of rare books,
we opened a new rare book exhibit area outside the Paskus-Dan-
ziger Rare Book Room, in the summer of 2008. The two large exhibit
cases in this area are used for series of themed exhibits, such as the
inaugural exhibit in 2008: The Flowering of Civil Law: Early Italian
City Statutes in the Yale Law Library, in honor of former dean Guido
Calabresi’s 50th class reunion. These exhibits have been popular
with library users, but they can also be viewed online via the library’s
Rare Book blog, linked from the library’s website at http://blogs.law.
yale.edu/blogs/rarebooks/ .
In the current era, it’s no longer necessary to enter the library physi-
cal space to access many of its information resources. An ever grow-
ing portion of our collection is now available in digital formats,
which can be accessed by members of the Yale community from a
computer on their desktops. But this shift has made research more
complex, as print resources are dropped in favor of an ever expand-
ing array of online sources, each with a different user interface. This
more complex information world is counterintuitive to those ac-
customed to limiting their research to one box searching, such as
Google, and it has led our librarians to seize opportunities for offer-
ing effective legal research instruction and building information dis-
covery tools and guides supporting the best use of our rich resources.
In sum, the digital era is an exciting period for the Yale Law Library,
and we are especially enthusiastic about the new challenges and
opportunities the ever evolving information landscape allows us for
improving our collections and services. We hope some of this excite-
ment is conveyed in this report.
S. Blair Kauffman
Law Librarian and Professor of Law
 technical services:
adaptability and innovation

Despite weathering a year of significant budget and staffing reductions, technical services
has demonstrated an admirable resiliency. As leaders in the field, the staff collaborated in the
development and testing of information services systems to improve research processes and was
heavily involved in the reprioritizing of the library’s collection goals.
The serials department began planning the
Library’s transition from print journals to
online resources, in response to increased
user preference for the convenience of
electronic research and also the need to trim
expenses. The serials team cancelled 210 print
titles in the 2008 fiscal year and 471 print titles
in 2009. Spanning two fiscal years, the serials
unit checked in numerous items, including
10,095 bound volumes, 26,362 volume
equivalents in microfilm and microfiche
formats. A total of 11,292 volumes were
and save a list of titles for future reading. ITEMS CATALOGUED
Yale affiliates with network IDs are now able 10000
to rate books or add their book reviews to 9000
MORRIS. Development of a new faceted
8000
interface called Encore continued as version
7000
2.0 launched publicly. Encore now features a
new search tool called Research Pro. With this 6000
tool, patrons may send their keyword search 5000
to several selected databases simultaneously 4000
without rekeying their Encore search. 3000
University mandated cutbacks in personnel at 2000

prepared for commercial binding. the end of the 2009 fiscal year were felt heavily 1000
in technical services and have warranted 0
In 2008, the cataloging team completed a reassessment of priorities and a staffing 2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
cataloging canon law materials acquired reorganization. Three clerical positions, two
from the Association of the Bar of the City in cataloging and two in serials as well as one
of New York in 2006 by Yale Law Library, part time professional position, were identified
where it is on permanent loan from the for elimination. BINDING
Association of the Bar of the City of New 8000
York. The cataloging team cataloged 7096 Technical services librarians remained
7000
other print titles and purchased records for professionally engaged serving on a number
of Law Library and University Library 6000
12,667 electronic titles available in a variety
of collections and aggregator services. These committees, attending continuing education 5000

records were downloaded into MORRIS and programs and were active nationally in 4000

include hyperlinks to the electronic resource. professional organizations. 3000

In 2009, the cataloging team began work on Mary Jane Kelsey prepared a presentation for 2000
the German law collection acquired from the Innovative Users Group in Washington D.C. 1000
Association of the Bar of the City of New York. in Spring 2008 (delivered by Anne Myers). 0
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
The project was suspended after cataloging She also delivered two presentations at the
207 titles due to budget constraints resulting 2008 AALL conference in Portland, Oregon:
from the shrinking value of the University’s “Encore, Enterprise, Primo and WorldCat
endowment. The plan is to finish cataloging Local: Explore the Evolving Discovery Tools
ACQUISITIONS ACTIVITY – PAID INVOICES
the collection when the financial situation for Your Catalog” and “Energize Your Catalog!
16000
improves. During the fiscal years 2007-2009, Get Electronic Titles Out of Their Silos and into
the cataloging team cataloged 14,215 other Your OPAC.” 14000

