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Reference: Keeping Current

John Nann — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:07:00 -0700

Below please find the text of an email that was sent to YLS students regarding current awareness tools.

Today, I thought that I would let you know about a few tools that can help you keep current. These tools can help you keep current with the law in particular fields or scholarship in particular fields, by particular authors, or that appear in particular journals.

There are several methods that you can use to stay current with new events in particular areas of law. I expect that you are already familiar with Lexis' and Westlaw's saved searches (if not, contact a reference librarian or the Lexis or Westlaw representative for instruction). Those tools allow you to receive new results from searches that you have constructed. There are, however, better tools.

Two publishers have specialized in a form of legal publishing called "looseleafs". Looseleafs pull together all primary source material on a legal topic as well as analysis and current awareness information (the name hearkens back to their print past). Today, these publishes still produce these research tools and they are still very useful and they produce excellent current awareness tools.

Commerce Clearinghouse is one of these publishers. CCH has pulled many of their looseleafs together into one online platform that you can access from the Law Library Databases page (under the name CCH Online Networks). After a short registration process you will have access to information on a wide variety of legal topics. You can also sign up to receive "tracker" newsletters from CCH (either in your email of via your rss reader) on over 70 legal topics. Just click on the "tracker News" link in the upper left.

Another looseleaf publisher, the Bureau of National Affairs also produces material on a large number of legal topics and produces newsletters on over 100 legal topics. You can see a list of the newsletters here: http://www.law.yale.edu/library/research/bna-email.asp. These newsletters will come to you by email. If you are interested in receiving any BNA newsletters, please send an email with your name, your Yale email address, and the name(s) of the newsletters that you would like to receive to john dot nann at yale dot edu. Please note that it will take several days for your BNA subscription to become active.

There are several tools that you can use to track legal scholarship. I expect that you know about the "New Acquisition" lists that the law library publishes, http://www.law.yale.edu/library/acquisitions.asp, but did you know that you can find out, on a weekly basis, what new books we've recieved on any topic that you choose? To do that, set up a preferred search and have new results sent to you. To set up a preferred search, conduct a search in MORRIS (a subject search is a good one) and, on the results screen, click on the "Save as preferred search" button. Log in and follow the prompts and from then on, you'll receive notice of any new books that we receive that match your search. By the way, for broader coverage, you can also do the same at worldcat.org.

There are a couple of good tools for keeping up with legal periodical articles. Washington and Lee Law Library's Law Journal Content tool allows you to set up an rss feed for new journal tables of contents (http://lawlib.wlu.edu/CLJC/index.aspx) (there is actually a lot more that you can do with the content, you can see their information page for more: http://lawlib.wlu.edu/CLJC/explanation.aspx).

The Current Index to Legal Periodicals is another contents tool. CILP is available to you by a variety of means. First, it exists as a database on Westlaw (database identifier is CILP) and the usual Westlaw saved searches work on it. Second, you can sign up to get the tables of contents of selected journals and/or information about articles classified under selected subjects. To set up a CILP search, go to http://lib.law.washington.edu/cilp/scilp.html and set up a profile. First, however, you will need YLS's code. You can get that in the Library databases link on the Inside site (https://inside.law.yale.edu/Research/305/default.aspx - this should work if you sign in). And third, you can go to CILP and read it in html, Word or PDF at: http://cilp.nellco.org/cilp/index.cfm.

Also, some journal publishers provide table of content or other current awareness tools for their stable of titles (see Sage Journals Online for example) and other, non-law, indexes allow you to save searches. If you are interested in any of these, stop by and see a reference librarian or contact one of us and set up a meeting (http://www.law.yale.edu/library/reference.asp).

Also, don't forget that we can help with your other research issues. You can stop by or, for more complex probnlems, contact us and set up a meeting.

Thank you!

John

--
John B. Nann
Associate Librarian for Reference and Instructional Services,
Bibliographer for EU and UK Law, and Lecturer in Legal Research
Yale Law School
127 Wall Street
P.O. Box 208215
New Haven, CT 06520-8215
203.432.1259
john dot nann at yale dot edu

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas: Acknowledgments

Mike Widener — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:44:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to the following individuals and institutions for their assistance in preparing this exhibit:

David Warrington
Librarian for Special Collections
Harvard Law School Library

Kathryn James
Assistant Curator, Early Modern Books and Manuscripts
Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University

Christine McCarthy
Chief Conservator
Yale University Library

Tara Kennedy
Preservation Field Services Librarian
Yale University Library

Shana Jackson
Lillian Goldman Law Library

Benjamin Yousey-Hindes
Stanford University

The portrait of Hugo Grotius is from: Hugo Grotius, Inleydinghe tot de Hollandsche rechtsgheleerdheydt (Haarlem, 1636). Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

"Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law," curated by Edward Gordon and Michael Widener, is on display October 2009 through January 2010 in the Rare Book Exhibition Gallery, Level L2, Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale Law School.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas: Bibliography

Mike Widener — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:09:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum

The Development of the Law of the Sea in the 17th Century: A Bibliography of Modern Scholarship
Compiled by Edward Gordon

Akashi. Kinji. Cornelius van Bynkershoek: His Role in the History of International Law. The Hague: Kluwer, 1998.

Alexandrowicz, C.H. An Introduction to the History of the Law of Nations in the East Indies. Oxford: Clarendon, 1967.

Alexandrowicz, C.H. "Freitas versus Grotius," 35 British Yearbook of International Law 162 (1959).

Allen, E.W. "Freedom of the Seas," 60 American Journal of International Law 814 (1966).

Alsop, J.D. "William Welwood, Anne of Denmark and the Sovereignty of the Sea," 49 Scottish Historical Review 171 (1980).

Amaral, Sylvino Gurgel do. "Le ‘Mare Liberum' et ses adversaries", in Hugo Grotius: Essays on His Life and Works Selected for the Occasion of the Tercentenary of His ‘De Jure Belli ac Pacis' 1625-1925 (A. Lysen ed.; Leyden: A.W. Sythoff, 1925). [Translated from the Portuguese, where it appeared in the author's Ensaio subre a vide e obras de Hugo de Groot (Grotius) (Rio de Janeiro-Paris, 1903).]

Anand, R.P. Origins and Development of the Law of the Sea: History of International Law Revisited. The Hague: Nijhoff, 1983.

Andrews, Kenneth R. Ships, Money and Politics: Seafaring and Naval Enterprise in the Reign of Charles I. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Armitage, David. The Ideological Origins of the British Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

Armitage, David, ed. The Free Sea: Hugo Grotius, Translated by Richard Hakluyt; with William Welwood's Critique and Grotius's Reply. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2004.

Blom, Hans W., ed. Property, Piracy and Punishment: Hugo Grotius on War and Booty in De Jure Praedae – Concepts and Contexts. Leiden: Brill, 2009.

Borschberg, Peter. "Grotius, Intra-Asian Trade and the Portuguese Estado da India Problems," in Property, Piracy and Punishment: Hugo Grotius on War and Booty in De Jure Praedae – Concepts and Contexts ( Hans W. Blom, ed.; Leiden: Brill, 2009).

Borschberg, Peter. "The Seizure of the Sta. Catarina Revisited: The Portuguese Empire in Asia, VOC Politics and the Origins of the Dutch-Johor Alliance (1602-ca. 1616)," 33 Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 31 (2002).

Braudel, Fernand. The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II. New York: Harper & Row, 1972.

Brett, Annabel. Liberty, Right and Nature: Individual Rights in Latin Scholastic Thought. Cambridge: University Press, 1997. [See pp. 165-204, on Vásquez.]

Brito Vieira, Monica. "Mare liberum vs. Mare clausum: Grotius, Freitas, and Selden's Debate on Dominion over the Seas," 64 Journal of the History of Ideas 361 (2003).

Butler, Geoffrey; & Simon Maccoby. The Development of International Law. London: Longmans, Green 1928. [See esp. pp. 40-60, "The World by Sea".]

Butler, W.E. "Grotius and the Law of the Sea," in Hugo Grotius and International Relations (H. Bull, A. Roberts & B. Kingsbury, eds.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990).

Chatterjee, Hiralal. International Law and Inter-State Relations in Ancient India. Calcutta: Mukhopadhyay, 1958.

Christianson, Paul. Discourse on History, Law, and Governance in the Public Career of John Selden, 1610-1635. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1996.

Clark, G. N. "Grotius's East India Mission to England," 20 Transactions of the Grotius Society 45 (1935).

Clark, G. N., & van Eysinga, W. J. M. "The Colonial Conferences between England and the Netherlands in 1613 and 1615," 15 Bibliotheca Visseriana 15 (1940).

De Pauw, F. E. R., ed. Grotius and the Law of the Sea (P.J. Arthern, transl.). Brussels: Institut de Sociologie, 1965.

Diesselhorst, Malte. "Hugo Grotius and the Freedom of the Seas," 3 Grotiana (N.S.) 11 (1982).

Dumbauld, E. "Grotius on the Law of Prize," 14 Journal of Public Law 370 (1965).

Edmundson, George. Anglo-Dutch Rivalry during the First Half of the Seventeenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1911.

Eysinga, William J. M. van. "Quelques Observations au Sujet du Mare Liberum et du De Jure Praedae de Grotius," 9 Grotiana 60 (1942).

Eysinga, William .M. van. "Le 350ieme anniversaire du ‘De jure Praedae commentarius' de Grotius" [French translation of address of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences and Letters, March 24, 1956], in Sparso Collect (Leyden 1958), pp. 358-374.

Fenn, Percy Thomas, Jr. The Origin of the Right of Fishery in Territorial Waters. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1926. [See esp. ch. VIII, "Mare liberum versus Mare clausum."]

