Update on "Baby Veronica" ICWA Adoption Case

The Prairie Law Blog has been reporting on the high-profile ICWA case of Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, which has become known in U.S. media outlets as the "Baby Veronica" case.  (See our previous posts of June 28, 2013 and September 5, 2013 for more information on the background of the case.)  In an emotional turn of events, Baby Veronica was handed over to her adoptive parents on Monday after the Oklahoma Supreme Court lifted an emergency stay which had allowed Veronica to stay in the custody of her biological father in Oklahoma.  As reported by CBS News, the Oklahoma Supreme Court's decision to lift the stay was not unanimous.  For a local perspective on this issue, the South Dakota Public Broadcasting website has made available an interview with Saunie Wilson, a former juvenile court judge on the Pine Ridge Reservation, and Raymond Cournoyer, ICWA Director of the Yankton Sioux Tribe.  Click here to listen to the interview. 

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

Banned Books Week: Celebrate the Freedom to Read

This week (September 22 to September 28, 2013) is Banned Books Week, an annual event which is sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and other national organizations.  The purpose of Banned Books Week is to celebrate the freedom to read and "the value of free and open access to information" (ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom, http://www.ala.org/bbooks/bannedbooksweek). 

The law library is currently featuring a display for Banned Books Week.  This display features compiled lists of some of the most frequently banned or challenged books by decade and by year. The display also features selected library resources on the First Amendment and freedom of speech. 

For more information about Banned and Challenged Books, visit the ALA's website on the topic here.  The ALA also maintains a list of Notable First Amendment Cases on the Right to Read Freely.  For First Amendment and free speech resources in the law library, click here to access a list of titles in the law library's catalog.

Update:  A local Sioux Falls attorney and USD Law alum has been blogging on "Banned Books That Shaped America."  You can visit his blog, A Progressive on the Prairie, here.  (Note: The McKusick Law Library has included this link for informational purposes only, and does not endorse the blogger or blog or any opinions expressed therein.)

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

New Study on Link Rot in Supreme Court Opinions

A recent New York Times article has highlighted a topic that has been of recent interest to law libraries and legal scholars: link rot in legal citations.  The article addresses a forthcoming study by Jonathan Zittrain, a professor of Law and Computer Science at Harvard, Larry Lessig, a professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard, and Kendra Albert, a Harvard law student.  The study looks specifically at link rot in U.S. Supreme Court opinions, finding that nearly 50% of the links in Supreme Court opinions no longer work.  The study also looked at link rot in law journals, including the Harvard Law Review.  Professor Zittrain discusses the study in a recent post on his blog and provides a link to the study on SSRN. 

Law libraries, who have long had an interest in this topic (see a recent article here by law librarians Raizel Liebler and June Liebert in the Yale Journal of Law and Technology), are becoming more involved than ever in addressing link rot in legal citations.  Zittrain's blog discusses a new project called Perma.cc, which is a project undertaken by the Harvard Library Innovation Lab and a number of academic law libraries.  According to Zittrain, the project "will allow those libraries on direction of authors and journal editors to store permanent caches of otherwise ephemeral links."

(As an aside, the New York Times article mentions the recent book by Richard A. Posner titled "Reflections on Judging."  The Law Library has recently received this book as part of its collection.  See the library's catalog for more information.)

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

Dakota Days - Legal Research CLE

Darla Jackson and Marsha Stacey will be co-presenting a Continuing Legal Education program titled “Conducting Free, Low Cost, and Other Electronic Legal Research” from 3:00 - 4:30PM on October 4, 2013 (during Dakota Days) at USD Law School Room 102. Attendance at the program is free to all who are interested in improving their legal research skills. Registration is requested but not required.

Additional details regarding the program and registration are available via the September 2013 issue of the State Bar of South Dakota Newsletter at page 30.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Darla Jackson)

U.S. Judicial Conference Appeals to President for Additional Court Funding

In the wake of several years of flat funding for the judiciary and the sequestration cuts that took effect in fiscal year 2013, the Judicial Conference of the United States recently wrote a letter to President Obama, appealing for additional funding in FY2014.  The Chief Justice of the United States is the presiding officer of the Judicial Conference, and membership is comprised of the chief judge of each judicial circuit, the Chief Judge of the Court of International Trade, and a district judge from each regional judicial circuit.  See the Judicial Conference website for further information about the U.S. Judicial Conference.  To view the letter to President Obama, click here.  As the letter outlines, the judiciary has already announced new cost-cutting measures in anticipation of continued budget cuts, including reducing attorney compensation for indigent criminal defense.  Fiscal year 2014 begins on October 1, 2013, the deadline for Congress to resolve the budget issue.  See here and here for other articles discussing this topic.  For further information on the federal judiciary and budget issues, consult the 2012 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary prepared by the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