print titles and in FY09 purchased 2454 shelf 12000

ready titles. The Morris catalog now contains
records for 32,000 electronic titles available in
a variety of collections and aggregator services
including Lexis and Westlaw. These records
were downloaded into MORRIS and include
hyperlinks to the electronic resource.
In 2008, the acquisitions team continued the
effective use of technology to streamline the
purchase of 7476 new book titles in print, and
271 DVD titles with 491 discs. In FY09, the
library acquired 11,046 book titles in print and
also acquired 146 DVD titles with 316 discs.
Jo-Anne Giammattei served on the University 10000
Libraries Collection Development Council. 8000
Anne Myers completed a term on the AALL 6000
Executive Board and served as a member 4000
of the AALL Continuing Professional 2000
Education Committee. 0
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
Susan Karpuk was a reader for the Descriptive
Cataloging for Rare Materials (Serials)
DCRM(S) commenting on the draft before
its publication in 2008. Susan has also been a
ACQUISITIONS ACTIVITY – LINE ITEMS
member of  AALL Technical Services Interest
Section’s Descriptive Cataloging Policy Advisory
16000

The collection grew by a little over 21,000 Working Group since 2007. 14000
print volumes. 12000
Michelle Sullivan served on AALL’s Technical 10000
We were once again invited by our library Services Special Interest Section on Cataloging
8000
system vendor, Innovative Interfaces, to beta and Classification as well as the Descriptive
test the newest release of the software running Cataloging Policy Advisory Working Group.
6000