Fenn, Percy Thomas, Jr. "Origins of the Theory of Territorial Waters," 20 American Journal of International Law 465 (1926).

Fenn, Percy Thomas, Jr. "Justinian and the Freedom of the Seas," 19 American Journal of International Law 465 (1925).

Fruin, Robert. "An Unpublished Work of Hugo Grotius," 5 Bibliotheca Visseriana 3 (1925). [English translation of a work first published, in Dutch, in 1868.]

Fulton, Thomas Wemyss. The Sovereignty of the Seas: An Historical Account of the Claims of England to the Dominion of the British Seas, and of the Evolution of the Territorial Waters: With Special Reference to the Rights of Fishing and the Naval Salute. Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1911.

Gepken-Jager, Ella; Gerard van Solinge, & Levinus Timmerman. VOC 1602-2002: 400 Years of Company Law. Deventer: Kluwer, 2005

Goldwin, R.A. "Locke and the Law of the Sea," 71 Commentary 46 (June 1981).

[Grotius, Hugo]. De jure praedae commentaries. I. Commentary on the Law of Prize and Booty. Gwladys L. Williams and Walter H. Zeydel, transl.. II. The Collotype Reproduction of the Original Manuscript on 1604 in the Handwriting of Grotius. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon, 1950.

Grotius, Hugo. "Defense of Chapter V of the Mare Liberum," in 7 Bibliotheca Visseriana 154 (1928). [Originally written between 1613 and 1617.]

Haggenmacher, Peter. "Grotius and Gentili: A Reassessment of Thomas E. Holland's Inaugural Lecture," in Hugo Grotius and International Relations (H. Bull, A. Roberts & B. Kingsbury, eds.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990).

Hakluyt, Richard. The Original Writings and Correspondence of the Two Richard Hakluyts. 2 vols. E.G.R.Taylor, ed. London: Hakluyt Society, 1935.

Holk, L.E. van, & C.G. Roeflofsen, eds. Grotius Reader: A Reader for Students of International Law and Legal History. The Hague: T.M.C. Asser Instituut, 1983.

Ito, F. "The Thoughts of Hugo Grotius in the Mare Liberum," 18 Japanese Annual of International Law 1 (1974).

Ittersum, Martine van. Profit and Principle: Hugo Grotius, Natural Rights Theories and the Rise of Dutch Power in the East Indies (1595-1615). Boston: Brill, 2006.

Ittersum, Martine van, ed. Commentary on the Law of Prize and Booty: Hugo Grotius. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2006.

Ittersum, Martine van. "Dating the Manuscript of De Jure Praedae (1604-1608): What Watermarks, Foliation and Quire Divisions Can Tell Us About Hugo Grotius' Development as a Natural Rights and Natural Law Theorist," 35 History of European Ideas 125 (2009).

Ittersum, Martine van. "Mare Liberum in the West Indies? Hugo Grotius and the Case of the Swimming Lion, a Dutch Pirate in the Caribbean at the Turn of the Seventeenth Century," 31:3 Itinerario 59 (2007).

Ittersum, Martine van. "Mare Liberum versus the Propriety of the Seas? The Debate between Hugo Grotius and William Welwood and the Impact on Anglo-Scottish-Dutch Fishing Disputes in the Second Decade of the Seventeenth Century," 10 Edinburgh Law Review 239 (2006).

Kenworthy, J.M., & George Yound. Freedom of the Seas. London: n.d.

Knight, William S.M. "Seraphin de Freitas: Critic of Mare liberum," 11 Transactions of the Grotius Society 1 (1926).

Kwiatkowska, B. "Hugo Grotius and the Freedom of the Seas," in Hugo Grotius: 1583-1983: Maastricht Hugo Grotius Colloquium March 31, 1983 (J.L.M. Elders et al., eds.; Van Gorcum: Assen, 1984).

Landwehr, John. VOC: A Bibliography of Publications Relating to the Dutch East India Company 1602-1800. Utrecht: HGS Publishers, 1991.

Lauterpacht, Hersch. "The Grotian Tradition in International Law," 23 British Yearbook of International Law 1 (1946).

Macrae, L.M. "Customary International Law and the United Nations' Law of the Sea Treaty," 13 California Western International Law Journal 181 (1983).

Meurer, Christian. The Program of the Freedom of the Seas: A Political Study in International Law. Leo J. Frechtenberg, transl. Washington: GPO, 1919.

Molen, G.H.J. van der. Alberico Gentili and the Development of International Law: His Work and Times. Amsterdam: H.J. Paris, 1937. [Later printing: Leyden 1968. See esp. ch. VI, "Questions of International Law."]

O'Connell, D.P. The International Law of the Sea. London: OxfordUniversity Press, 1983.

Oudendijk, J.K. Status and Extent of Adjacent Waters: A Historical Orientation. Leyden: Sijthoff, 1970.

Pagden, Anthony. Lords of All the World: Ideologues of Empire in Spain, Britain and France c.1500-1800. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995. [See esp. pp. 56-61 on Vasquez.]

Parks, George Bruner. Richard Hakluyt and the English Voyages. New York: American Geographical Society, 1928.

Piggott, Frances. The Freedom of the Seas Historically Treated. Oxford: printed for the Historical Section of the Foreign Office, 1919.

Porras, Ileana M. "Constructing International Law in the East Indian Seas: Property, Sovereignty, Commerce and War in Hugo Grotius' de Iure Praedae - The Law of Prize and Booty, or on How to Distinguish Merchants from Pirates," 31 Brooklyn Journal of International Law 741 (2005-2006).

Potter, Pitman B. The Freedom of the Seas in History, Law, and Politics. New York: Longmans, Green, 1924. [Reprint 2002. See esp. ch. IV, "The Grotius-Selden Controversy."]

Quinn, D.B. "A Hakluyt Chronology," in The Hakluyt Handbook (D.B. Quinn, ed.; 2 vols.; London: Hakluyt Society, 1974).

Rawlinson, H.G. Intercourse between India and the Western World: From the Earliest Times to the Fall of Rome. Cambridge: University Press, 1926.

Roelofsen, C.G. "The Sources of Mare Liberum; the Contested Origins of the Doctrine of the Freedom of the Seas," in International Law and its Sources: Liber Amicorum Maarten Bos (W.P. Heere, ed.; Boston: Kluwer, 1988). [Reprinted in C.G. Roelofsen, Studies in the History of International Law: Practice and Doctrine in Particular with Regard to the Law of Naval Warfare in the Low Countries from circa 1450 Until the Early 17th Century (Utrecht: Rijksuniversiteit te Utrecht, 1991).]

Roelofsen, C.G. "Grotius and the International Politics of the Seventeenth Century," in Hugo Grotius and International Relations (H. Bull, A. Roberts & B. Kingsbury, eds.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990). [Reprinted in C.G. Roelofsen, Studies in the History of International Law: Practice and Doctrine in Particular with Regard to the Law of Naval Warfare in the Low Countries from circa 1450 Until the Early 17th Century (Utrecht: Rijksuniversiteit te Utrecht, 1991).]

Roelofsen, C.G. "Grotius and State Practice of His Day," 10 Grotiana 3-46 (1989). [Reprinted in C.G. Roelofsen, Studies in the History of International Law: Practice and Doctrine in Particular with Regard to the Law of Naval Warfare in the Low Countries from circa 1450 Until the Early 17th Century (Utrecht: Rijksuniversiteit te Utrecht, 1991).]

Roelofsen, C.G. Review of Anand, Origins and Development of the Law of the Sea, 31 Netherlands International Law Review 117 (1984).

Rogers, F.M. "Hakluyt as Translator," in The Hakluyt Handbook (D.B. Quinn, ed.; 2 vols.; London: Hakluyt Society, 1974).

Steinburg, Philip G. The Social Construction of the Oceans. Cambridge: University Press, 2001. [See esp. pp. 92 et seq.]

Toomer, G. J. John Selden: A Life in Scholarship. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. [See vol. 1, ch. 12, "Mare Clausum."]

Trevor-Roper, H. From Counter-Reformation to Glorious Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982.

Vollenhoven, C. The Three Stages in the Evolution of the Law of Nations. The Hague: Nijhoff, 1919.

Vreeland, Hamilton. Hugo Grotius: The Father of the Modern Science of International Law. New York: Oxford University Press, 1917. [See esp. pp. 39-67.]

Wade, Thomas C. "Introductory Essay: The Freedom of the Sea," in Sir John Boroughs, The Sovereignty of the British Seas (Edinburgh: W. Green & Sons, 1920).

Wilkinson, John. "The First Declaration of the Freedom of the Seas: The Rhodian Sea Laws," appendix to Ch. XIX of the same author's paper, "A Tentative Program for Simulation of Historical ‘Ecology' of the Mediterranean," in The Mediterranean Marine Environment and Development of Region (Malta: Royal University of Malta Press, 1974).

Wilson, Eric. Savage Republic: De Indis of Hugo Grotius, Republicanism and Dutch Hegemony with the Early Modern World Systems (c.1600-1619). Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2008.

Winstedt, Richard; & P.F. De Josselin De Jong, "Maritime Law of Malacca," 29 (Pt. 3) Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (Aug. 1956).

Wright, Herbert F. "Some Lesser Known Works of Hugo Grotius," 7 Bibliotheca Visseriana 132 (1928). [Four works are reproduced, of which two are translations: one of Grotius's works on fisheries in his controversy with William Welwood, another a translation of extracts from Grotius's letters concerning international and natural law and fisheries. See esp. "Defense of Chapter V of the Mare Liberum."]

Zemanek, Karl. "Was Hugo Grotius Really in Favour of the Freedom of the Seas?", 1 Journal of the History of International Law 48 (1999).

