Law Schools and the Free Access to Law Movement

Presenter(s):

Elmer Masters, CALI

Sarah Glassmeyer, CALI

Thomas Bruce, Cornell Law School

I've watched the ideas about free and open access to primary legal materials bounce around law schools for the past 20 years. How have things changed? How have they stayed the same? Does it make a difference? I'll dig into these questions and more while laying out a potential future for the FALM in American law schools.

Law schools have a history in collecting, archiving, and providing access to free and open primary legal materials. In the 1990's any number of law schools were involved in posting court opinions and other legal materials on the web. Over time things changed as law schools focused more on providing resources and services that that most directly supported faculty scholarship. Now few law schools actively host or support the hoisting of primary legal materials.

This represents a lost opportunity for schools, and more specifically law libraries, to create unique digital collections of primary legal materials that serve not only the research needs of the faculty, but the educational needs of the students, and the legal information needs of the public. Law schools should be taking the lead in working with courts and legislative and administrative bodies to provide free and open access to the primary legal materials produced in a law school's home jurisdiction.

Of course CALI can help. Through projects like the Free Law Reporter and CourtCloud we can provide our members with tools and expertise needed to develop outstanding local collections of free and open primary legal materials.

Elmer's notes: