The US Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision in Hollingsworth vs. Perry, denying Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker’s plans to televise the Proposition 8 trial, is worth reading for a number of reasons. The opinion acknowledges that the question whether courtroom proceedings should be broadcast has prompted considerable national debate and that reasonable minds differ on the proper resolution of that debate and on the restrictions, circumstances, and procedures under which such broadcasts should occur. While the per curiam decision prevents Judge Walker’s plans for transmission of the proceedings of the case to five other federal courthouses located in Seattle, Pasadena, Portland, San Francisco, and Brooklyn, (and also, on a delayed basis, to allow the video to be posted on YouTube) it does so on procedural grounds stating that is does not “express any views on the propriety of broadcasting court proceedings generally”. The opinion lays out some interesting procedural aspects of the case. For example, page 3 of the opinion states: “The State of California declined to defend Proposition 8, and the defendant-intervenors (who are the applicants here) entered the suit to defend its constitutionality.” While the decision takes pains to side step the controversy, it makes references to claims by the proponents of Proposition 8 that a televised trial would subject them to harassment. For example, at pages 2 to 3, the decision addresses the concerns of the proponents of Proposition 8:

Its advocates claim that they have been subject to harassment as a result of public disclosure of their support. For example, donors to groups supporting Proposition 8 “have received death threats and envelopes containing a powdery white substance.” Some advocates claim that they have received confrontational phone calls and e-mail messages from opponents of Proposition 8 and others have been forced to resign their jobs after it became public that they had donated to groups supporting the amendment. Opponents of Proposition 8 also are alleged to have compiled “Internet blacklists” of pro-Proposition 8 businesses and urged others to boycott those businesses in retaliation for supporting the ballot measure. And numerous instances of vandalism and physical violence have been reported against those who have been identified as Proposition 8 supporters (citations omitted).

See also Cameras in the Courtroom: Television and the Pursuit of Justice by Marjorie Cohn and David Dow (Call #KF8725 .C63 1998).

Judge Alex Kozinski, in his letter dated January 10 defending the Ninth Circuit pilot program for TV broadcasting, may have summed up the argument best by writing “”Like it or not, we are now well into the twenty-first century, and it is up to those of us who lead the federal judiciary to adopt policies that are consistent with the spirit of the times and the advantages afforded us by new technology. If we do not, Congress will do it for us.” In fact, in the last session of Congress, Sen. Grassley and Sen. Schumer introduced the Sunshine in the Courtroom Act of 2009 to authorize the televising to the public of court proceedings. A Congressional Research Service Report entitled Televising Supreme Court and Other Federal Court Proceedings: Legislation and Issues discusses the issue at length.

With the launch of Brooklyn Law School’s new website this past fall, came new and improved ways of searching and accessing the library’s broad array of resources.  These new search capabilities, which include the ability to search across databases for both journal titles and articles, help to make research more efficient.

One new enhancement is the ability to search for an electronic version of a journal across all of the library’s subscription databases.  To do so, click on the E-Journals link from the library’s main page.  By doing so, you are taken to the E-Journal Portal.  From this page, you can type the title of a journal in the search box and find a list of the different databases which publish that journal, along with the coverage dates.  For example if you were to search for the title, Tobacco Control, your result list will show you that the databases, PubMed Central, JSTOR, Health and Wellness Resource Center, Health Reference Center Academic and Proquest Central carry the title.  You will also see the coverage dates for the various databases.  For example, JSTOR contains issues of Tobacco Control dating from 1992 to 2005.  This new search capability will aid those researchers who need to cite check.

Besides being able to search for journal titles across the library’s electronic resources, researchers can search all of the library’s electronic resources for citations, abstracts, full text articles, and records in the library’s catalog.  This new “360° Search” allows a researcher to further sort their results by date, author, title or source.  It also gives users the ability to refine their search by a pre-populated list of topics, by date, by journal title or by author.  To access the “360° Search,” go to the library’s main page and click on the hyperlinked text, “multiple BLS databases,” which is located near the top of the page, under the “Cross Searching” heading.   This great new tool is a one stop shop that simplifies and consolidates the process of research.   For example, if you were to do a keyword search for “’regional greenhouse gas initiatives’ or RGGI” combined with a subject search for “climate change”, you receive 209 results.  You can then refine your search by one of the topics provided, such as “Auction” which then limits your results to 36 hits from a variety of databases including Proquest Central, LegalTrac, Business and Company Resource Center, and Custom Newspapers.  This is a much more thorough and efficient way to research rather than searching within each individual database to determine what it contains on a given topic.

The major Argentine political, financial and legal news story this week involves President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner’s decision to implement a “Bicentennial Fund” financed with $6.6 billion of $17 billion in reserves held by Argentina’s Central Bank to make debt payments this year. The President of the Central Bank, Martin Redrado, resisted the move and refused to release the reserves to the government for debt service payments. He also refused to resign when President Kirchner demanded his resignation. In a sequence of surreal events involving all parts of the government, Kirchner fired Redrado and, according to a BBC report, an Argentine court has now ordered his reinstatement and blocked President Kirchner’s plan to use currency reserves to pay public debt. The Argentine government has $13 billion in debt service payments due in 2010. La Nacion, Argentina’s leading daily newspaper, has reported that the president also ordered Attorney General Esteban Righi to file criminal charges against Redrado, a Harvard-educated economist.