Ziskind, Jonathan. "International Law and Ancient Sources: Grotius and Selden," 35 Review of Politics 537 (No. 4, 1973).

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 8

Mike Widener — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:58:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 8

For the 17th century Mare liberum and Mare clausum were the centerpieces of the debate between advocates of exclusive and inclusive uses of ocean space. In England, Mare clausum reigned supreme as the authority on all questions of sovereignty at sea, although its authority on more mundane legal issues of maritime law yielded late in that century to Charles Molloy's De jure maritime et navali, or, A Treatise of Affaires Maritime, and of Commerce (1676), which dealt with mercantile questions such as bills of exchange, insurance and maritime loans.

Molloy, Charles (1646-1690). De jure maritimo et navali (London, 1682).
This popular work went through 12 editions between 1676 and 1778.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Neither Welwood nor Selden dealt decisively with the question of how far out to sea a sovereign’s territorial sea could extend: Welwood seemed to suggest one hundred miles, but left the issue open; Selden finessed it entirely. In time, British maritime power rendered such matters moot: as an old saw had it, "Britannia rules the waves – and waives the rules."

But by the end of the century, support was growing elsewhere for some limitation to the seaward extent of territorial waters. What emerged was the so-called "cannon shot rule", which deferred in theory to the idea that property rights could be acquired by actual occupation, and in practice to the effective range of shore-based cannon: about three nautical miles. The rule has long been associated with Cornelis van Bijnkershoek (1673-1743), a Dutch jurist who, especially in his De dominio maris (1702), advocated a middle ground between the extremes of Grotius and Selden, accepting both the freedom of states to navigate and exploit the resources the of the high seas and a right of coastal state to assert wide-ranging rights in a thus limited territorial sea.

Bijnkershoek, Cornelis van (1673-1743). De dominio maris (The Hague, 1703).
Special Collections, Harvard Law School Library.

Viewed in historical perspective, what emerged from the 17th-century debate were not just these two legal regimes, but a more inclusive one – international law – to govern humanity's common interest in the use of shared space and shared resources, interest as to which the future may well offer exhibits of its own.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 7

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 14:07:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 7

In supporting his case with a massive showing of state practice, Selden was able to draw upon historical research done by the Keeper of the Records in the Tower of London, Sir John Borough, whose work, The Sovereignty of the British Seas Proved by Records, History, and the Municipall Lawes of the Kingdome, written in 1633, was published only posthumously in 1651.

Borough, John (d. 1643). The soveraignty of the British seas (London, 1739).
The third edition.
Collection of Edward Gordon.

Grotius, too, was able to draw upon earlier work. Some of his arguments had been anticipated by the writings of Alberico Gentili (1552-1608), an Italian émigré who became Regius Professor of Civil Law at Oxford, and at least as prominently, an admiralty lawyer in London, representing the king of Spain. Gentili died before the publication of Mare liberum, but in his notes in defense of Spanish claims, published posthumously in 1613 as Hispanicae advocationis, he organized the issues far more systematically than the youthful Grotius had been able to do in Mare liberum.

Like Grotius, Gentili said that under Roman law, consistently with natural law, the open sea was common property. But he recognized the gap between principle and practice, bridging it by distinguishing dominium (ownership) from jurisdictio (jurisdiction) – the latter, unlike the former, being applicable to the high seas. He also distinguished coastal waters from the high seas, insisting, however, that a coastal state’s right to control its territorial seas did not justify closing them to foreign navigation.

His ideas anticipated those of De jure belli ac pacis as well. In his use of phrases like ius inter gentes and societas humana, for example, Gentili may be said to have initiated the liberation of the law of nations conceptually from both Roman law and the guardianship of theology. Not until the late 19th century, however, was the extent of influence on Grotius recognized by scholars. Only then did Gentili's reputation as a founder of modern international law begin to rival that of Grotius himself.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Gentili, Alberico (1552-1608). Hispanicae advocationis libri duo (Hanover, 1613).
Special Collections, Harvard Law School Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 6

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:50:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 6

William Welwood's work eventually drew a response from a Dutch lawyer, Dirck Graswinckel, entitled Mare liberi vindiciae adversus Gulielmum Welwodum (1653), but its relative obscurity today owes more to the publication in 1635 of Mare clausum, by John Selden (1594-1654), an English jurist, scholar and polymath whose erudition rivaled that of Grotius himself. Selden had begun researching and writing a refutation of Mare liberum soon after its publication, even before Welwood's two treatises appeared. He had completed it by around 1618, by which time, however, a coup d'etat had taken place in the Netherlands, Grotius had been imprisoned, and relations between England and the new government were unsettled. King James was reluctant anyway to provoke a dispute with Denmark, which had extensive claims of its own in the North Atlantic. Under the circumstances, the moment seemed inauspicious for a verbal assault on Grotius and the freedom of the seas – and James refused to publish Mare clausum.

Selden apparently abandoned the project for nearly seventeen years. By then, Grotius, having escaped from prison in 1621 and living in exile in France, had published his more mature and celebrated masterpiece, De jure belli ac pacis (1625), later translated into English as The Rights of Warre and Peace (1654), in which he toned down some of the extravagant positions he had taken in his youthful defense of the seizure of the Santa Catarina, constructing instead a more sophisticated basis for a law of nature and nations independent of empire or religious guardianship that was, not coincidentally, notably less lenient in justifying the resort to armed force.

By then, Selden's personal status had changed, too. Having become embroiled in parliamentary politics, he himself had been imprisoned and was now ensconced in the Tower of London. James meanwhile had been succeeded by Charles I, whose maritime policy was more aggressive than that of either of his two predecessors. In returning to his attack on Mare liberum, therefore, Selden was faced not only with the task of exposing weaknesses in Mare liberum, as Welwood had done and as he himself presumably had already done in his 1618 draft, but also with the more demanding one of taking into account the comprehensive legal regime Grotius had subsequently presented in De jure belli ac pacis. And he had to do both in a way that ingratiated himself with Charles.

Selden's treatise, like Grotius's, is remarkable for its erudition, too much so for modern readers, who tend to see in both works an excess of pedantry, but decisively impressive to the two men's own contemporaries. Selden conceded the innocence of harmless navigation and commerce, but maintained that restrictions on them do not necessarily violate the law of nature and the law of nations. He purported to show that the open sea is not everywhere common, is capable of appropriation, and in fact from time to time had been appropriated and occupied. As to the Spanish and Portuguese claims, whose legitimacy England continued to deny, Selden said that, while on general principles they could be valid, in actual practice neither of the two countries ever acquired valid title or command to the areas they claimed.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Selden, John (1584-1654). Mare clausum (London, 1635).
The first edition of Selden’s Mare clausum is also famous as the first use of Arabic type in England. The map depicts what ancient geographers called "the British sea."
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Selden, John (1584-1654). Mare clausum: the right and dominion of the sea (London, 1663).
The second edition of the English translation of Mare clausum.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). Of the law of warre and peace (London, 1655).
The second English edition, appearing only a year after the first. The portrait bears Grotius's motto, "Ruit Hora" ("Time flies"), reflecting his busy and productive career as a jurist, diplomat, and author.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 5

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:35:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 5

England's own claims to maritime sovereignty ran counter to both Spain and Portugal's and to Holland's. Even during the reign of Queen Elizabeth – and notwithstanding her rebuke to the Spanish ambassador – England claimed sovereign rights seaward. During her reign these rights extended to the waters immediately adjacent to its coast, but her successors extended them out into the Atlantic, from Cape Finisterre in Spain around the British Isles, and in the North Sea to the coast of Norway.

The first British treatise on the law of the sea appeared in 1590. Written by William Welwood (fl. 1566-1624), a professor of mathematics and then law at St. Andrews (Scotland), The Sea Law of Scotland defended royal dominion over the seas out to a distance of eighty miles off the Scottish coast. The work pleased the king of Scotland, James VI, who had objected strongly, though ineffectively, to what he regarded as the intrusion of the Dutch herring fleet into Scots waters, and who happily rewarded Welwood for lending legal support to his cause.

When James succeeded to the crown of England, following Queen Elizabeth's death in 1603, he issued a proclamation claiming all fisheries along the British and Irish coasts, and prohibiting foreign vessels from fishing in these waters without a royal license. To support his position, he asked Welwood to refute Mare liberum directly.

This Welwood did in two treatises: An Abridgement of All the Sea-Lawes (1613) and, in an amplified Latin version inspired in part by James's wife, Queen Anne of Denmark, De dominio maris (1615). Quoting extensively from biblical sources and Roman lawyers, Welwood rejected Grotius's claim that the waters of the world had always been regarded as indivisible; and defended the right of a coastal state to fish and to navigate – and to impose taxes with respect to either – in the waters adjacent to its coasts. Welwood is said to have been the first to clearly enunciate a coastal state's authority over living resources adjacent to its shores. What is more, and of more than passing interest, he based his argument, at least in part, upon the risk of exhaustion of fisheries posed by otherwise unregulated promiscuous use.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Welwood, William (fl. 1578-1622). An abridgement of all sea-lawes (London, 1613).
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 4

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:25:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 4

As it happens, the publication of Mare liberum came too late to influence negotiations with Spain. It served instead to ignite a fierce debate over the freedom of the seas that continued throughout the 17th century – what later scholars were to call the "Battle of the Books." Grotius contended that nature and public utility alike forbid the acquisition of property rights in the sea. Unlike land, the sea (and the air) cannot in practice be occupied, demonstrating that nature intended it to be free to all to use. Being inexhaustible in use, moreover, it is not susceptible of occupation, which is necessary when the utility of things can be preserved only if they become private property.

