Category Archives: Uncategorized

New Books List

The latest edition the Brooklyn Law School Library New Books List has 68 items that cover a broad range of legal topics. All of the titles provide users of the BLS Library with content that can help their research needs on a wide number of subjects. These items on the list deal, to select just a few, deal with themes that are newsworthy and perhaps controversial: Capital Punishment’s Collateral Damage by Robert M. Bohm (Call #HV8699.U5 B64 2013); Chasing Gideon: The Elusive Quest for Poor People’s Justice by Karen Houppert (Call #KF336 .H68 2013); Democracy of Sound: Music Piracy and the Remaking of American Copyright in the Twentieth Century by Alex Sayf Cummings (Call #KF3035 .C86 2013); The Tough Luck Constitution and the Assault on Health Care Reform by Andrew Koppelman (Call #KF3605 .K67 2013); Rebels at the Bar: The Fascinating, Forgotten Stories of America’s First Women Lawyersby Jill Norgren (Call #KF367 .N67 2013); and Payback: The Case for Revenge by Thane Rosenbaum (Call #K5103 .R674 2013).


Readers of this blog post who want a preview any of these items can click on the links above to see the item record which contains information about on the subjects for the selected book and a dust jacket for the book. When an item in the BLS Library catalog has a dust jacket, users can click on it to get use Amazon’s Search Inside feature which allows users to find the exact book to borrow from the BLS Library. SARA, the BLS Library catalog also has a browse shelf feature for each item record. By clicking on the browse shelf link next to an item’s call number, users will be able to  quickly see what other items are located next to the item in the record.  This is useful for researchers who are interested in a specific topic or an author and would like to see what else the library might own quickly. 

Summer Library Hours

Early Summer Hours: May 20 – May 31, 2013

Seven days a week:  9:00am – 10:00pm

Memorial Day, Monday, May 27th, 9:00am – 10:00pm

Summer Hours: June 1 – July 29, 2013

Sunday – Thursday:  9:00am – 12Midnight

Friday & Saturday:  9:00am – 10:00pm

Independence Day, Thursday, July 4th:  9:00am – 10:00pm

Late Summer Hours, July 30 – August 11, 2013

Sunday:  10:00am – 10:00pm

Monday – Saturday:  9:00am – 10:00pm

Have a great summer!

Pretrial Motion Practice and Employment Discrimination

New York Law School Law Review has a new symposium issue, Volume 57, Issue 4, Trial by Jury or Trial by Motion? Summary Judgment, Iqbal, and Employment Discrimination. The issue is based on a symposium held at New York Law School in April 2012 which examined evidence that civil rights cases, especially those alleging employment discrimination, are susceptible to dismissal before trial as well as to unfavorable judgment notwithstanding the verdict after trial.

Among the many contributors who include practitioners, judges, and academics is Brooklyn Law School Professor Elizabeth M. Schneider who with Harvard Law Professor Nancy Gertner co-wrote the article “Only Procedural”: Thoughts on the Substantive Law Dimensions of Preliminary Procedural Decisions in Employment Discrimination Cases, 57 N.Y.L. Sch. L. Rev. 767 (2012-2013), which focuses on the “substantive law dimensions” of the procedural decisions that federal courts make in employment discrimination cases. Professors Scheider and Gertner take the Supreme Court decision Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, 564 U.S. ___ (2011), which limited the availability of class actions as the starting point for their argument.

The other articles published in the issue give an in-depth look at pretrial motion practice in employment discrimination cases both from the point of view of practitioners and academics, offering practical suggestions for attorneys for plaintiffs and guidance for judges in ruling on pretrial motions.

Taxing Internet Sales

The Senate, by a vote of 69-27, passed S. 336, the Marketplace Fairness Act of 2013, a bill designed to restore States’ sovereign rights to enforce State and local sales and use tax laws. The legislation seeks to reverse the decision of Quill Corp. v. North Dakota, 504 US 298  (1992) in which the Supreme Court ruled that States cannot require a retailer to collect sales taxes on its behalf, unless that retailer has a physical presence in the taxing state.  The Marketplace Fairness Act eliminates the Quill standard and would allow States that meet certain minimal standards to require retailers in all States to collect taxes for them.

The bill’s aim to enforce a sales tax on businesses that rely on the Internet to reach their customers has three problems: 1) Online businesses would be responsible for collecting and filing their sales tax from customers that do not reside in their state; 2) Businesses would need to use software to keep track of their tax paying customers putting their customers at risk by exposing sensitive information records; and 3) Requiring that sales tax be collected at the state from which the goods are shipped would be much simpler and would encourage states to be less reliant on highly regressive sales taxes.

The BLS Library has in its internet collection a report from the Congressional Research Service “Amazon Laws” and Taxation of Internet Sales: Constitutional Analysis which examines efforts by States to tax internet sales. According to the report, New York was one of the first to do so. On March 28, 2013, the New York Court of Appeals found New York’s Amazon tax constitutional in Amazon.com, LLC v. New York State Department of Taxation and Finance. That decision is important because, since New York enacted Tax Law §1101(b)(8)(vi) in 2008, eight other states have passed similar laws.

Brooklyn Law School Professor Brad Borden took part in a podcast with the Voice of Russia about the legislation that require retailers with more than $1 million a year in online sales to send taxes to states where their products are delivered. Large retailers and smaller stores support the bill, but online retailers such as eBay oppose it. According to Borden: “With Internet sales rising, constituents and business owners in various states are putting pressure on lawmakers to help even the playing field.”