behind MORRIS. Some of the enhancements 4000

include the option to maintain reading history 2000

0
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09

2 | 3
 the evolving collection:
new challenges and opportunities

Recent budgetary reductions have opened up opportunities to reassess the library’s collecting
goals. While the demand for electronic collections has grown exponentially, the library is still
committed to the acquisition and maintenance of a first rate collection of scholarly monographs
and foreign and legal history materials in print to support the research interests of our faculty
and students.
In the area of print and online library collections,
the primary challenge in FY 08 and FY 09 was to
continue to serve the ambitious research needs
of Yale Law School faculty and students in the
face of mounting budgetary restrictions. Our
Associate Librarian for Collections and Access
Services, Fred Shapiro, devoted considerable
time in identifying cancellations that made sense
in terms of cost-savings while preserving the
research mission of our library. He consulted
extensively with reference librarians at our
library, Yale Law School faculty, law students
from foreign countries who shared their
knowledge of legal publications from their
home countries, and librarians from other
libraries. Our Serials Librarian, Anne Myers, was
indispensable to the cancellation process. Her
considerable knowledge and skills enabled us to
implement cuts in a way that was quick, efficient,
and responsive to the intricacies of faculty and
student needs.
Fortunately, our library has been preparing
for a more restrictive budgetary climate for
several years and was well positioned to respond
efficiently and with minimum impact on our
patrons. Our principal approach was to cut
subscriptions to underutilized print serials, such
as looseleaf services, journals, reporters, and
treatises. In most cases we would still have access
to the same publications in electronic formats.
We hope that, by greatly reducing print serials,
we have preserved our ability to ambitiously
collect monographs, foreign legal publications,
legal history materials, and electronic resources.
In these areas we are among the handful of
unique and rich law library collections, and will
continue to strive to maintain that status.
We continue to aspire to have one of the
best collections of legal electronic resources
from around the world. New electronic
subscriptions initiated in 2007-2009 included:
Audio Case Files, CCH Tax Network,
Hague Academy Collected Courses Online,
Halsbury’s Laws Direct, HeinOnline Israel
Law Reports, HeinOnline National Conference
of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws,
HeinOnline Selden Society Publications and
the History of Early English Law, HeinOnline
Tax and Economic Reform in the United States,
HeinOnline United Nations Law Collection,
Human Rights Documents Online, International
Investment Claims, Justis International Law
Reports, Justis State Trials, and Max Planck
Encyclopedia of Public International Law.
The dollar was stronger for much of the 2008-
2009 year, and there were funds available to
acquire virtually all the books suitable for
selection in the foreign and international law area
in English. Many monographs were ordered in
French, German, Italian, and Spanish. In
addition, there was a major acquisition of over
100 Croatian law books, Croatia being one of
Yale’s VCR’s (vigorous collecting responsibilities
in the parlance of the Northeast Foreign Law
Librarians Cooperative Group NEFLLCG). Yale
hosted the spring NEFLLCG meeting in May
attended by librarians from Harvard, University
of Pennsylvania, and Cornell. Current issues and
challenges facing selection and collecting in the
area of foreign and international law were
discussed. Dan Wade, Associate Law Librarian
for Foreign and International Law, chaired the
Foreign Law Selectors Interest Group of the
American Association of Law Libraries in 2008-
2009. He also assisted Professor Brilmayer in
teaching Contemporary Legal Issues in Africa
and participated in Research Methods in
International Law.
Under the leadership of our Acquisitions
Librarian, Jo-Anne Giammattei, we have made
great strides in improving the efficiency and
effectiveness of our collection development
and related acquisitions processes. Selectors
now use Yankee Book Peddler’s online GOBI
system extensively for English-language book
selections. In the foreign-law area, we use the
OttoEd system from Harrassowitz (German-
language countries) and electronic slips from
Casalini (Italy, France, and Spain), and we are
exploring new relationships with other vendors,
such as EastView for some Slavic-language
countries. These new tools have allowed us
coordinate collection development more closely
and streamline workflow in many ways. The
efficacy and sophistication of our collecting
have also improved because our Foreign and
International Law Librarian, Teresa Miguel,
and Evelyn Ma, our Asia Law Specialist, have
connected with foreign vendors important to
their areas of selection.
Fred Shapiro, our prolific Associate Librarian for
Collections and Access, published numerous
articles about quotations, including a regular
column in the Yale Alumni Magazine and an “On
Language” column in The New York Times
Magazine. His book, The Yale Book of Quotations,
was reviewed or covered in many media such as
the New Yorker and the Today Show, and it
received a number of awards. The Wall Street
Journal named it the number two most essential
reference book. He is the Contributing Editor to
Black’s Law Dictionary responsible for adding
historical information to their entries, and he
received a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation for research, using online databases,
into the origins of English-language words and
phrases. In addition, he is the consultant to the
Gale company for the Making of Modern Law
digital legal history projects and the consultant
to the Oxford English Dictionary on legal terms.
library publications
After several years of preparation, Yale University
Press and the Yale Law Library have revived the
long-dormant Yale Law Library publication series.
In its new incarnation the series has the name Yale
Law Library Series in Legal History and Reference.
As noted in the last annual report, the plan for
this series is “to publish about two books per year
on legal history or legal reference. We hope that
the series will further scholarship in legal history
and legal reference, enhance ties between our
library and the research of Yale Law School faculty,
exploit the riches of the Law Library collection,
and promote the visibility of our library and its
collection in the law library profession and among
legal scholars.”
Fred Shapiro, our Associate Librarian for
Collections and Access Services, is the series editor.
The first book in the series was published in 2007,
Yale Law School professor James Q. Whitman’s
acclaimed work, The Origins of Reasonable Doubt:
Theological Roots of the Criminal Trial. The second
book, published in 2009, was The Yale Biographical
Dictionary of American Law, edited by Roger
K. Newman. The latter is the first full-fledged
scholarly biographical dictionary of law.
We continued to work with the Gale Company
to digitize our books in the Making of Modern
Law product, probably the most ambitious digital
legal history project in the world. In 2009, we
agreed to participate in the fourth module of
Making of Modern Law and began planning for
it. This fourth module will be largely drawn from
the Yale Law Library collection, and our library
is playing the lead role in conceiving, planning,
and implementing the module. Legal history
researchers, as well as those in other areas of
history, will greatly benefit from the online
availability of the materials.
Another important library initiative is the
creation of a Digital Commons open-access online
repository of Yale Law School faculty, student,
and other publications. If successful, this can
serve as an institutional repository of the Yale
Law School, capturing the intellectual output of
the Law School and preserving its institutional
history. In 2009, we were at the point of setting up
a repository using the Digital Commons platform
of Berkeley Electronic Press. There were 159 papers
in the initial site, and our next step is to work with
faculty to solicit many more current and future
papers from them.
NEW MONOGRAPHS PURCHASED
10000
9000
8000
7000
6000
5000
4000
3000
2000
1000
0
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
4 | 5
 rare books and special collections:
showcasing the library’s illustrious
collections to the yale community and beyond