The defense of Portugal's imperial claims in the East Indies fell initially to Seraphim de Freitas, a Portuguese theologian-jurist, professor at the University of Valladolid, in a treatise published in 1625 under the name De iusto imperio Lusitanorum Asiatico (On the Just Empire of the Portuguese in Asia). Vastly larger and longer than Grotius's mere pamphlet, De iusto imperio was highly critical not only of the youthful Grotius's arguments, but of its factual inaccuracies and misleading references and inferences as well.

Freitas contended that the right to free trade and navigation, whatever its roots in natural law, had never become a part of the law of nations. A sovereign could exclude foreigners from his territories or commerce and could forbid his subjects to trade with them. He conceded that the pope lacked an abstract right to accord dominion over newly discovered territories and peoples, but insisted that his authority as the spiritual dominus mundi entitled him to grant an exclusive right to spread the Christian faith and civilization. Since, to be effective, this right necessarily involves both trade and limited conquest, the pope had the authority to grant Portugal-Spain the right to exclude other powers from the east.

De iusto imperio was expanded upon four years later by a Spanish jurist named Juan de Solórzano Pereira (1575-1655), in a treatise entitled Disputationem de Indiarum iure. Scarcely known or written about by English-speaking scholars, De Indiarum iure is regarded by some Spanish scholars as the most systematic juridical formulation of the legitimacy of Spain and Portugal's 17th century claims. Unlike Freitas, Solórzano Pereira said that, regardless of the legitimacy of the 15th century papal grants on which they were said to be based, Portugal's actual control and occupation of the new territories were sufficient in themselves to satisfy the requirements for retrospective ownership (prescription) recognized in both Roman and customary law.

Neither Freitas's nor Solórzano Pereira's treatise had as much influence in the 17th century as their intellectual content warranted, perhaps because they were too learned and too long, but in any event because the center of intellectual interest and political power was shifting from Spain to England.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Solórzano Pereira, Juan de (1575-1655). De Indiarum jure (Lyons, 1672).
This work became the definitive treatise on the laws governing Spain’s overseas colonies.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 3

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:00:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 3

The tension generated by Spanish and Portuguese claims to maritime dominion intensified at the start of the 17th century. An exponential growth in world trade and, especially, aggressive efforts by the Dutch East India Company to protect its right to engage in it, brought the issue to a head. The Company was organized by the Dutch government in 1602 with a view to expanding the capital base, and enhancing the collective security, of the individual ship owners and captains who up to that point had had to fend off Spanish and Portuguese naval vessels on their own.

The stage was set for a dramatic confrontation. It took place in February 1603, when a small fleet belonging to the Company attacked and overwhelmed a richly laden Portuguese vessel, the Santa Catarina, near Singapore. The captured vessel and cargo were brought back to the Netherlands, where a Dutch court ordered the proceeds of its sale distributed to the Company, the admiral of the fleet and his crew. A furious row erupted over the legality of the seizure, which struck many as immoral – in fact, scarcely distinguishable from outright piracy.

The case presented complex legal issues. The need to defend its right to participate in the East India trade had arisen in the course of the young Dutch republic's war of independence against Spain, which by then held dominion over Portugal and regarded the Dutch as no more than rebellious subjects. Moreover, as some of the Company's dissident shareholders themselves pointed out, the Company had been organized as a private mercantile enterprise, not as a vehicle for engaging in an aggressive war, much less for enriching itself in the process.

Some of the shareholders threatened to withdraw their capital, to form a new enterprise in competition, even to make common cause with a French company projected by Henry IV. The Company’s very existence was thought to be at risk – and with it the future of the young republic's burgeoning overseas commerce.

To win over popular support, the Company turned to Hugo Grotius (1583-1645), then only twenty-one years old and too new to the practice of law to have been hired to handle the Santa Catarina litigation itself, but already renown throughout Europe for his prodigious erudition, his knowledge of the wisdom and practices of nations from biblical and classical times. Henry IV himself had greeted Grotius's arrival in France as a fifteen-year-old diplomatic attaché by having a medal struck in his honor, declaring the young man to be nothing less than "the miracle of Holland." In effect, Grotius's defense of the Company's position was tantamount to a celebrity endorsement, as valuable to the Company in this respect as by the persuasiveness of whatever legal argument he could muster in support of its actions.

Grotius immediately set about preparing a treatise that would portray the Company's action in the context of a comprehensive theory of the law of prize. But before he could finish it, it had already been overtaken by events. The dissident shareholders had made good on their threat, to the extent of withdrawing their capital, but had failed to organize another company or to persuade the French to do so. Just as important, the Company’s commercial success had precipitated a change in public sentiment, effectively silencing critics of its aggressiveness. Moreover, and perhaps even more critically, an end was in sight to Holland's decades-old war of independence from Spain. The moment, perforce, was inauspicious for a verbal assault on Spain and Portugal's claims to a global monopoly. Grotius's monograph, substantially completed by 1604, went unpublished – for the time being.

Grotius seems to have been dissatisfied with the work, anyway. In a letter written in November 1606, he says: "My little work on Indian affairs is finished, but I do not know whether it ought to appear in its present form, or only those parts which relate to the general law of war and prize."

By 1608, however, events had taken another turn. The Company was becoming increasingly alarmed over reports that, in pursuit of a truce with Spain and of obtaining its recognition of Dutch independence, the Dutch government was prepared to concede Spain’s right to'exclude the Dutch from the eastern seas. At the Company's urging, Grotius returned to his manuscript, rewriting the introduction and expanding the conclusion of one of its chapters, Chapter XII – the one in which he dealt specifically with the legal basis of the freedom of the seas.

This one chapter, entitled Mare liberum, was published the following spring, by itself, as a pamphlet. No mention was made of the identity of its author (although the fact that it was none other than the celebrated Grotius quickly became known locally and in England). The rest of the monograph was consigned to Grotius's personal papers. Though alluded to in his private correspondence, its existence was practically unknown until a manuscript copy was discovered nearly three centuries later and published, in 1868, under the title De jure praedae (On the Law of Prize).

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). De jure praedae commentarius [facsimile] (New York, 1952).
A facsimile of the manuscript Grotius completed in 1604, showing Chapter XII, which was published five years later as Mare liberum.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). De jure praedae commentarius (The Hague, 1868).
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). Mare liberum (Leiden, 1618).
The 2nd edition of Mare liberum, and the first to bear Grotius’s name.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). Hugo Grotius Mari libero et P. Merula De maribus (Leiden, 1633).
This edition includes a related work on maritime affairs by the Dutch scholar Paulus Merula.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). Vrye zeevaert (Haarlem, 1636).
An early Dutch translation of Mare liberum.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 2

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:43:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum
Part 2

Early efforts to codify maritime law did little to resolve claims growing out of acrimonious political disputes over rights to trade with the Americas and the East Indies. The most extensive of these claims were ones made beginning in the mid 15th century by Spain and Portugal, respectively, following the discoveries of the New World and maritime trade routes to Asia. Initially based upon papal grants, the claims were said to have been established by an award made by Pope Alexander VI in 1493, perfected the following year in the Treaty of Tordesillas. Together they purported to justify the exclusion of other states not only from sharing in dominion over the newly discovered lands, but from navigating the trade routes and carrying on profitable trade with their inhabitants, as well. The two countries’ rival claims were resolved by fixing a line drawn 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands, with Spain receiving all the lands west of the line, Portugal those to the east. Portugal then claimed sovereignty over the Indian Ocean and the south Atlantic, Spain over the Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico.

The pope's authority to grant these rights did not go uncontested, even within Catholic Spain itself. As early as 1564, in Illustrium controversiarum, a prominent Spanish jurist named Fernando Vázquez Menchaca (1512-1569) attacked Venice and Genoa's claims to dominion over parts of the Mediterranean, defending freedom of the seas itself. Other European states rejected Spain and Portugal's claims even more energetically, not only because, as had quickly become apparent, the logic underlying the line purportedly dividing their dominions had been undercut by the realization that it could be approached both from the east and the west, but for the practical reason that the two countries were manifestly unable to enforce them.

Even Queen Elizabeth of England, while herself demanding that foreign vessels entering waters claimed by England strike their topsails and take in their flags in recognition of Britain’s sovereign jurisdiction, declared that the exclusion of foreign merchants from Indian commerce was contrary to the law of nations. "The use of the sea and the air is common to all," she told the Spanish ambassador, "neither can any title to the Ocean belong to any people or private man, forasmuch as neither Nature, nor regard of the public use and custom permitteth any possession thereof."

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Vázquez Menchaca, Fernando (1512-1569). Controversiarum usu frequentium libri tres (Barcelona, 1563).
Special Collections, Harvard Law School Library.

Rare Books: Freedom of the Seas, Part 1

Mike Widener — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 11:42:00 -0700

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law
An exhibit marking the 400th anniversary of Hugo Grotius’s Mare Liberum
Part 1

Grotius, Hugo (1583-1645). Mare liberum (Leiden, 1609).
Grotius launched his illustrious career in international law with this little book that initially did not bear his name.
Special Collections, Harvard Law School Library.

This exhibit marks the 400th anniversary of the publication of Hugo Grotius’s Mare liberum, a short work, originally published as a pamphlet, which produced the first effective argument for the freedom of the seas and, with Grotius’s more mature work, De jure belli ac pacis (1625), lent substance and prestige to the idea of an international law in the service of the common good.

In principle, the Roman Civil Law had already established that navigation on the high seas was open to all. But in practice the principle was frequently disregarded – even by Rome itself, when its naval power was at its height, and by others after its decline. With the growth of maritime commerce, especially in the later Middle Ages, maritime powers asserted dominion over wide areas of ocean space: Venice to dominion over the Adriatic Sea (Guido Pace, De dominio maris Adriatico, 1619); Genoa the Ligurian (Pietro Battista Borgo, De dominio serenessimae Genuinsis Reipublica in mari Liguria, 1641); Sweden, Denmark and Poland to all or parts of the Baltic.