Upcoming Presentation on Tribal/State Relations and Library Display

On Thursday, September 19 at 3:00 p.m., the USD Native American Law Student Association and the USD School of Law are hosting a presentation by P. Sam Deloria, board member of the American Indian Graduate Center, Albuquerque, NM.  Deloria will speak on Tribal/State Relations in the Law School Courtroom.  After Mr. Deloria's presentation, there will be a discussion panel with other experts in the area, including Professor Frank Pommersheim of USD Law, J.R. LaPlante, director of the South Dakota Department of Tribal Relations, and Philip Mahowald, general counsel for the Prairie Island Indian Community in Minnesota.  Both LaPlante and Mahowald are graduates of the USD School of Law.

To accompany the presentation, the law library is currently featuring a display which features a recent article by Tasse Hanna, Sam Deloria, and Charles E. Trimble, The Commission on State-Tribal Relations: Enduring Lessons in the Modern State-Tribal Relationship, 47 Tulsa L. Rev. 553 (2011-2012).  The display also features print titles on tribal/state relations, as well as information on the South Dakota Department of Tribal Relations website and resources.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

Hispanic Heritage Month Display

September 15 through October 15 is Hispanic Heritage Month, a time to recognize the contributions of Hispanic and Latino Americans to the United States and celebrate the group's heritage and culture.  The law library is currently featuring a display to commemorate Hispanic Heritage Month.  The display features some of the law library's print resources which discuss Hispanic and Latino identity and the American legal system.  Highlighted are American Cultural Pluralism and the Law by Jill Norgren and Serena Nanda, which contains a chapter on Latinos and the Law, as well as Race, Racism & Reparations by J. Angelo Corlett, which offers a chapter on Latino Identity.  The display also features A Latina Judge's Voice, 13 Berkeley La Raza L.J. 87 (2002), a transcription of a speech by Sonia Sotomayor, in which she discusses her background and its impact on her judicial career.  Justice Sotomayor is the first Hispanic American appointed to the United States Supreme Court.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

HeinOnline Collection Trial

As evidenced in the image below, in coordination with the McKusick Law Library and the University Libraries, HeinOnline is providing trial access to a number of collections, including:

- Session Law Library - This library contains the session laws of all 50 U.S. states as well as Canada, Australia, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, and the D.C. Register. All states are current within 60 days of the printed publication, and all states are available back to inception.

- U.S. Congressional Documents - This collection features the complete Congressional Record Bound version, as well as the daily version back to 1980. It also includes the three predecessor titles: Annals of Congress (1789-1824), Register of Debates (1824-1837) Congressional Globe(1833-1873), and Congressional Hearings (1927-2012), as well as other important congressional material. Using the Daily-to-Bound Locator Tool, you can quickly find a page in the Bound volume from the Daily edition.

- American Indian Law Collection - With more than 900 unique titles and more than 900,000 pages dedicated to American Indian Law, this collection includes an expansive archive of treaties, federal statutes and egulations, federal case law, tribal codes, constitutions, and jurisprudence. This library also features rare compilations edited by Felix S. Cohen that have not been accessible online.

- Congress and the Courts - This library,featuring William H. Manz's Congress and the Courts: A Legislative History 1787-2010, brings together materials reflecting congressional concern with the composition and structure of Article III Courts and provides all relevant documents prepared by various Congresses relating to the purpose, formation, organization, and restructuring of the federal government. Also included are Federal Judicial Center Publications, Periodicals, Links to Scholarly Articles,CFR Title 28 - Judicial Administration, Other Related Works, and much more.

- History of Supreme Court Nominations - This library features the complete print series Supreme Court of the U.S. Hearings and Reports on Successful and Unsuccessful Nominations of Supreme Court Justices by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Browse by Justice option allows you to see relevant works related to that Justice including links to articles and a bibliography of other works, along with links to Scholarly Articles.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Darla Jackson)

Constitution Day is September 17

Constitution Day, September 17, was established by Congress in 2004 to recognize the ratification of the United States Constitution.  The Constitution was signed by the Constitutional Convention on September 17, 1787.  The law library is currently featuring a display that includes several titles which focus on the history of the Constitution.  The display also offers information on USD's Constitution Day program, which this year features Law Professor Frank Pommersheim.  Professor Pommersheim, a nationally-recognized expert in Indian law, will be speaking in the Law School Courtroom at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, September 17.  The title of Professor Pommersheim's address is “Broken Landscape: Indians, Indian Tribes, and the Constitution” which is also the title of his recent book, featured in the law library's display.  The display also offers biographical information about Professor Pommersheim as well as copies of recent articles he has published in the South Dakota Law Review.  The Constitution Day program is free and open to the public, and students and professors alike are encouraged to attend.  To link to the official USD press release about the program, click here.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Sarah Kammer)