Our rare books area now has state of the art rare book exhibition showcases, to display the
library’s illustrious collections. Exhibits can also be enjoyed around the world, courtesy of the
rare books blog which premiered in April 2008.
The Pakus-Danziger Rare book room continues
to serve as an integral part of the intellectual
life in the Yale Law School and beyond. A new,
state-of-the-art rare book exhibition gallery was
launched in the Rare Book Collection, under the
energetic and imaginative management of Rare
Books Librarian Mike Widener. The two 8-foot-
wide exhibit cases enable the library to showcase
its rare books in a safe and secure environment.
The inaugural exhibit, “The Flowering of Civil
Law: Early Italian City Statutes in the Yale Law
Library,” highlighted the library’s outstanding
collection of early Italian statutes. The exhibit
opened during the October 2008 Alumni
Weekend and was dedicated to the Hon. Guido
Calabresi (Law ’58), Dean Emeritus. “Landmarks
in Law Reporting” followed in March 2009,
coinciding with Professor John Langbein’s
“History of the Common Law” course. Items
on display included a medieval Year Book
manuscript, first editions of the case reports
of Coke and Plowden, and the first published
American case reports.
Both exhibits can be enjoyed from computers
around the world thanks to the Yale Law Library
Rare Books Blog, which launched in April 2008.
Postings on the blog included acquisitions, gifts,
events, interesting discoveries, links to legal
history resources, bibliographies, and images and
descriptive text from the exhibits.
The Rare Book Collection supported teaching in
several classes in the Law School and elsewhere
on campus. The Paskus-Danziger Rare Book
Reading Room served as the classroom for
Professor Anders Winroth’s graduate history
seminar in “Medieval Law” in Fall 2007.
Professor James Whitman invited Rare Book
Librarian Mike Widener to present several
early canon law works in his “Western Legal
Traditions” class, Spring 2008. Widener also
taught sessions on biographical and archival
research in Professor Morris Cohen’s seminar on
“Research Methods in American Legal History,”
in Spring 2008 and Spring 2009. Entering first-
year law students and graduate students received
a brief introduction to the Rare Book Collection
in their Fall 2008 library orientation tours.
The Rare Book Librarian prepared special
displays and presentations for several group
tours: about twenty staff from Manuscripts &
Archives, Sterling Memorial Library (Aug. 2007);
new interns at the Beinecke Rare Book and
Manuscript Library (August 2008); about twenty
Latin American law students in the Linkages
program (February 2009); and twenty eight
students from the Scuola S. Anna, Pisa (March
2009). In addition, Widener gave a presentation
entitled “Race on the Stand: African American
History in the Law Library’s American Trials
Collection” in the Sterling Memorial Library
Lecture Hall on February 20, 2008, as part of
Black History Month activities.
Mike Widener published Part 1 of “Remembering
Roy Mersky” in Legal Miscellanea, the newsletter
of the Jacob Burns Law Library, George
Washington University School of Law. He was
named to the Board of Advisers for the Green
Bag Almanac & Reader, an annual compilation
of outstanding legal writing. He was appointed
to the Special Collections Committee of the Yale
University Libraries.
The Rare Book Collection hosted two unpaid
internships. Sabrina Sondhi, the new Special
Collections Librarian at Columbia Law School
Library, completed a three-week internship
in February 2009. Benjamin Yousey-Hindes,
a Ph.D. candidate in medieval history from
Stanford University, co-curated the “Early Italian
City Statutes” exhibit.
There were several significant gifts to the Rare
Book Collection. Professor Morris Cohen
donated his unique and outstanding collection of
over 200 law-related children’s books spanning
the 18th to 21st centuries. The library is actively
collecting additional titles for the Juvenile
Jurisprudence Collection. Charles J. Tanenbaum
(Law ’37) donated a significant letter from Chief
Justice John Marshall. Written in April 1835, not
long before he died. Marshall describes a meeting
with George Washington that led to his career
in public service. Beverly Manne of Houston,
Texas, donated Thomas Mortimer’s Every Man
His Own Broker (London, 1765) in honor of
her brother-in-law Henry Manne (LL.M. ’53,
S.J.D. ’66), one of the founders of the Law &
Economics movement. Mordecai Rosenfeld (Law
’54) gave a fine copy of the 1830 London edition
of Blackstone’s Commentaries. Before his death
in May 2009 at the age of 102, the late Harold I.
Boucher of San Francisco funded the acquisition
of Essex’s Innocency and Honour Vindicated
(London, 1690) and John Brydall’s Jura Coronae:
His Majesties Royal Rights and Prerogatives Asserted
(London, 1680).
There were two major acquisitions from the
library of the Association of the Bar of the City of
New York. A collection of early German law (826
volumes) was acquired in September 2007, made
possible with the generous support of the Oscar
M. Reubhausen Fund. A collection of foreign law
(163 titles) arrived in October 2008.
The Rare Book Collection continued to actively
acquire titles for its William Blackstone
Collection (already the most comprehensive in
the world), its collection of early Italian statutes
(possibly the largest outside of Italy), and its
collections of American trials and law books with
illustrations. Other acquisitions strengthened its
holdings in Anglo-American common law.
manuscripts and archives
During the 2007-2009 fiscal years, the library’s
Archivist Barbara Heck completed revisions to the
finding aid for the White Brothers/Clark, Hall &
Peck Collection. The collection contains over 1200
linear feet of materials, primarily consisting of title
examination documents, surveys, and real estate
closing documents. White Brothers and Clark, Hall
& Peck were two of the largest New Haven law
firms from the mid 1850s to the 1990s and their
records document over a century of development of
real property in New Haven and New Haven County.
In addition to continuing reference by surveyors
and attorneys for title research, the collection is
also regularly used by two Yale architecture classes
to study the evolution of different New Haven
neighborhoods during the twentieth century.
Manuscripts and Archives also acquired 350 bound
volumes of legal materials from New York attorney
and Yale alumnus Peter Megargee Brown. The
volumes primarily document his professional
practice at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft and
his subsequent writings and speeches relating to
legal ethics.
Nancy Lyon, Archivist at the Sterling Library and
Barbara Heck traveled to Philadelphia to appraise
and acquire the personal papers of Judge Edward R.
Becker. Becker, a 1954 YLS graduate, was best known
for his long and dedicated service on the bench,
first as a United States District Court Judge for the
Eastern District of Pennsylvania (1970-1982), then
as a judge on the United States Courts of Appeals
for the Third Circuit until his death in 2006. His
papers document his lifelong involvement in the
civic affairs of his hometown of Philadelphia as
well as his most well-known opinions about the
reliability of scientific evidence, class action suits,
and complex litigation.
Our archivist also completed a preliminary
inventory of the 135 boxes of materials donated by
the family of Lawrence Z. Freedman. Freedman’s
primary appointment in the Psychiatry Department
at Yale Medical School was complemented by
his work in the legal field with Harold Lasswell.
Freedman and Lasswell collaborated extensively
in studying the intersections of law and psychiatry
in the 1950s. Much of the collection pertains to
Lasswell’s subsequent work at the University
of Chicago where he became an expert in the
personality development of political assassins and
serial killers.
Another notable acquisition consisted of 30 boxes
of materials by donation from the family of Stanton
Wheeler. Wheeler taught at Yale Law School from
1968 until his death in 2007, primarily in the fields
of sociology and the law. In addition to his classes
at Yale Law School, Wheeler’s papers document
his work as a sociologist with the Russell Sage
Foundation, and his membership and chairmanship
of the Yale Faculty Committee on Athletics.
Due to ongoing budgetary constraints, the library
regrettably has to suspend its manuscript and
archives program. We hope to reinstate this
invaluable service in the near future when the
budget situation improves.
6 | 7
 access services:
the library’s hub of activity