Early efforts to codify maritime law, such as the 12th century Laws of Oleron and the Consolat de Mar (ca. 1484) had codified admiralty law on a range of subjects, including, for example, ship ownership, discipline and punishment of crews, and salvage.

-- Notes by Edward Gordon

Pace, Giulio (1550-1635). De dominio maris Hadriatici desceptatio (Lyons, 1619).
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Libro llamado Consulado de mar (Valencia, 1539).
A translation from the original Catalan into Spanish of “The Book of the Consulate of the Sea,” the basis for much of Europe’s maritime law.
Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

“Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law,” curated by Edward Gordon and Michael Widener, is on display October 2009 through January 2010 in the Rare Book Exhibition Gallery, Level L2, Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale Law School.

Reference: Yale ISP Celebrates Open Access Week

John Nann — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 11:54:00 -0700

Just received this press release from the YLS Information Society Project:

Yale ISP Celebrates Open Access Week with New Research

The Information Society Project at Yale Law School (Yale ISP) today launched three new reports on the state of access to knowledge in comparative national perspective. The new works feature research on challenges of intellectual property and innovation in three developing countries. The launch is timed to coincide with the first-ever international celebration of Open Access Week, October 19-23, 2009.

Open Access Week seeks to raise awareness of the importance of open access to research. In today's world, proper use of digital publication platforms and open copyright licenses can greatly facilitate the spread and impact of academic research. Consistent with these values, the research launched this week carries Creative Commons licenses and is available for free download at the Yale ISP website.

In developing the reports, the Yale ISP partnered with academic institutions abroad at the University of Buenos Aires, the University of Addis Abeba, and the University of Cape Town. Research teams within these and other institutions have joined with the Yale ISP to form the A2K Global Academy, a network of academic centers dedicated to research, education, and policy analysis promoting access to knowledge.

The project has already resulted in two books, both forthcoming from the open access publishing imprint Bloomsbury Academic this winter: Access to Knowledge in Brazil: New Research on Intellectual Property, Innovation and Development, and Access to Knowledge in Egypt: New Research on Intellectual Property, Innovation and Development.

Research examining related topics in India and China was launched in August 2009. The newest installment, featuring insights into the state of access to knowledge in Argentina, Ethiopia, and South Africa, completes the series of seven reports. Topics addressed by the research include: open source software, alternative business models for cultural production, exceptions and limitations to copyright, ICT for development, access to medicines, open educational resources, technological standards, and biotechnology.

The three-year research project was supported with funding from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, as part of an initiative supporting international academic collaboration on access to knowledge challenges and opportunities.

“Innovation is the basis for economic growth and finding solutions to pressing problems,” said Lea Shaver, director of the ISP’s research program in access to knowledge. “But law and policy do not always support innovation optimally, nor ensure that new knowledge spreads as widely as it could. This research offers important guidance to policymakers, particularly in the context of developing countries.”

Continuing its academic work in this area, the Yale ISP will host a major conference on access to knowledge and human rights on February 12-13, 2010 at Yale Law School.

The Yale Information Society Project is an intellectual center at Yale Law School that studies the implications of new information technologies for law and society, guided by values of democracy, human rights, and innovation. For more information, visit isp.law.yale.edu.

Rare Books: In Memoriam: Charles J. Tanenbaum

Mike Widener — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 11:41:00 -0700

I was sorry to learn that Charles J. Tanenbaum, Yale Law School Class of 1937, passed away on Oct. 17, 2009, at age 94. Mr. Tanenbaum was a noted book collector and philanthropist. The Lillian Goldman Law Library was one among a great many institutions that benefited from his generosity.

Like many other great book & manuscript collectors, Charles Tanenbaum's motive for collecting was not to acquire and hoard, but to discover and share. He curated over thirty exhibitions at major U.S. libraries, including Harvard, Penn, Stanford, and the Grolier Club, where he was a member for over 40 years.

Here at Yale, Mr. Tanenbaum endowed the Charles J. Tanenbaum Fund, which supports rare book acquisitions relating to the history of the legal profession. From his personal collection, he donated an important letter from Chief Justice John Marshall (described here) and Yale-College Subject to the General Assembly (New-Haven: Printed by Thomas and Samuel Green, 1784), a brief arguing for the Connecticut General Assembly's right to regulate Yale College, by the prominent lawyer Samuel Whittelsey Dana.

The last gift we received from Mr. Tanenbaum was not from early American history, but from Mr. Tanenbaum's personal history. It is a letter of recommendation from Yale law professor Underhill Moore, a letter that documents not only the anti-Semitism prevalent in the 1930s but also the person that Professor Moore described as "an unusually valuable man." The letter appears below. I extend my deepest condolences to his widow, Mrs. Szilvia Szmuk-Tanenbaum, and his daughter Ann, for their loss.

MIKE WIDENER
Rare Book Librarian

Rare Books: New exhibit: Freedom of the Seas, 1609

Mike Widener — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:04:00 -0700

New exhibit...

Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law

October 2009 - January 2010
Rare Book Exhibition Gallery
Level L2, Lillian Goldman Law Library
Yale Law School

In 1609, a little pamphlet touched off a big debate that shaped modern international law. The Lillian Goldman Law Library marks the 400th anniversary of this event with its exhibition, "Freedom of the Seas, 1609: Grotius and the Emergence of International Law." It will be on display through January 2010 in the Yale Law School.

At the dawn of the 17th century, the Dutch East India Company commissioned a young prodigy named Hugo Grotius to prepare a legal argument rejecting Spanish and Portuguese claims of dominion over the oceans around their overseas empires. His essay, Mare Liberum ("On the Freedom of the Seas") touched off a "Battle of the Books." What eventually emerged was a regime of international law to govern humanity's common interest in shared resources.

At the center of this battle was Grotius and England's leading legal scholar, John Selden. The exhibition documents their contributions and those from other European jurists, with books from the Rare Book Collection of the Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale's Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, the Harvard Law School Library, and the private collection of Edward Gordon.

The exhibition was curated by Edward Gordon, Yale Law School Class of 1963, and Mike Widener, Rare Book Librarian. Gordon, past President of the American Branch of the International Law Association, was formerly professor of international law at Albany Law School, and has also taught at Rutgers, George Washington University, American University, Wellesley College, and the Fletcher School at Tufts University.

The Rare Books Exhibition Gallery is located in the lower level of the Lillian Goldman Law Library (Level L2), directly in front of the Paskus-Danziger Rare Book Reading Room.

For those unable to visit the exhibit in person, it will appear in installments here in the Yale Law Library Rare Books Blog.

For more information, phone Mike Widener at (203) 432-4494 or email him at <mike.widener@yale.edu>.

The illustration:
Hugo Grotius Mari libero et P. Merula De maribus (Leiden, 1633). Rare Book Collection, Lillian Goldman Law Library.

Reference: European Union Case Law

ct286 — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:45:00 -0700

The Law Library has a variety of case law materials in print from the European Union, including:

Proceedings of the Court of Justice and of the Court of First Instance of the European Communities

Reports of Cases Before the Court of Justice and the Court of First Instance, usually referred to as European Court Reports (ECR)

Common Market Law Reports (CML) and European Union Law Reporter

European Commercial Cases

International Law Reports

Case law is also available online from the EU, as well as on LexisNexis Law School and Westlaw.

Reference: India Research

ct286 — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 12:03:00 -0700

For a research guide on India's Resources, check out our country-by-country grid or the Foreign Law Guide.

For print primary resources please go to the Lower East Side of the Law Library, call number location KNS. Here we will have the Constitution of India (KNS1744.5195), selections of Constitutional Debates (KNS1760 .I33 2001) and the following federal case reporters: Supreme Court Reports (KNS18.5.A2 I53), the All India Reporter (KNS24.A2 A45), and Supreme Court Cases (KNS18.5 .A3). Please note that state cases will also be in the All India Reporter (KNS24.A2 A45). In addition to federal and state reporters, the Lower East side houses certain specialized reporters like Current Consumer Cases (abbreviated CCC) and the decisions of the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (abbreviated NC). However, the collection of specialized reporters is not complete in coverage. Titles such as Consumer Protection Reporter (abbreviated CPR) and Consumer Protection Judgments (abbreviated CPJ) can be ordered by library patrons through Interlibrary Loan. Other primary print sources, including archived editions of India's constitution, India's Code, and Regulations are available by request from the Library Shelving Facility (LSF) via MORRIS.

For electronic primary resources, the Government of India's web site <http://indiacode.nic.in/> contains primary law, although this is not an official version. Yale Law Students also have access to India's statutory and case law through the subscription database Manupatra (password on YLS Inside). In addition, LexisNexis Lawschool (individual password) contains the reported and unreported decisions of the Supreme Court of India, from 1999 to present, as well as select international arbitration agreements. More specialized information can be found through agency websites, for instance National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission decisions are available here and the Legal Information Institute has select government publications online, as well listed here.

For secondary sources, run title searches in MORRIS and ORBIS first. These catalogs will indicate if we subscribe to a journal in either print or electronic format. If we do not own a copy of the journal or book that you are looking for, search WorldCat and request the item via Interlibrary Loan using the "Yale Links" button.

For newspapers are kept at Sterling Memorial Library's Newspaper Room for 6 months after receipt. Some are then archived in microfiche format. Always check Orbis for currency and title, as well as to find online versions. Certain papers are also available online through the newspaper's website:

Bombay
- The Times of India

Madras
- The Hindu

New Delhi
- The Indian Express
- The Statesman

Foreign & Int'l: Chilean Independence Day!

