Advanced Electronic Legal Research

Tuesday and Thursday 7:00-9:15 PM
Library Electronic Classroom

Instructors: Gordon Russell and Korin Munsterman

Syllabus

The course covers:

• A survey of law and law-related information products in electronic and on-line formats.
  
  
• A comparison of electronic and on-line formats with printed formatted materials.
  
  
• An overview of current issues in access to legal and law-related information.
  
  
• The course will teach you basic HTML skills that will enable you to create your own homepage. Part of the course will consist of a hands-on lab where you will search the Internet, use CD-ROM products and on-line legal databases.
  
  
• The course will focus not only on the practical but also theoretical issues. The goal of the course is to give students the ability to select research methods appropriate to them as students and practicing attorneys in light of the rapidly changing environment of research tools and techniques.
  
  
• The course will meet from 7:00-9:15 pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On, Tuesday the class will be a lecture format given by Professor Russell. On Thursday, students will be in a lab environment with Korin Munsterman, Electronic Services Librarian and Professor Russell.
  
  
• There will be a major individual project: creating a Web Homepage designed as a guide to legal research on a specific legal topic chosen by the student. The Home page will be created using HTML. The Webpage will be 70% of the grade and will be due by Friday, July 25. There will also be a Legislative History Assignment due on July 1 and worth 30% of the grade. Attendance is mandatory and absences will result in the reduction of the grade.
  

Web Home Page

A Webpage provides information and hyperlinks to other materials located on the Internet. Students will choose the legal topic and create a webpage that provides annotated links to electronic material on the topic selected. It not only describes available materials but compares types of materials and illustrates their value within the overall information strategy. As a research publication, the page can be used to guide researchers to relevant material on the topic.
The major project for this course is to prepare a Webpage covering in detail a specific area of law. By becoming familiar with a particular legal area, you should develop a research methodology and perspective that will have an application to other areas of the law. You will learn how to find and organize your research, develop a strategy and complete an in-depth review of a particular area of the law.

Audience
The Webpage should be helpful to someone with basic research skills, but with no knowledge of the subject matter. It should be a valuable research tool for future researchers; so, it will be important to specify its scope.

Legislative History Assignment
Using the techniques covered in class, you will locate sources of Legislative History of a section of the Communications decency act of 1995. This act was an attempt to deal with the Internet. By focusing on one particular section of the Act you will analyze the legislative intent of the section and provide a memo to the professor that would present the arguments for the meaning of the section to be argues to the Court.



Students will receive a packet that includes readings for the course.

Class Schedule, May 28
Introduction to the Course
Using the Internet to find law and law related information sources
Introduction to HTML

Class Schedule, June 3
Statutory Research: U.S. Constitution and Federal Statutes

Class Schedule, June 5
Lab on HTML and Federal Sources

Class Schedule, June 10
Federal Legislative History

Class Schedule, June 12
Lab on Federal Legislative History Sources

Class Schedule, June 17
State Materials and municipal Codes

Class Schedule, June 20
Lab on State Materials and Municipal Codes

Class Schedule, June 24
Administrative Materials and International Law

Class Schedule, June 26
Westlaw Training in Westlaw Room with Marianne

Class Schedule, July 1
Introduction to Cases: Federal and States

Class Schedule, July 3
Lab on Federal and State Cases

Class Schedule, July 8
On-line citations and Secondary Sources

Class Schedule, July 10
Lab on On-line Citations and Secondary Sources

Class Schedule, July 15
Lexis and nonlegal sites

Class Schedule, July 17
Lab Fun and Pizza

Link to:

Professor Gordon Russell's Bookmarks for Advanced Electronic Research.