The increase in and accessibility of electronic materials has not diminished the level of
circulation activity. Our students and faculty continue to request and check out print materials.
The library as a whole remains probably the most preferred and comfortable space in the law
school for study and group interaction.
 Access Services, ably supervised by Information
Access Manager Martha Clark, continues
to be a center of activity. Even in this era of
electronic access to materials, access services
staff spend significant time at the circulation
desk assisting patrons with charging, renewing
and recalling books and answering a variety
of questions. Materials are circulated from the
library’s collection, and also from other Yale
campus libraries through the intra-campus
delivery service Eli Express; Interlibrary Loan;
and ShareLaw, which is a consortium of law
libraries used for quick turnaround lending
and borrowing. Due to budgetary constraints
and low borrowing statistics, the library ceased
to participate in the interlibrary loan portion
of ShareLaw as of May 2009. In FY 08, the
library loaned 285 items and borrowed 67 while
in FY 2009 the library loaned 243 items and
borrowed 87. Although we have discontinued
the interlibrary loan portion of ShareLaw, the
library has elected to continue with ShareLaw’s
expanded union catalog.
Eli Express, our intra-campus delivery service,
has increased by almost 1,000 transactions
goal of having a readily accessible collection The following are comparative circulation
that responds to the needs of our users. figures for this year as compared to the last
Approximately 15,000 items per year have been two years:
processed for storage at the environmentally
controlled and secure Library Shelving Facility. 2005–06 academic year
Currently about 266,000 bound volumes, 1067 > 29,499 checkouts
archival materials and over 6,000 microfilm > 89,070 total transactions
documents are housed in the facility. This
figure represents titles that have been cancelled 2006–07 academic year
due to our serials cancellation initiative as well > 33,770 checkouts
as titles that are no longer in heavy use. As a > 100,137 total transactions
result, space in the stacks has been freed up 2007–08 academic year
for incoming and high use materials which
> 32,327 checkouts
are immediately accessible to our users. A
> 96,793 total transactions
comprehensive and thorough inventory of
two levels of stacks was completed in spring 2008–09 academic year
2009. This process ensures the accuracy of > 31,397 checkouts
information in the online catalog and the > 91,449 total transactions
availability of library materials to our users.
Our Collections and Access Coordinator,
Cesar Zapata is playing an important role in CIRCULATION CHECKOUTS
managing the library’s online repository for
40,000
working papers and other content generated
35,000
by Yale Law School faculty and students.
As chair of our Task Force on the Digital 30,000