Teresa Miguel — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:57:00 -0700

Feliz Dieciocho, Chile!

Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, also sends her congratulations to Chile today, on its 199th anniversary of independence.

Not only is Chile know for its wines, but it is also one of the top five legal publishers in Latin America. Our Country-by-Country page contains several Chilean legal research guides to help you get started. Additionally, if you venture down to the Lower East Side, head to LC Call Number KHF where you can have a look at our Chilean legal collection, including current Chilean laws and the Civil Code of Chile in English. You can browse the collection in Morris. Look at the Latin American Journals & Serials page for a quick glance at our holdings in Chile. We even have a few Chilean DVDs.

Legal databases containing Chilean legal material include vLex and InterAm (subscription databases) and SciELO (open access).

Of course, for additional research assistance, please contanct the reference department.

Que lo pases bien!

Rare Books: Portrait gallery: "Dottori Modonesi"

Mike Widener — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 19:37:00 -0700

My Flickr frenzy continues... Another new portrait gallery in the Rare Book Collection's section of the Yale Law Library Flickr site comes from Lodovico Vedriani's Dottori Modonesi di teologia, filosofia, legge canonica, e civile (Modena, 1665). The majority of the 36 portraits are of the leaders of Modena's legal profession, along with churchmen, diplomats, politicians, and authors. One woman is included: Tarquinia Molza. Each portrait is accompanied by a lengthy panegyric highlighting the individual's virtues and accomplishments.

The example below is of Aurelio Bellencini, "gran leggista," one of four Bellencini family members pictured in the book.

Our copy of Dottori Modonesi is bound with Vedriani's most well-known work, Raccolta de pittori, scultori et architetti modonesi (Modena, 1662), an important source for art historians. Our copy is also notable for having once formed part of the enormous private library of Richard Heber (1773-1833).

MIKE WIDENER
Rare Book Librarian

Rare Books: A gallery of illustrious jurists

Mike Widener — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:47:00 -0700

One of the first portrait albums ever published featured Italy's outstanding jurists, Antoine Lafréry's Illustrium iureconsultorum imagenes (Rome, 1566?). The book consists of 25 portraits, attributed to Niccolò Nelli, that reportedly were based on a set of portraits in the collection of Mantova Benavides, a jurist in Padua. The volume is one of the treasures of the Lillian Goldman Law Library's Rare Book Collection.

Scanned images of all the portraits are now up in the Law Library's Flickr site. The portraits are of leading jurists from the 13th to 16th centuries, and include such famous names as Accursius (ca. 1182-1260), the compiler of the standard gloss to the Corpus Juris Civilis, Bartolus of Sassoferrato (1313-1357), and the Renaissance humanist Andrea Alciati (1492-1550). In the midst of the 24 jurists' portraits is, inexplicably, the image of Dante Alighieri. Below is the portrait of Gerolamo Cagnolo (1491-1551), author of commentaries on the Digest and Code of Justinian.

MIKE WIDENER
Rare Book Librarian

Reference: Is researching online better for the environment?

John Nann — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 06:32:00 -0700

Tough question to answer, but Reed-Elsivier took a crack at it. They looked closely at the carbon costs related to one journal (the aptly enetitled Fuel)

There are two sides to the cost: production and end use. The biggest carbon impact in journal production was employee commuting and business travel. Production of the journal used about 40 tons of CO2. Delivery of the print journal has about twice the carbon impact when compared to online delivery. But, and it's a big but, the largest variable is end user behavior. Online delivery starts out with a 2 to 1 advantage over print (say 10 tons of CO2 versus 5 tons). However, if users print out the articles, the online benefit quicky disappears. The estimate of the carbon impact of "high end use" of the online version using the numbers above raises the 5 tons to 80 tons! Although, the study seems not to include any corresponding increase related to photocopying articles from print journals.

So, production 40 tons, printing and distribution 10 tons, online delivery 5 tons. Printing out the online journal up to 75 tons!

In any event, what seems clear is that the biggest variable is end user behavior and that a marked benefit for online delivery can quickly disappear. Another reason for better e-readers!

Rare Books: New location, new images for the Rare Books Flickr gallery

Mike Widener — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 19:09:00 -0700

The Rare Book Collection's image galleries on Flickr are now part of the Yale Law Library's Flickr site. All the previous content is still there -- Legal Trees, Dutch Court Scenes, and Provenance Markings -- and I continue to add images to these sets. New sets include:

21 images from Francesco Maria Pecchio's profusely illustrated Tractatus de aquaeductu (1713), a 4-volume treatise on the Roman law of aquaducts and riparian rights (see an example at right).
Images of Justitia (or Themis), or "blind-folded Justice with her scales."
Title pages from a half-dozen 18th-century German legal dissertations. Our rare book cataloger, Susan Karpuk, spoke at the 2009 annual meeting of the American Association of Law Libraries on how to decipher their long-winded and complicated titles.
Two pamphlets relating to the prosecution of William Lanson, a leader of New Haven's African-American community in the early 19th century. Lanson built the original Long Wharf and several other developments. In 1845 Lanson was accused of operating a house of ill repute. Isaiah Lanson's Statement and Inquiry, Concerning the Trial of William Lanson (1845) is a defense of Lanson by his son Isaiah, and William Lanson's Book of Satisfaction (1848) is William Lanson's own defence, including a poem describing the events.

More to come...

MIKE WIDENER
Rare Book Librarian

Reference: New judicial nominations database

Jason Eiseman — Thu, 28 May 2009 09:39:00 -0700

We are happy to announce that we have released a new site for researching and tracking federal judicial nominations.

The site is available at http://judges.law.yale.edu/ .And it includes data for every federal judicial nomination from the 103rd congress to the current day.

The site offers:

The ability to quickly and easily track down nominees based on a number of faceted criteria including congress, nominating president, and nomination result.
The ability to track nominees and nominations via RSS feeds.
Up to date contact information for sitting judges nominated and confirmed since the 103rd congress, and nominees from the 111th congress forward.

Possible future enhancements include:

Adding additional biographical data such as education (currently only Yale grads are tracked), gender, etc.
Adding the ability to narrow down nominations by date and sort congress information by date.
Better styled RSS feeds, RSS feeds for search results.
Enhanced search capabilities.

Why isn't Sonia Sotomayor listed as having been nominated to the Supreme Court?

As of the writing of this blog post, President Obama has announced his intent to nominate Sonia Sotomayor as Associate Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court. When her nomination is made official and received in the senate, we will add this information to the nominations database. But you can track her nomination by using the RSS feed from her existing profile page, or using the RSS feeds for Recent Nominations on the home page.

Any additional questions, comments, suggestions (including corrections), should be sent to lawlib.webmaster at yale.edu

Foreign & Int'l: Treaties in Force 2009

Teresa Miguel — Thu, 07 May 2009 19:22:00 -0700

The just-released Treaties in Force 2009 publication by the U.S. Department of State will tell you what bilateral and mulitlateral treaties to which the United States is a party are currently in force. This is an annual publication also available in print and on HeinOnline (subscription database available to Yale community only).

Treaty research can be complicated so there are plenty of research guides and databases to help with your research. You will find them on our Foreign and International Research Resources page.

Reference: Effect of the Economic Situation on American Universities

John Nann — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 11:47:36 -0700

This article from the New York Review of Books describes the problems facing students and universities in the current financial situation as well as the impact on access to education and further stratification of education. Worth a read!

Reference: Turmoil in UK over Gurkha Immigration

John Nann — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 11:26:05 -0700

Can Gurkhas who served in the British army settle in the UK? Rule denying automatic rights for those who served while the regiment was based in Hong Kong (until 1997) was overturned by the high court. Efforts to compromise look to be a mess. See this article.

Reference: European Parlaiment votes to extend music copyright

John Nann — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 11:20:05 -0700

The European Parliament has voted to extend the copyright from 50 to 70 years on recordings. The EU Internal Market Commissioner had proposed 95 years! If passed, will this become known as the "Beatles Act"? Their catalog was to start becoming copyright-free in 2012!

More

Reference: EU Green Paper on Foreign Judgments

John Nann — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 09:09:58 -0700

On 21 April 2009, the [European] Commission adopted a report and a green paper on the functioning of the existing rules on jurisdiction of the courts and the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments. It concludes that time has come to achieve a free circulation of judgments in civil and commercial matters in the European Union on the basis of mutual recognition of judgments among Member States.

. . .

In this context, the report limits itself to presenting the outcome of the evaluation of the operation of the Regulation. Instead, the green paper outlines possible avenues for moving forward on the points raised in the report. In summary, the report and green paper address the following issues:

The removal of the remaining obstacles to a free circulation of judgments, i.e. the removal of "exequatur"^[6]
The protection of European citizens and companies in case of disputes with parties domiciled in third States, in particular by ensuring equal access to the courts of the Member States and equal protection against judgments given by the courts of third States against European defendants;
Finally, certain imperfections in the application of certain rules of the Regulation, such as avoiding parallel proceedings in different Member States and ensuring the sound application of contractual agreements as to which courts will deal with the case in the Union.

The report and the green paper aim at launching a broad public consultation of civil society and Member States on the possible ways to deal with the issues referred to above. The deadline for consultation is 30 June 2009. The Commission's work programme foresees that a proposal for revision of the Regulation may be adopted by the end of 2009.

Reference: UK copyright law is considered to be least user friendly

John Nann — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 08:53:00 -0700

A recent report by Consumers International has concluded that the UK is the worst among 16 leading nations at protecting the rights of the users.

