This post is coauthored by Robert Brammer and Barbara Bavis, senior legal reference specialists. We sometimes receive questions about communications sent to Congress by the president that concern legislation. Since this post pertains to legislative history, our focus is on executive communications, presidential messages, veto messages, and signing statements. If you would like to learn more about …
Most fans of James Joyce’s novel Ulysses celebrate the day of the novel’s action, June 16, also known as Bloomsday. I knew a Joyce specialist who used to honor the day by eating a gorgonzola sandwich on white bread with a glass of burgundy—he said he couldn’t face the grilled mutton kidneys. Fans of the …
This post is coauthored by Barbara Bavis and Robert Brammer, senior legal reference specialists. Congressional documents concern a wide variety of subjects and include all papers ordered printed by the House or Senate apart from congressional committee reports. As described by the Government Publishing Office (GPO), congressional documents “may include reports of executive departments and independent organizations, …
This post is coauthored by Barbara Bavis and Robert Brammer, senior legal reference specialists. To continue our Beginner’s Guide series on legislative history documents, we next turn to congressional committee reports. The reports created by the committees of the United States House of Representatives and United States Senate are important sources for determining legislative intent, …
Hey! Does the Law Library Reading Room think that they get to have all the fun? Stand back Public Services Division! We’ll see your 40,000 volume move to temporary space pending the construction of the new and improved Law Library Reading Room, and up the ante to a 2.4 million (give or take 100,000) volume …
The Library has just released its new Recommended Format Specifications, a more current set of specifications for “identifying preservable content.” Library staff, including subject matter and technical experts, joined the team led by Ted Westervelt, head of acquisitions and cataloging for U.S. Serials – Arts, Humanities & Sciences at the Library of Congress, so they could …
This week’s interview is with Janice Hyde, recently appointed as the first director of the Global Legal Collection Directorate. Describe your background. I was born in the same town (Catskill, N.Y.) and delivered by the same doctor as my mother. I was raised in Owego, New York, which is so remote from the “Big Apple” …
This week’s interview is with Rick Fitzgerald, a Librarian in the Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate of the Library of Congress. I grew up in Sparta, New Jersey, and moved to Arizona in 1994, where I lived on and off for nine years. I have also lived overseas for brief periods – in the Netherlands and …
This is a joint post drafted by Clare Feikert and Margaret Wood. The Global Legal Research Center has done a number of briefings and blogs, as well as too many Global Legal Monitor Articles to list, on electoral law across various jurisdictions around the world. The Russian Federation, Parliamentary Elections: Legal Issues, 2008; Elections in …