during the most recent fiscal year. These figures Repository, he has also, worked on developing 25,000
represent the number of books from other Yale the design of the repository and preparing for 20,000
campus libraries delivered to the Law Library its launch in Fall 2009. 15,000
and checked out to patrons from the Law 10,000
Our librarians in access services have been
Library Circulation Desk.
professionally engaged both locally and 5,000
Also, effective March 2009, the Law Library nationally. Martha Clark serves on the 0
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
is now able to lend and deliver Law Library University Library’s Document Delivery
books to other libraries on the Yale campus. Coordinating Committee and the Managerial
The service is gaining in momentum and we Performance Appraisal Committee. In addition
anticipate that it will pick up significantly at she is a member of the Arabic and Middle TOTAL TRANSACTIONS
the start of school year in September 2009. Eastern Electronic Library (Project AMEEL)
105000
Interlibrary Loan lending and borrowing have which is a web-based portal for the study of
both increased in the last two years. the Middle East. Her involvement relates to 100000

Interlibrary Loan implications for this growing 95000

Our statistics for circulation of Law Library
digital collection. 90000
books has decreased only slightly during the
85000
past two years despite the increase of electronic Cesar Zapata served as chair of the Latino
information. Our DVD collection and our New Caucus of the American Association of Law 80000

Books Collection remain very popular parts of Libraries and was a member of AALL’s Diversity 75000
the Law Library collection. About 10% of all Committee. He was also chair of the Library 70000
2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09
circulations during the 2008-2009 fiscal year Disability Services Committee and a member of
were for DVD’s. the Law Library’s Website Launch Committee
and Preservation Committee.
Access Services actively collaborated with
other departments in working toward the INTERLIBRARY LOANS
2500

“Yale Law School’s tremendous movie collection has made 2000

1500
Blockbuster a thing of the past (well, at least a trivial thing until 1000

graduation). It’s one of the many under-discussed treasures of Yale 500

Law School. Located smack in the middle of the Federal Practice 0

2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09

Digest Series and Almanacs, it offers a wide variety of film and

television shows available for free to all Yale Law Students.”
K.S., 3L
8 | 9
 reference and instructional services:
innovation and creative approaches
to research and teaching

