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The UFO Files

Posted by: Clare Feikert-Ahalt

Despite a line that I once heard in a movie that the United States is the only country in which unidentified flying objects (UFOs) are sighted, the United Kingdom appears to have its fair share of unexplained phenomena across its skies too.  The UK’s National Archives has published an extensive array of documents of sightings and policy …

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Congratulations to the People Behind Kenya Law Reports!

Posted by: Hanibal Goitom

The Kenyan Law Reports (KLR), a free Kenyan Law database, was just announced winner of the International Association of Law Libraries (IALL) 2011 Website Award Competition.  With this award, Kenyan Law Reports joins the ranks of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law websites that claimed …

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Laws in a Crusader State

Posted by: Nathan Dorn

On November 27, 1095, Pope Urban II declared the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont. In so doing, he inaugurated a period of centuries of intense, though intermittent, warfare fought at the peripheries of Christendom. The Crusades exist in our historical memory as a period of near constant bloodshed and destruction, but out of the chaos …

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Prisoner Swap Deals Under Israeli Law

Posted by: Ruth Levush

The recent release of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit has forced Israelis to reflect again on the cost of releasing kidnapped soldiers. Shalit was abducted by the military wing of Hamas from inside Israel’s borders in June 2006 and had been held captive for over five years.  Israel agreed to release 1,027 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the …

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Celebrating Veterans Day

Posted by: Christine Sellers

Veterans Day is November 11, 2011. As Andrew wrote last year, the Library is home to the Veterans History Project. The Veterans History Project was created by Congress in 2000 (P.L. 106-380) as part of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. The Project’s mission is to collect, preserve, and make accessible personal …

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Double, double toil and trouble, fire burn and caldron bubble…

Posted by: Christine Sellers

The following is a guest post by Francisco Macías, Senior Legal Information Analyst. Fillet of a fenny snake, In the caldron boil and bake; Eye of newt, and toe of frog, Wool of bat, and tongue of dog, Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting, Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing,— from William Shakespeare’s Macbeth If you’ve read …

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DSK: A Tale of Two Criminal Procedures

Posted by: Kelly Buchanan

The following is a guest post by Nicole Atwill, Senior Foreign Law Specialist in the Global Legal Research Center. I recently watched Dominique Strauss Kahn’s return to France on the French news as I vacationed there.  There was nonstop live television coverage during the day.  Many commentators pointed out that although Dominique Strauss Kahn (“DSK”) …

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Weird Laws, or Urban Legends?

Posted by: Clare Feikert-Ahalt

As mentioned in my previous post, during my day-to-day work at my cool job, I never know what I’m going to stumble upon.  It so happened that, as I was gathering information for my post on sumptuary laws, I came across a page of ‘legal curiosities’ compiled by the UK’s Law Commission and published by …

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¡Happy Day of the Race!

Posted by: Francisco Macías

If you’ve ever seen this day marked on your desktop calendars and wondered what it was, think La Niña (née La Santa Clara), La Pinta, and La Santa María. On October 12, 1492, Christopher Columbus landed in the modern-day Commonwealth of the Bahamas.  Although Columbus Day was formally recognized here in the United States on …