In Argentina, the Central Bank is answerable to the president, unlike in the US where the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank serves independently from the US President. The Federal Reserve Banks were established by Congress as the operating arms of the nation’s central banking system. Imagine the uproar in the US if a similar series of events were to occur. Events in the US leading up to the financial crisis in 2008 led many critics to suggest that American central bankers should face criminal charges for their part in the collapse. The news from Argentina shows how how such retaliatory tactics can

Opposition leaders claim that President Kirchner is on an asset-grabbing spree to fund wild spending until 2011 when the next election takes place. The nationalization of private pension funds and the current effort to tap central bank reserves are cited as evidence. Whatever the fate of Martin Redrado, Kirchner will need to convince the Argentine Congress of the validity of using central bank reserves to pay off the debt before the issue is resolved.

When I gave my presentation to 20+ law librarians, Peking University Law School graduate student Lovy (Helen) Lee was my outstanding interpreter.  Since she introduced herself to me by her English name, Helen, I will refer to her as Helen.

Helen is a bright, caring law student who is completing a paper about taxation of intercompany income. In future, she plans to apply to American LL.M. programs in taxation.  I hope that some members of the BLS community will be able to meet this outgoing young woman. Helen reminds me of the leaders of BLSPI! Last year, during her school break, Helen and a group of her law school classmates volunteered to teach school in a rural Southern province of China. Because the children’s parents needed them to work on farms, it was difficult for some of the children in this province to receive an education. Helen and her classmates lived and taught in very difficult conditions. When the student-teachers’ supply of bottled drinking water ran out, Helen stated: “we boiled and drank the local water, but we all got stomach aches.” Helen did more than teach these children during her school intercession–she and her family later hosted three of them as their guests in Beijing. “I wanted to give them a dream,” Helen emphasized. She noted, with regret, that the children’s parents would only spare them from farm obligations for a week-long visit.

After Helen completes her paper, she will need to complete an internship before she can receive her graduate law degree. She plans to apply for an internship to the International Labor Organization.

This posting features book-related information from Buenos Aires as I conclude my travels in Argentina with the help and suggestion of Antonina Becciú, author of Rutas a Bellas Artes. Her beautiful book summarizes in novel form years of artistic trips sponsored by the Association of Friends of the National Museum of Fine Arts and her personal insights. Its 144 pages has many interesting and curious anecdotes, with a delicate combination of history, geography, music, art, spirituality and even a touch of humor. Her book expresses the values and spiritual wealth absorbed from places and events that endure and survive the passage of history. She directed me to the Palermo section of Buenos Aires to explore an intimate and beautiful bookstore called Eterna Cadencia which had a sophisticated Spanish language collection of literary masterpieces from all over the world.

After spending an enjoyable afternoon with the owner of la libreria, I went by colectivo (Buenos Aires’ public transportation vehicles and one of the best-known traditions of the city) and passed the Biblioteca Nacional de la República Argentina in the Recoleta barrio of the city. The library is located in a building inaugurated in 1992. However, its architectural design dates from 1961 and is in the brutalist style. Construction of the new library did not begin until 1971. The library’s first headquarters were in an old 18th century Jesuit mansion and still stands, although in disrepair, at the corner of Moreno Street and Peru Street, although I was unable to find it. Originally named the Public Library of Buenos Aires and founded in September 1810, the library is celebrating its bicentennial this year. The year 2010 is when Argentina celebrates the 200 year anniversary of the Revolution that opened the way for Argentina’s independence. It will be celebrated throughout the year through various activities and ceremonies that will end at the great feast of the May 25, 2010. The National Government has established the Permanent Commission of the Bicentennial of the Revolution of May 1810 – 2010 which is tasked to do work, set goals and create awareness for the Bicentennial.

As my travels to South America draw to a close, the third and final law school that I was able to visit was the Universidad de Mendoza (UM). The law school and Biblioteca Central were closed for the holidays and the start of the summer and I was unable to meet with library or law school personnel, faculty or students. The facility is located on a wide tree-lined street called Avenida Boulogne sur Mer and sits opposite the Parque San Martin, Mendoza´s equivalent of Central Park. UM, unlike UBA, is a private university with its main branch in the city of Mendoza and another branch in the city of San Rafael.

The seven-story building in Mendoza is where local law students enroll for courses on the humanities and the law and study in this beautiful environment. This private school, founded in 1959, provides different levels of knowledge and training courses in a number of areas of concentration at this faculty. More history of the facultad is available here.

In addition to UM, Mendoza also has the Facultad de Derecho de la Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, a public university that is part of the largest higher education institution in the province of Mendoza that was created in 1939. The location of Mendoza’s public is within Parque San Martin. This video from the law school website has photographs of the campus.

With both law schools closed for the holidays, this post is short on content. The photos of the schools and the library are interesting.