Our reference librarians have kept a pulse on the research needs of our students and faculty.
While traditional walk up reference still exists, the complexity of the questions have risen and
the corresponding need for individual counseling sessions. Librarians have also tapped into social
media such as Facebook, Twitter and Blogs to reach a fast growing segment of our patrons on
social networks.
The Reference and Instructional Services
Department has made great advances in
providing services in new and innovative ways.
Members of the department also remained
extremely active professionally and also took
on new responsibilities within the university
libraries and at the law library.
The department’s educational efforts have
expanded and in addition to an increase in
individual instructional sessions, we have also
added a fall semester section of Advanced Legal
Research as well as specialized courses offered
throughout the school year. These courses have
covered a variety of topics, ranging from use
of bibliographic database programs to recent
developments with ebooks.
The first semester legal research sessions have
continued to raise the awareness of the students
about the issues and methods of legal research.
Students are introduced to the issues of legal
research, to important sources, and to research
strategies. The first semester sessions are an
excellent lead in to the larger slate of classes
offered in the spring. There were twelve sections
of first year students taught in the first semester.
Each section had roughly 17 students. Exclusive
of Lexis and Westlaw training, each section met
for about 4 classroom hours.
Trends in reference have included a rise in the
complexity of questions and a rise in requests
for individual research counseling sessions.
There also has still remained a need to maintain
a presence at the reference desk as a significant
point of contact with our patron base. Over
the past two years, we have experimented with
various coverage configurations and have found
that during the school year, it is important to
have a reference librarian at the reference desk for
most of the day.
We have also made it easier for patrons to reach
us. Most reference librarians have individual
web pages that contain their schedule as well as
contact information including: location, phone
number, email address, IM handle, and an IM
widget. The reference department also has an
IM handle, with a widget embedded on the
reference web page, that is monitored by the
librarian on duty. IM has become an important
means of communicating with our patrons. IM
is currently the third most favored means to
reach us (walk-up is first, and email is second).
Telephone reference has declined dramatically:
most phone queries are from the general public
and not from members of the Yale community.
The Reference Department has also worked
with social media to serve our patrons. We
have developed a Facebook page that provides
access to our most important services and serves
as a point of contact. While we have not been
especially aggressive with Twitter, we are among
the most “followed” library. Also, members of
the Department have been active bloggers, both
at the blogs maintained at the law library and at
other professional blogs.
Throughout the year, the Department offered
many library tours for a variety of groups,
including: new and visiting faculty, visiting
scholars, other Yale librarians, Chinese scholars,
regular tours for Law School employees, and
tours for other special groups. The Department
also offers library orientations to new members
of the faculty, visitors, fellows, research
assistants, and incoming students.
The department’s liaison program with the
faculty has witnessed a steady increase in the
number of requests fielded with almost 4,000
requests in the past two years. The number
of faculty members who have used reference
services has also increased and we were able
to identify almost 75% of the faculty who used
reference services.
The past two years have seen a drop in
microform subscriptions, helping us resolve
space issues. However, there has not been a
reduction in microform use. The material that
is available solely in microform is still important
and there is still a fairly large support need
with microforms. Due to university mandated
budget cuts, we faced a situation where this vital
function, microforms, was not being supported.
We have worked collaboratively with other
departments to fill this need and beginning
Fall 2009 school year, the Technical Services
Department will assist with microform filing.
The judicial nominations database in order to
grow and remain relevant, had to be completely
redeveloped and our Emerging Technologies
Librarian, Jason Eiseman has completed this
project. We now have a new database that is
more complete, searchable, and expandable.
Also, the department has taken on responsibility
for the maintenance and the future direction of
Avalon: the most popular web-site at Yale.
The department has had some changes in
personnel during the past two years. Mark
Engsberg, Head of Reference, left to become
the Director of the Law Library at Emory
Law School. The department has been
further strengthened by the addition of Ryan
Harrington as a Reference Librarian in 2008 and
Jason Eiseman as the Librarian for Emerging
Technologies at the beginning of 2009.
Members of the department remain active in
professional endeavors. In 2008, John Nann
spoke at the Joint Study Institute (a conference
sponsored by several domestic and foreign law
library organizations and with attendees from
the United States, United Kingdom, Canada,
Australia, and New Zealand), the Conference
on Computer Aided Legal Instruction, and
at the American Association of Law Libraries
Annual Meeting, and has served as the Education
faculty services: reliability
and efficiency
Yale Law School faculty have always relied
