Ross-Blakley Law Library Blog

The city of Tombstone is waging an epic legal battle against the federal government for access to the wilderness area of the Huachuca Mountains in order to repair its damaged water system.

Tombstone relies on a number of mountain springs for its water, which is piped in to the city.  The pipelines that deliver the spring water were damaged in last year’s Monument Fire and the ensuing mud and rock slides.  Tombstone officials have attempted to make repairs to the pipeline and restore the water flow to the city, but the National Forest Service has … Continue Reading

Law Students: Are you taking summer classes? Do you have a summer job with a firm?

If you find yourself in need of some research help this summer, remember that our Reference Librarians are here for you!

Did you know you can make an appointment with a Librarian for one-on-one help? We’ve added an online form to the Law Library website to make it easy! Just click here to request an appointment.

You can also find a link to the form on the Ask a Librarian page or the Law Students page.

… Continue Reading

Cornell’s Legal Information Institute (LII) recently announced that the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is now available on its website.  The CFR is the codification of the general and permanent rules published in the Federal Register by the executive departments and agencies of the federal government.

The LII website allows for searching of the CFR and includes linked cross-references within the CFR to relevant parts of the United States Code, as well as to rulemaking dockets for pending regulations.  It is updated concurrently with the GPO’s Federal Digital System data, and links users to the Office of … Continue Reading

This year’s Law Day theme is “No Courts, No Justice, No Freedom,” and according to the Presidential Proclamation, “recalls the historic role our courts have played in protecting the fundamental rights and liberties of all Americans. Our courts are the guarantors of civil justice, social order, and public safety, and we must do everything we can to enable their critical work. The courthouse doors must be open and the necessary services must be in place to allow all litigants, judges, and juries to operate efficiently. Likewise, we must ensure that access to justice is … Continue Reading

A recent case in Virginia, Bland v. Roberts, 2012, saw employees of the Hampton, Virginia Sheriff’s department fired ”for cost cutting purposes”, though the employees believed they were actually terminated for “liking” their boss’s opponent for re-election.

They sued, saying that their First Amendment Rights were violated, but lost the case when the court concluded that “liking” a facebook page is insufficient speech to qualify for constitutional protection.  In this Ars Technica article, lawyer Venkat Balasubramani and law professor Eric Goldman argue that this interpretation of the First Amendment fails recognize the ways that political activism has changed in the past few years, … Continue Reading

Mispronouncing the name of the law firm you are interviewing at likely will not impress your prospective employer.  To avoid a pronunciation faux pas, Georgetown Law has developed a Law Firm Pronunciation Guide which contains audio clips of the pronunciation of the names of many large law firms across the country.

Other resource that can help you brush up on your interview etiquette include the Career Services guide Preparing for the Interview, which is available online to ASU Law students, and the books Maximize Your Lawyer Potential: Professionalism and Business Etiquette for Law Students and Lawyers and … Continue Reading

Lacking a legal argument to get out of your traffic ticket?  Try physics.  Dmitri Krioukov, a UC San Diego physicist, submitted a four-page physics paper to a city traffic commissioner arguing that three coincidences occurred at the same time, making a nearby police officer believe that he had seen him run a red light, when really he had not.  Krioukov writes in the paper, “We show that if a car stops at a stop sign, an observer, e.g., a police officer, located at a certain distance perpendicular to the car trajectory, must … Continue Reading

Monday marks the first day of Spring 2012 exams, with Criminal Law kicking things off at 8:30am and Evidence getting underway at 1pm.  Check out these new Evidence study skills books and browse through the library catalog for Criminal Law titles which will help you get ready for Day 1 of testing!

Also, if you are looking for ways to use your time during reading week wisely and be more productive as you prepare for exams, read through the study tips on the Law School Academic Support Blog.

Evidence in … Continue Reading

The Law Library hours are extended on Fridays and Saturdays beginning this week and through the end of finals.  We will be open until midnight on Friday, April 20 and 27 and Saturday, April 21 and 28.

Good luck on your finals!

What’s that? We look lighter? Thanks for noticing, we have lost a few pounds. Over 78,000 pounds, actually!

If you were around last week, you may have noticed we were getting rid of a few books. And by “a few,” we mean over 13,000! According to ASU Recycling (our superstar partners in this project), the total weight of the books we discarded was 78,785 lbs (just under 40 tons!). The Law Library and Recycling staff certainly built some muscle as we shed this weight – what a workout! And speaking … Continue Reading