While Jean J. Davis, Brooklyn Law School’s Foreign and International Law Reference Librarian and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law, is touring law libraries in China, Harold V. O’Grady, Reference Librarian and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law at BLS, is visiting law libraries in South America. Interestingly, Chile’s President Michelle Bachelet just inaugurated the exhibition, “The Ancient China and the Terracotta Army,” in the central hall of the Cultural Center La Moneda Palace in Santiago.

Today’s post updates the one here about the law library in Buenos Aires with news that he met today not only with law library personnel at the Facultad de Derecho of the University of Chile in Santiago but also with a distinguished alumnus of the law school and an American law professor on the campus for a visit. Caroline Maulin, Law Librarian, who led the tour of the Biblioteca on behalf of Director Nora Carrion, explained that because of Chile’s smaller population, as compared to Argentina, the law school in Santiago is much smaller than the one in Buenos Aires. Here the school has about 1,300 law students who study law over a period of five years and students are required to complete three major components to earn a degree: a practicum, a thesis and an examination. For more detailed reading on the subject, see Antonio Bascunan Valdes, Legal Education in Chile, 43 S. Tex. L. Rev. 683 (2001-2002) in HeinOnline available to BLS law school community on the Library’s A-Z List of subscription databases. Caroline explained that there were two libraries at the University, the central library for most of the law students and another for the exclusive use of post grads.

While the tour was in progress, the law students at the University of Chile were in the middle of their final exams which take place in December and January just before the summer recess. The photo here shows that whatever differences there are in legal education in Chile and the US, law students have one thing in common: exhaustion.

The library collection consists of about 50,000 print volumes of which about 6,000 are on reserve and about 3,300 are reference material. The collection also contains more than 14,000 theses completed by graduate and post graduate students as well as more than 650 legal periodicals, mostly from South America but also from North America and Europe. There is also a special collection of about 19,000 volumes that is one of the most valued in the country especially its historical collection. Chileno law students, like their Argentine counterparts, have access to electronic databases without charge only in the law library.

Also in attendance on the tour was Daniel Friedenzohn, J.D., M.A., Assistant Professor of Law who teaches Aviation Law at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach FL. The alumnus responsible for the tour was Guillermo Aguero, who earned his law degree from the University of Chile thirty years ago and a graduate law degree in labor law a dozen years ago. Aguero is now a member of the municipal council of Ciudad Santiago and discussed the upcoming presidential run-off election in Chile between the two candidates who received the most votes on December 13 — center-right Sebastián Piñera and center-left Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle. The run-off will be held on January 17 with the winner to replace President Michelle Bachelet, the first woman to hold the position in the country’s history. She won the 2006 presidential election in a runoff and is ineligible to run for a second consecutive term under Chilean law.

Last night, Eric, Grace, Jane and Nina, four exceptional students in Peking University’s international M.B.A. program, honored Ken and me by dining with us at Quan Ju De in the TUS (Tsinghua University Science) Park. The students selected this restaurant–Quan Ju De serves exceptional Beijing roast duck. In an elegant private dining room, we talked for hours and enjoyed wonderful food. Our duck was outstanding, and it even had a pedigree! Eric kindly showed us how to maximize our enjoyment of the roast duck by adding sweet onions and sauce, and wrapping everything in a thin pancake. Also, I have become a huge fan of flower tea.

Our student hosts work for multinational corporations such as Deloitte, International Systems and Röder. Like some BLS students I know, these students balance demanding full-time jobs and graduate course work. Grace even carved out time to learn traditional Chinese drumming so that she could perform (with other classmates) in the school’s New Year’s celebration. In future, Grace hopes to study finance at Fordham University’s graduate business school, so I might be able to show her some of the highlights of NYC.

These students explained that their “working language” is English. Many of the contracts that they review (as part of their work for multinationals) are written in English. The students noted that Chinese characters can have different meanings and need to be read in context. Thus, sometimes it avoids ambiguity to draft documents in English. We had an interesting discussion in which we compared features of civil law and common law-oriented systems.

Since BLS law students and their future clients will be sitting across the negotiating table from Eric, Grace, Jane and Nina, I want to emphasize that these Peking University graduate M.B.A. students are poised, friendly, bright, hard-working and fluent in English. They are well-prepared to serve as China’s future business leaders. I plan to remain in e-mail contact with these students, so that when some of them have the opportunity to travel to New York, I can arrange for them to meet BLS law students.

Thank you, Jane, for organizing such a wonderful dinner meeting!

Eric, Grace, Nina, Jean, Ken and Jane enjoy a memorable dinner together

The library will begin selling bar exam study passes on Monday, January 4, 2010 at 9:00am at the first floor reference desk. All passes are $50.00. Cash or checks, made payable to Brooklyn Law School, are accepted. The passes expire on February 24, 2010. A limited number of passes are available for sale.

The individual purchasing the pass must have graduated from law school in the past twelve months and must present two forms of identification, one of which must be their law school ID card. If the individual does not have a law school ID card, he/she must obtain a letter from their law school stating their date of graduation.