As part of its comprehensive collection development objectives, the Law Library of Congress collects the laws of nations of the world, including historic works that document the earliest layers of those nations’ legal heritage. A recent acquisition for the Law Library’s Rare Book Collection captures one such moment in the history of the laws of …
In recent posts, I have pointed out that while the Law Library’s rare books collection is in principle a collection of printed books, we sometimes have the good fortune to acquire unique documents created by important Americans in the course of their public careers. One example of these was a document signed by two 17th-century …
We are in the midst of the Jewish festival of Hanukkah. Often known as “the Festival of Lights” in reference to the basic feature of its observance – the lighting of the eight-branched candelabra – Hanukkah commemorates the events surrounding the rededication of the Temple of Jerusalem after a period of political oppression and forced …