"UK copyright law is the oldest but also the most out of date. It’s time our copyright law caught up with the real world," said Ed Mayo, chief executive of Consumer Focus. "The current system puts unrealistic limits on our listening and viewing habits and is rapidly losing credibility among consumers. A broad ‘fair use’ exception would bring us in line with consumer expectations, technology and the rest of the world."
.
In addition, the UK government does not seem to see reform of copyright law as a priority.

More

Foreign & Int'l: After Genocide - Rwanda & Beyond

Teresa Miguel — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 18:39:00 -0700

Our very own Zachary D. Kaufman, YLS JD Candidate '09, will be giving a book talk this Friday, April 17, 2009, at 4:00pm, in the Law Library's L3 Periodical Reading Room. Zach, an Olin Fellow and editor-in-chief of the Yale Law & Policy Review edited After Genocide: Transitional Justice, Post-Conflict Reconstruction, and Reconciliation in Rwanda and Beyond with Philip Clark, research fellow at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, University of Oxford, and co-founder of Oxford Transitional Justice Research.

In After Genocide, published by Columbia University Press, ". . . leading scholars and practitioners analyze the political, legal, and regional impact of events in post-genocide Rwanda within the broader themes of transitional justice, reconstruction, and reconciliation."

The book includes ". . . chapters from Rwandan academics and practitioners, such as Tom Ndahiro, Solomon Nsabiyera Gasana, and Jean Baptiste Kayigamba—all of whom are also survivors of the 1994 genocide—and draws on their personal experiences. After Genocide constitutes the most comprehensive survey to date of issues related to post-genocide Rwanda and transitional justice." Read a more complete description of the book.

After Genocide is not on our shelves yet, but it will be very soon!

On a related note, to start researching the domestic law of Rwanda, begin with our Country-by-Country guide. A nice portal to Rwandan legislation is Lexadin's World Law Guide. Also, a simple Morris "Call Number" search for Rwanda -- KTD --will return a list of titles that have been assigned to Rwandan law. Other human rights materials related to Rwanda are found elsewhere in the library collection. A Morris Subject Heading" search, human rights rwanda, will return more resources cataloged primarily under human rights rather than strictly Rwandan law.

Reference: Library 2.0 Symposium

John Nann — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 07:02:00 -0700

This past Saturday, Yale Law School's Information Society Project hosted a fantastic symposium on "Library 2.0". Materials from the conference, including video of the sessions and the concurrent twitter conversations is available at: http://yaleispblog.net/ . Take a look, the issues are increadibly important: its no exageration to say that the future of society will, to a large extent, be driven by the resolution of these issues. Also, it was great fun.

Foreign & Int'l: Treaty Research with Flare

Teresa Miguel — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:15:00 -0700

The Institute of Advanced Legal Studies has released a new easy-to-use treaty index: FIT, the Flare Index to Treaties.

FIT is searchable by any one or a combination of the following:

keywords drawn from the official, popular and alternative titles which have been used for each treaty
additional keywords relevant to the subject matter or organisations associated with the treaty
the date on which the treaty was concluded
the place where the treaty was concluded

For example, a free-text search for "genocide" will redirect you to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. When you click on the Convention, you'll discover that the treaty was concluded on 9/12/1958 in New York, and is published at 78 UNTS 277 (and many other places). There are also several links that will take you to the full-text of the convention.

For more resources related to treaty research, including a drafting history (travaux preparatoires) research guide and an annotated list of databases, see the Yale Foreign and International Resources page.

Reference: OECD lashes out at university 'conservatism'

John Nann — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 07:59:04 -0700

"Traditional university faculties are too conservative and are standing in the way of progress, as Europe's education system struggles to become more innovative, according to the head of the OECD's Centre for Educational Research and Innovation."

-more-

Reference: YouTube - Librarians' Parade

Jason Eiseman — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:08:49 -0700

via youtube.com

Video from 1930 showing librarians moving with book from the old library to the Sterling Memorial Library. This comes from Yale's YouTube Channel.

Reference: Database Trial

John Nann — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 12:17:02 -0700

Justis

via law.yale.edu

We are conducting a trial of an additional portion of the Justis database. In this case, their version of CELEX, the documents of the European Union. To give it a try, simply go to Justis (you can click on the link above) and, once you are in the database, click on the EU and then search. Please let us know what you think. The trial continues until early April.

Posted by jnann.

Foreign & Int'l: Westlaw China Database Trial

Evelyn Ma — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 10:44:00 -0800

The Law Library is testing Westlaw China, a new database with primary and secondary sources on China laws:

http://www.westlawchina.com/login.php

The trial user ID and password can be found in YLS Inside Research Sites under Library Database Passwords.

Foreign & Int'l: Treaties and Other International Acts Series (TIAS)

Teresa Miguel — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 11:27:00 -0800

The State Deparment recently began publishing online the Treaties and Other International Acts Series (TIAS). This website is open-access and a work-in-progress. As of today there are only treaties from the years 1996 - 1998. The treaties are available in pdf.

You can find scanned pdfs of the TIAS print volumes on HeinOnline from 1982 - 1996.

The print volumes of TIAS are available on L1 (KZ235.32 .U55) and, like the online State Department version, have only been released up to 1998.

Foreign & Int'l: War Crimes Research Portal and Webcasts

Teresa Miguel — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:03:00 -0800

The Frederick K. Cox International Law Center at Case Western Reserve law school has developed an exiting new War Crimes Research Portal. The portal has four features:

the portal contains over a thousand links to websites related to international humanitarian law, arranged alphabetically by subject area and including a summary of the content of each site;
the portal contains the text of over 120 research memoranda on issues pending before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the Special Court for Sierra Leone, and the International Criminal Court. The memos can be searched by date published, title, or keywords. (Cites to the memos should take the following form: [Author’s name], [Title of Memo], Research Memorandum Prepared for the Office of the Prosecutor of the [Name of Tribunal], [Date].);
there is a Research Guide to international humanitarian law and tribunals, prepared by the Case Law School Law Library, which includes a bibliography of relevant articles and books, as well as links to international law journals on the Web;
the portal contains "instant analysis" articles, written each month by the members of the American Branch of the International Association of Penal Law, on the hottest topics in international criminal law.

Frederick K. Cox International Law Center also has webcasts available of recent events:

War Crimes Research Symposium: The International Criminal Court and the Crime of Aggression
Speakers: M. Cherif Bassiouni, Mark Ellis, Don Ferencz, William Schabas and many more
http://law.case.edu/lectures/webcast.asp?dt=20080926
Klatsky Seminar in Human Rights: The Future of Human Rights
Speaker Information: Geoffrey Robertson, Queen's Counsel, formerly of the SCSL
http://law.case.edu/lectures/webcast.asp?dt=20081106

When searching for books on war crimes and humanitarian law in Morris, try searching by the following Subject Headings:

war crime trials
war (international law)
guerillas (international law)

Foreign & Int'l: HeinOnline's new United Nations Law Collection

Teresa Miguel — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 11:52:00 -0700

HeinOnline is a subscription database collection available to the Yale community.*

HeinOnline's United Nations Law Collection will allow you to access UN research materials quickly and easily using the Finding Aids available from the collection home page. The Finding Aids include the ability to:

Find and retrieve a UN Treaty by entering the UNTS Citation
Search for a UN Treaty by treaty/registration number, country, short title, popular name and more
Search by subject, as all treaties have been assigned a Kavass Subject
Find and link directly to law review articles that cite a UN Treaty

Hein has also developed user guides, video tutorials, FAQ’s, and more. Training Resources Include:

Quick Reference Guide (PDF format): http://heinonline.org/HeinDocs/UN_QuickRefGuide.pdf
Video Tutorial: http://www.screencast.com/t/JN7N3S57
United Nations Law Collection Wiki Page: http://heinonline.org/wiki/index.php/HeinOnlineLibSpec:United_Nations

The United Nations Law Collection Wiki page contains links to the Quick Reference Guide, Video Tutorial, FAQs, How-To information, search examples, and more!

Hein further invites users to collaborate and join in discussions via HeinOnline’s 2.0 Community. Friend Hein on Facebook, collaborate on Hein's Wiki, subscribe to Hein's Blog, watch Hein on YouTube, or follow Hein on Twitter!

Visit Hein at http://www.heinonline.org/home/training/Educational_Resources.html to find out more about our virtual community.

*In order to access HeinOnline and other Yale subscription database from off-campus, you must be connected to the Yale network via VPN.

Foreign & Int'l: International Video Law Library

Teresa Miguel — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 18:39:00 -0700

The International Video Law Library is a fantastic place to find, listen to, and watch leading experts in the field discuss substantive international law issues. Also within the International Video Law Library is the Human Rights Video Library.

Some of the lectures in the library include:

Thomas Buergenthal, Judge at the International Court of Justice, speaks about reservations to treaties.

Philippe Kirsch, President of the International Criminal Court, for an interview in September 2005 in which he introduced himself, and went on to give the historical background of the creation of the International Criminal Court. President Kirsch then when on to explain how the Court functions, its structure, and finally gave a status report of the Court's activites as of 2005.
James Crawford , Whewell Professor of International Law, University of Cambridge, considers his time at the UN International Law Commission as part of the Working Group on an International Criminal Court and the drafting of the 1994 Draft Statute for an International Criminal Court. The 1994 ILC Draft was source of the drafting process which ultimately lead to the 1998 Rome Diplomatic Conference and the creation of the International Criminal Court.
Judge Navanethem Pillay, President of the International Criminal for Rwanda Tribunal (1999 - 2003) and later Judge of the International Criminal Court introduces herself and explains why the Rwanda Tribunal was established. Judge Pillay speaks about the legacy which the ICTR will leave in respect to the evolution of international jursiprudence, and discusses the means by which the ICTR will finish its work.
Christine Chinkin, Professor of International Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), discusses the feminist approach to international law.