Academic Success LibGuide

Whether you are a first-year law student or a seasoned veteran of the halls of The University of South Dakota School of Law, the Law Library is here to help you advance your skills to perform your best.  The new Academic Success LibGuide is intended to assist all law students in developing their full potential to study, analyze, and use the law.  The Academic Success LibGuide lists available resources to help students succeed in their legal education.  With topics such as "Getting Started," "Online Resources," "Help with Specific Legal Subjects," and "Getting Further Help/Bar Exam Study Information," the Academic Success LibGuide provides a variety of ways to strengthen students' learning and skills.  Time management, effective outlining, test-taking skills, and stress management are just some of the ways to enhance your academic achievement.  The LibGuide will connect you to strategies to help conquer topics.

(This entry was originally written and published by Marsha Stacey)

HeinOnline Adopts QR Codes to Increase Ease of Sharing and Accessing Documents

HeinOnline has recently added a new feature to allow mobile device users to quickly access and share documents. Users with QR (quick response) code reader downloaded on the mobile device can point the camera of the device at the HeinOnline Print/Download Options screen, and the document will be displayed instantly.

The use of QR codes has been growing in popularity for several years. Potential uses for QR Codes in the Library was the topic of a 2011 Law Library Journal work written by McKusick Law Library Director Darla Jackson in 2011. Access the work by using your mobile device on the QR Code below.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Darla Jackson)

Continuing Controversy in High Profile Indian Child Welfare Act Case

In June, the Prairie Law Blog reported on the U.S. Supreme Court opinion in Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl.  Yet, experts opined that the Supreme Court ruling would likely not serve to end the controversy surrounding the custody of the child.

Despite other court orders requiring Brown to give the child to the South Carolina couple, the case is now before the Oklahoma Supreme Court, which issued the emergency stay, allowing Veronica’s father to keep her while arguments were heard in the case.   A court referee is expected to recommend whether the full Oklahoma Supreme Court should rule on which entity has jurisdiction in the case—South Carolina, Oklahoma or the Cherokee Nation.

 According to ABC News, although the Oklahoma Supreme Court has issued the emergency stay, Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin has ordered Baby Veronica's biological father extradited to South Carolina to face felony charges for interfering with the custody of her adoptive parents. The Cherokee Nation Secretary of State Chuck Hoskin Jr. issued a statement criticizing Fallin's action as "an unnecessary overreach in authority," which violates Brown's right to due process as well as tribal authority.

For additional information on ICWA and tribal sovereignty issues, use the Law Library catalog to locate resources.

(This entry was originally written and posted by Darla Jackson) 

Social Justice Week September 3-6, 2013

"Social justice" has been defined as "the committment to act with and on behalf of those who are suffering because of social neglect, social decisions or social structures and institutions."  William P. Quigley, Letter to a Law Student Interested in Social Justice, 1 DePaul J. Soc. Just. 7, 13-14 (2007).

During this year's 2nd Annual Social Justice Week observance, student groups will be sponsoring various activities and events.  Today, September 3rd, the Domestic Violence Legal Program will hold a Self-Defense Workshop at 6:45 p.m. at the USD Wellness Center.  On Wednesday, September 4th, Women in Law will conduct the "Quiz Your Professor" contest at 4 p.m. in Law School Room 101.  On Thursday, September 5th, the OUTlaws' Social will be at Carey's Bar starting at 5 p.m. in downtown Vermillion, followed by the Law Students for Reproductive Justice "Sex and the Law Trivia" contest at 6:30 p.m.  To round out the week, the Native American Law Students Association will have a film screening of Thunderheart on Friday, September 6th, at 7 p.m. in Law School Room 102. 

In conjunction with this week's activities, the Law Library has created a display of books and other items from the collection on the topic of "Social Justice."  Included in the display are the following books: Law and Social Justice (Joseph Keim Campbell et al. eds., 2002); Evan Gerstmann, Same-Sex Marriage and the Constitution (2004); It's Harder in Heels: Essays by Women Lawyers Achieving Work-Life Balance (Jacquelyn Hersh Slotkin & Samantha Slotkin Goodman, eds., 2007); and Bruce E. Johansen, Debating Democracy: Native American Legacy of Freedom (1998).  Also included in the display are the law review article by Willima P. Quigley cited above and Charles Elsesser"s Community Lawyering - The Role of Lawyers in the Social Justice Movement,  14 Loy. J. Pub. Int. L. 375 (2012).  These articles about social justice, as well as social justice articles from other public interest and social justice law journals and law reviews, can be accessed by USD students and faculty from HeinOnline. 

(This entry was originally written and posted by Marsha Stacey)