CALI Lessons for Final Exams

Brooklyn Law School students can better prepare for final by using CALI lessons. BLA students registering for the first time can contact a reference librarian for the school’s authorization code to create a new account.

Lessons written by law faculty/librarians include those for first year courses and many upper-level subjects. There are three podcasts on exam taking skills titled Exam Taking Skills, Outlines, and Advice for Law Students. Six law professors on three different panels discuss outlines, studying for class, preparing for exams, time management, and how professors grade exams. The conversations were recorded as podcasts. The podcasts are not intended to take the place of a conversation with your professor, but they offer law students additional insight into the exam process. See the podcasts for Panel 1, Panel 2, and Panel 3. Another CALI lesson, Writing Better Law School Exams: The Importance of Structure, is designed to improve student exam-writing techniques. Legal writing including writing exams as students employs a special form of writing. The lesson discusses that form and its structural implications discussing the tasks to perform and the tools to use in performing those tasks, and how to sharpen those tools. The lesson concludes with interactive opportunities to try the techniques described.

Graduating Students: Access to Bloomberg Law, Lexis Advance & Westlaw

Congratulations to our graduating students.  Below are vendors’ access policies for use of their databases after graduation:

Bloomberg Law: Access for 6 months after graduation.  Register here for a Bloomberg Law account, if you do not already have one.  Enter your BLS email in the registration form.

Lexis: Access Lexis Advance through a law school account until July 31, 2013.  Register here for a Lexis Advance law school account, if you do not already have one.  Also, Lexis will email BLS graduates to describe its new Graduate ID program, which requires graduating students to register for a new ID that Lexis will provide via email in early July.  Lexis states that the “new ID will be active until December 31, 2013 for educational, bar review and job search purposes only…Students cannot use this ID for commercial purposes.”  Alternatively, graduating students who will be engaging in verifiable 501(c)(3) public interest work can register for the Lexis ASPIRE program.  Lexis states that graduates may apply for either the Graduate ID or the ASPIRE ID (if eligible).  Questions?  Email marybeth.drain@lexisnexis.com

Westlaw Classic & WestlawNext: Access through November 2013, if graduating students register to extend their passwords.  The extension form is posted on the main www.lawschool.westlaw.com homepage.  Sign on to the site and select the “need Westlaw this summer” icon on the main page to complete the extension form.  Additionally, graduates will have access to Westlaw’s job search databases for one year after graduation.  Questions?  Email Stefanie.efrati@thomsonreuters.com

Also, BLS alumni who visit Brooklyn Law School Library are welcome to use Lexis Academic to search news, U.S. federal and state cases, law review articles and company data.  Finally, reference librarians can show you how to access   free gateways to law such as the Federal Digital System, Justia and the Legal Information Institute.

Law Day 2013

The first Law Day, May 1, 1958, came about by Proclamation 3221 which President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed on February 3, 1958. The Proclamation read “The people of this nation should remember with pride and vigilantly guard the great heritage of liberty, justice, and equality under the law that our forefathers bequeathed us.” A few years later, in 1961, Congress passed Pub. L. 87-20, 75 Stat. 43 establishing Law Day “for the cultivation of the respect for law that is so vital to the democratic way of life.”

The first of May was purposely chosen to contrast with May Day, a holiday which socialist nations celebrate on May 1 as International Workers Day in commemoration of the 1886 Haymarket riots in Chicago. The Brooklyn Law School Library has The Chicago Haymarket Conspiracy, and the Detection and Trial of the Conspirators through its subscription to HeinOnline.

This year, the American Bar Association has designated the theme for Law Day 2013 as “Realizing the Dream: Equality for All.” The ABA website lists themes for past Law Days. See the New York State Bar Assocation website for more on Law Day 2013.

April: National Poetry Monrth

National Poetry Month has been around since 1996 when the Academy of American Poets designated April as the month for schools, publishers, libraries, booksellers, and poets to celebrate poetry and its place in American culture. This April, the Academy of American Poets is celebrating the role that correspondence has played in poets’ lives, as well as in their poems. Brooklyn Law School has just such an item in its collection with Calamus:  A Series of Letters Written during the Years 1868-1880 by Walt Whitman to a Young Friend, Peter Doyle (Call # LC1059 .A73). One quotation from that book is “I delivered my poem here before the College yesterday. . .  I am to go to Vermont for a couple of days, and then back to Brooklyn. . .  I will send you the little book with my poem, (and others) when I get back to Brooklyn.”

For law-related poetry, take a look at Supreme Court Haiku by Houston attorney Keith Jaasma who creates haiku poems featuring the decisions of the US Supreme Court. Seed for example the haiku for Moncrieffe v. Holder in which the Court ruled that a non-citizen cannot be automatically deported for the kindhearted but illegal act of bringing a few joints to a party. The haiku reads:

Immigrant’s drug crime

“Aggravated felony”?

No, just a few joints

The three line poems that Japanese poets write, usually about nature, are very witty. There are also haiku about the Constitution and various justices. The FAQ movie on the site is worth watching.

Exam Time Courtesy

quiet studyThe Library Staff wants to remind you to be considerate of your colleagues during the exam period. Please remember to hold quiet conversations in the vestibules and hallways, and to keep it to a minimum. Group study rooms are available for discussions.  You can reserve group study rooms using the library’s online reservation system.   Also, please do not bring food into the library. The smells are distracting to many students. Thank you and good luck on your finals.
*The image, which appears in this post, is courtesy of Binghamton University Libraries