There are many more. Enjoy!

Of course the Yale Law Library has a fantastic print and electronic international law library. For a list of our electronic international law resources, go to our webpage of Foreign, International and Transnational Law Resources. Our international law reference books, treatises, looseleafs, and monographs are in the compact and open shelving areas and reading room on L1 as well as the Upper East Side. The librarians are more than happy to assist you with your international legal research!

Foreign & Int'l: EU and Cuba Renew Relations

Teresa Miguel — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 18:52:00 -0700

The BBC recently reported that the EU and Cuba have formally renewed ties that were severed 5 years ago following "a mass arrest of dissidents." Cuba will now receive 2 million Euros of aid for the hurricanes that swept over the island this summer; aid will increase to 30 million Euros next year.

The Yale Law Library purchases Cuban legal materials whenever possible, in both English and Spanish. You can find Cuban materials on the Lower East Side (LES), Call No. KGN. See, for example:

The Role of the Judiciary in Post-Castro Cuba - KGH2545 .S26 2003
Instrumentos internacionales sobre derechos humanos ratificados por Cuba - KGN3003 .I57 2001
La protección del medio ambiente en Cuba - KGN3305 .A67 C66 2005

Of course we also collect interdisciplinary materials involving Cuba and the United States. Try a Subject Heading search in our Morris catalog:

Cuba - Foreign Relations - United States; or
Cuba - Foreign Economic Relations - United States
When you pull up an item record on Morris, click on any of the Subjects Headings to view other related Subject Headings. Click again on any of the Subject Headings to find related books.

For a compilation of treaties involving Cuba, try another Subject Heading search: Cuba - Foreign Relations - Treaties . Also check out the new and improved United Nations Treaty Collection database. It's open-access and easy to search.

We also have a few Cuban DVDs:

Lucia (1968) by Humberto Solas (one of my all-time favorites!)
Quien Diablos es Julietta? (1967) by Carlos Marcovich
Check IMDB for reviews: Lucia and Julietta

The Avalon Project also has documents pertaining to Cuba, specifically the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Foreign & Int'l: United Nations Treaty Collection

Teresa Miguel — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 14:49:00 -0700

The new and improved United Nations Treaty Collection database is up and running. In this fabulous open-access database, you can find the complete run of the United Nations Treaty Series (UNTS), League of Nations Treaty Series (LoN), Multilateral treaties deposited with the UN, Status of Treaties (MTDSG), Certified True Copies (CTCs) of treaties (pdfs), and Depositary Notifications (CNs). There is a UN legal research guide, cumulative index, and more. The database has been further refined to offer a variety of advanced search features including Popular Name search, Title search, and Participant search.

UNTS is also available in print in the tunnel between L1 and the UES. You can find all of Yale's subscription-based and some open-access international law databases and resources on our Foreign and International Law Resources page.

Foreign & Int'l: Messi conflict in Barcelona v. FIFA

Teresa Miguel — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 20:01:00 -0700

Lionel Messi, one of the world's greatest football (i.e. soccer) players at the moment, is caught in the middle of a conflict. His national squad, Argentina, has called him to play in the Olympics this month. His club team, Barcelona, who pays his multi-million euro salary, does not want him to go because of Champion's League obligations. Barcelona has appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) for a ruling. Here is the court's summary of the dispute:

The CAS has registered an appeal from FC Barcelona against the decision made by the Single Judge of the FIFA Players' Status Committee regarding the release of players for the Olympic Games. This appeal will be handled together with the appeals filed by FC Schalke 04 and Werder Bremen against the same FIFA decision. The CAS will deliver its final ruling on or before 6 August 2008.

FIFA, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association, the governing body of football, has long contended that players should be released to play with their national teams. A single judge from the FIFA Players' Status Committee ruled on July 30, 2008 that the clubs must release their players to the national teams. This ruling was appealed by the clubs to the CAS.

AUGUST 6 UPDATE: According to Reuters, the Court of Arbitration for Sport has shockingly ruled that club teams may recall their players from their national teams! Regardless, both FIFA President Sepp Blatter and International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge are calling on the clubs to allow their players to remain in China to compete in the Olympics.

Photo of Lionel Messi in his Argentina kit from the Guardian: CAS steps in to stop players heading to Beijing.

The Yale Law Library has quite a few resources pertaining to the Court of Arbitration for sport such as:

The proceedings before the Court of Arbitration for Sport - 2006 Conference - K3702 .P36 2007
The Court of Arbitration for Sport, 1984 - 2006 - K3702 .C686 2006
Arbitraje deportivo - K3702 .G66 2006

We also have other titles dealing with various aspects of sports law:

The regulation of sport in the European Union - KJE6063 .R44X 2007
Equal play: Title IX and social change - KF4166 .E68X 2007
The strict liability principle and the human rights of athletes in doping cases - K3702 .S64 2007

There are many sports law journals, too (do a subject heading search in Morris, for example: Sports - law and legislation - united states - periodicals):

Seton Hall journal of sports and entertainment law - K23 .E83 and Hein Online
The sports lawyers' journal - K23 .P67 and Hein Online

Foreign & Int'l: Guantanamo Bay Cases

Teresa Miguel — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:00:00 -0700

The U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia has created a webpage of public information on the Guantanamo Bay cases. Find the court schedule, court orders and opinions, and press releases and notices.

Meanwhile, back at the camp, the trial of Osama Bin Laden's driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, began about 10 days ago, as reported on NPR. In 2006, Yale law students worked closely with Mr. Hamdan's lawyer, Neal Katyal, a YLS grad, in his challenge of the use of military commissions; they were victorious. As a result, Congress passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006.

Another Guantanamo prisoner, Omar Khadr, has been in the news recently as a result of the release of a videotaped interrogation conducted on the island. The video was released by Mr. Khadar's defense team, as explained in this story on NPR. An interesting history of Mr. Khadar's life and eventual detention at Guantanamo can be read in a 2006 article in Rolling Stone; a summary of his legal history can be found on Human Rights First.

The U.S. Dept. of Defense, Military Commissions, has a website with court filings and documents pertaining to Mr. Khadr's and Mr. Hamdan's cases, as well as other Guantanamo Bay detainees facing trial. The Military Commissions Act and Military Commissions Manual can also be found here.

The Yale Law Library has several recently published book on the Military Commissions Act of 2006 and the Guantanamo detainees:

Honor Bound: Inside the Guantanamo Trials by Kyndra Miller Rotunda (2008)
Bush, the Detainees, and the Constitution: The Battle over Presidential Power in the War on Terror by Howard Ball (2007)
Beyond the Law: The Bush Administration's Unlawful Responses in the "War" on Terror by Jordan J. Paust (2007)

We also have interesting historical works on military commissions in the U.S.:

Constitutional Limitation on Trials by Military Commissions by Harold Loeb (1943) (microfiche)
Military Commissions for the Trial of Citizens: A Letter to the Attorney General of the United States by John H. James, Jr. (1860) (microfiche and MOML)
An Argument to Establish the Illegality of Military Commissions in the United States, and Especially of the One Organized for the Trial of the Parties Charged with Conspiring to Assassinate the Late President, and Others, Presented to that Commission, on Monday, the 19th of June, 1865 by Reverdy Johnson, one of the counsel of Mrs. Surratt (1865)

There are several online, free research guides pertaining to the Military Commissions Act of 2006:

Foreign & Int'l: Paraguayan President Granted Holy Dispensation

Teresa Miguel — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 14:41:00 -0700

In an unprecedented decision the Vatican has granted Paraguayan President-elect Fernando Lugo dispensation of "all obligations as a priest, as a bishop and as a religious man of the Divine Word" (my translation). The dispensation by Pope Benedict XVI was formally announced today in Paraguay by Orlando Antonini, Apostalic Nuncio of the Vatican. Antonini also stated that this decision was reached after several years of research and analysis into Canon Law.

President-elect Lugo resigned from the priesthood in 2006 when he decided to run for president. His victory in April 2008 ended the 61-year rule of the Partido Colorado in Paraguay. He will officially take office on August 15, 2008. At the time of his 2006 resignation, he was advised that he might be excommunicated for violating the Vatican's rule against clerical involvement in politics. Read more...

Yale has a fantastic Canon Law collection located on the LES (Lower East Side) of the library, with current and historical texts in many languages, such as:

The Canon Law (2002) (a handbook of Catholic Theology)
Die Geschichte der Quellen und Literatur des Canonischen Rechts (1875) (The History of the Sources and Literature of Canon Law (my translation) - a bibliography).

There are also several law reviews dedicated to Canon Law, such as:

There are several excellent, free, online research guides to assist with Canon Law research:

There is even a blog dedicated to Canon Law by Prof. Edward N. Peters, J.D., J.C.D., Sacred Heart Seminary in Detroit, MI:

In Light of the Law

Foreign & Int'l: Recueil de Cours - online! Part II

Teresa Miguel — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 11:06:00 -0700

Recently I wrote that The Hague Academy of International Law's Recueil des Cours de l'Academie de la Haye was online with free browsing but at the time the Yale Law Library had not yet purchased a subscription to the full-text.

Today I am happy to write that we have subscribed and you can now browse, search and access all the full-text articles.

"The Academy is a prestigious international institution for the study and teaching of Public and Private International Law and related subjects. The work of the Hague Academy receives the support and recognition of the UN. Its purpose is to encourage a thorough and impartial examination of the problems arising from international relations in the field of law. The courses deal with the theoretical and practical aspects of the subject, including legislation and case law. All courses at the Academy are, in principle, published in the language in which they were delivered in the Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law.

You can also access our complete print collection in the Yale Law Library on L1, Call No. KZ 3092 .R43.