on the creativity, speed, and efficiency of our
faculty services department and over 8,500
items were retrieved in the past two years.
This resourcefulness has become even more
crucial in an era of constrained budgets. At the
end of 2008, our Faculty Services Assistant,
Theresa Cullen, retired and was replaced by
Dick Hasbany. Dick has quickly and easily
transitioned into this position continuing
the tradition of excellence in the delivery of
materials to our faculty. However, due to the
budget reduction our attempt to fill a second
vacant faculty services position was halted.
Fortunately, other library departments have
stepped in and enabled us to continue to
provide our faculty with the superb service
that they expect. Kathy Eow, from Collections
and Access, assists our Faculty Services
Assistant, Dick Hasbany on a daily basis and
has proved to be an invaluable member of the
faculty services team.
Committee Chair of the Law Librarians of New
England since 2008. Margaret Chisholm served
on the library’s communications committee.
Teresa Miguel is Vice Chair/Chair elect , AALL
Latino Caucus. Teresa was most recently, Panel
Coordinator, Moderator, Speaker: Thinking
about Treaties: Interpretation, in Force at AALL
2009 in Washington, D.C.
Evelyn Ma presented an overview of noteworthy
China-related electronic resources at the Asian
Law Interest Group, Foreign and Comparative
Law Special Interest Section, AALL, Portland
Oregon in July 2008. She also served on
Publications and Translation Committee, 1st
China-United States Conference on Legal
Information and Law Libraries, Beijing, China,
May 2009.
Jason Eiseman spoke at the 2009 CALI
Conference in Colorado and was elected to the
Executive Board of the Computer Services Special
Interest Section of the American Association of
Law Libraries. Jason also co-cordinated the 2009
Un-Conference at AALL 2009 in Washington.
Camilla Tubbs was appointed to a three year term
on the Government Printing Office’s Depository
Library Council, she is also Chair of the AALL
Government Relations Committee.
The past two years have been challenging with
budgetary constraints and reduced staffing. The
adaptable staff in reference and instructional
services have tapped into their collective skills
and abilities to face these challenges and create
new opportunities. The demand for the products,
services, and skills offered by the Reference and
Instructional Services Department continues to
grow, and we are now more than ever central to
the mission of the law library and the law school
as a whole.
10 | 11
 programs
The library continued its active engagement in
the law school community by hosting a wide
array of exciting programs geared toward the
law school audience and the general public.
In continuing a tradition of showcasing the
scholarship of the law school faculty, the library
played host to several faculty scholarship series,
book discussions, and also for the first time
hosted a law student book discussion.
Among the well attended and lively book
discussions hosted by the library at Labyrinth
Bookstore in New Haven were Paul Kahn’s
exposition of his book “Sacred Violence:
Torture, Terror, and Sovereignty” in October
2008 and Robert Post’s talk in April 2009 on
his well received book “For the Common Good:
Principles of American Academic Freedom.”
The library hosted its very first student book
talk in April 2009 with Zachary Kaufman’s
(09) discussion of his book with Philip Clark
- “After Genocide: Transitional Justice, Post-
Conflict Reconstruction and Reconciliation
in Rwanda and Beyond.” This enlightening
discussion was well attended by students,
faculty and staff, and particularly struck a
chord with librarians because profits from the
book will be donated to Kigali Public Library,
Rwanda’s first public library.
Movie night continued the expansion of the
library’s outreach to graduate students outside
a conventional library setting. An interesting
array of films ranging from the “Monsoon
Wedding” (India) and “Yella” (Germany)
selected by international graduate students
showcased their home countries and were
viewed by lively audiences from within and
outside of the law school.
Librarians lunches and staff spotlight series
provided continuing education and learning
opportunities for librarians and support staff.
Discussions included an overview of China
Law by Evelyn Ma, two serials discussions by
Anne Myers, and an overview of the Harvard
Law Library’s faculty services program by Janet
Katz, Faculty Services Librarian at the Harvard
Law Library. Various spotlight series programs
featured a taped interview of Morris Cohen
(who was also present and provided personal
commentary), Femi Cadmus’ “Cybersleuthing”,
Kathy Eow and Heather Bryant’s “Librarian
Travels in Kenya and Vermont” amongst
others. Mary Jane Kelsey convened and
presented at a spring 2008 meeting of the
New England Innovative Users Group held at
the Yale Law School focusing on succession
planning in libraries.

transitions
professional appointments
Femi Cadmus Associate Law Librarian for Administration
Jason Eiseman Emerging Technologies Librarian
Ryan Harrington Reference Librarian
Anne Myers Librarian for Serials Services

new support staff

Drew Adan Library Assistant (Collections and Access)
Kathy Eow Library Assistant (Collections and Access)
Jonathan Lasky Library Assistant (Cataloging)

retirements
Bonnie Collier Associate Librarian for Administration, retired in June 2008
(35 years of service)
Alexandra Karyshev Cataloging Assistant, retired in July 2007
(16 years of service)
Barbara Renckowski Cataloging Assistant, retired in March 2008
(41 years of service)
Theresa Cullen Faculty Services Assistant, retired in January 2009
(9 years of service)
 yale law school
lillian goldman law library
po box 208215 • new haven, ct 06520-8215 • 203.432.1600 • www.law.yale.edu/library