News from the Wolf Law Library
Wolf Law Library News from the Wolf Law Library at William & Mary Law School.
Law Library Journal Recognizes Fred Dingledy with 2020 Article of the Year Award
William & Mary Law School’s Wolf Law Library is pleased to announce that Senior Reference Librarian, Fred Dingledy, is the recipient of this year’s Law Library Journal Article of the Year Award for his article, “From Stele to Silicon: Publication of Statutes, Public Access to the Law, and the Uniform Electronic Legal Material Act” published at 111 Law Library Journal 165 (2019) (SSRN). The award was announced by the American Association of Law Libraries, and is the highest award that they give for a librarian’s scholarly work. Dingledy's article is a delightful look at the evolution of statutory publication over time. It was also very timely, being cited in a number of amicus briefs in the Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org case that the Supreme Court released its opinion on April 27.
Leslie Street Co-Authors Amicus Brief in Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org
Also in regard to Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Library Director and Clinical Professor for Legal Research, Leslie Street, co-authored an amicus brief signed by over 100 law librarians and five library organizations, in support of Respondent Public.Resource.Org’s position that the annotations in the Official Code of Georgia should not be subject to copyright protections. The law librarians’ brief argued that the public should have access to laws and that states should not be able to copyright parts of their official codes. The majority of the Supreme Court held that like judges, legislators are lawmakers and may not be considered “authors” of the works they produce in their official duties, and as such, those works are not entitled to copyright protection.
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Thomas Jefferson founded William & Mary Law School in 1779 to train leaders for the new nation. Now in its third century, America’s oldest law school continues its historic mission of educating citizen lawyers who are prepared both to lead and to serve.