HCLL now offers LEXIS on four library computers.  LEXIS and WESTLAW, still available on three computers, have replaced the PREMISE CD-ROM products.  Both LEXIS and WESTLAW are available at no charge to users in the law library.

LEXIS and WESTLAW are more current than PREMISE and offer wider coverage of the statutes, administrative regulations, and case law of all 50 states.  Complete coverage of federal statutes, regulations, and cases is also included. 

Use LEXIS to Shepardize cases.  KeyCite is still available on the three pubic access WESTLAW computers.  If you want to email cases to yourself at your office, you can use Shepard’s “Get & Print,” which is a LEXIS product.  West’s “Find & Print” will not be available after February 1st. 

LEXIS also provides electronic access to several Minnesota secondary sources, including Dunnell’s Digest, Misdemeanors and Moving Traffic Violations, McFarland and Keppel’s Minnesota Civil Practice, and Minnesota Family Law Practice Manual.

If you need to update your Lexis searching skills, we are offering a training session on Thursday, February 3rd at 12:15.  Register Online

If you have questions about our new LEXIS service, please call reference librarian Ed Carroll at 612-348-2903.

Now that the Minnesota Legislature is back in session, take a look at MyBills, the Legislature’s personalized bill tracking service.  MyBills lets you create a list of House and Senate bills by bill number, subject, or author.  It then automatically tracks the status of those bills as they progress through the Legislature.

The service requires free registration.  Login and select the bills you wish to track.  For example, S.F. No. 6, a bill requiring vehicles to be driven in the right lane, or S.F. No. 152, a bill requiring mobile telephones used in motor vehicles to be hands-free.  Then, each time you login to MyBills, you will find a daily updated collection of all the information available on your selected bills.  It includes the bill status, short description, bill text, companion bills, authors, conference committee reports, House Research bill summaries, Department of Finance Fiscal Notes, recorded roll call votes, etc.  MyBills is a great service that alerts you to significant action on selected legislation.

HCLL will also be closed Monday, February 21 for Presidents' Day.

Last month’s Alert focused on Wisconsin continuing legal education materials.  It mentioned that, of course, HCLL owns an even more complete collection of titles from Minnesota’s continuing legal education providers.  It seems wise to remind our users just how complete and accessible this collection is.  Whether a client presents you with an issue and facts from a few years ago or just yesterday, HCLL owns the Minnesota title you need.

Elsewhere in this issue another article describes how easy it is to search our collection of Minnesota continuing legal education titles.  Even the chapter titles are accessible!  (See the article, Keyword Searching In The Online Catalog, below)  The collection is also complete and relevant to your needs. 

For many years, HCLL has had standing orders for two copies of all titles published in conjunction with CLE programs held by the major Minnesota providers.  One copy is available to be checked out, the second always remains in the library for use by patrons here.  The effect of this policy, aside from immediate availability of the current title you want, is that as staff members decide titles have been superseded by later versions, HCLL always has a copy to put in our storage collection.  So, when that client presents her problem of a few years ago, we have titles published by “old” Minnesota CLE providers:  Hamline University Advanced Legal Education, the Midwest Practice Institute, and Minnesota Institute of Legal Education.

Librarians here make an effort to collect Minnesota-oriented titles from national continuing legal education vendors.  Each month librarians review the Minnesota programs held by such providers as the National Business Institute and Lorman Education Services, and select for purchase titles on subjects frequently requested by our users or authored by Minnesota specialists in the subject.  As part of our selection process, we also review the programs sponsored by Minnesota Trial Lawyers Association and try to purchase their most substantive and relevant titles.

The major CLE provider in the state continues to be Minnesota Continuing Legal Education from the Minnesota State Bar Association.  Hennepin County Law Library owns more than 2,000 titles from this publisher including the very first Minnesota Practice Handbook published in 1968:  Minnesota Estate Administration.  MCLE continues to hold programs and publish manuals on a variety of topics ranging from law practice management to divorce to limited liability companies to real property to conservatorship to distributorships and corporate law.  Whether you are just starting out in practice and need the current New Lawyer Experience or are an experienced practitioner who attended the Real Estate Law Forum in 1966 and now hopes the 21st Real Estate Institute will answer your latest question, you will find your title at Hennepin County Law Library.

But this index in the catalog includes more than just PLI numbers and keywords in the title of a book.  The keywords in the index are actually also from subtitles, series titles, alternate titles, corporate authors, and contents notes.  As such, the KEYWORDS index is a great starting point if you are uncertain of the exact order of the words in a title or corporate author.  Entering APPLEMAN INSURANCE will retrieve both the original and new editions of that classic work.  If you want to do a subject search, but are not familiar with the controlled vocabulary of the Library of Congress subject headings, the KEYWORDS index will get you started.  Entering RULE 11 SANCTIONS will retrieve 12 titles in the KEYWORDS index, but none in the subject headings index.  Words in the KEYWORDS index may be truncated to retrieve variant word forms by using the * sign.

Since the late 1980’s cataloging staff have added contents notes to the catalog records of all new materials received from Minnesota continuing legal education publishers.  A contents note lists the chapters and authors included in a publication.  Catalogers have also added complete or partial contents notes to other non-Minnesota publications including materials which may not merit a separate subject heading or which are too specific for the controlled vocabulary of subject headings.  All of these contents notes are searchable in the KEYWORDS index.

So, if you recall reading about or attending a CLE on a particular topic or by a particular speaker, you can locate it by searching the law library’s KEYWORDS index.  Searching PIERRINGER or SHUGART will retrieve titles on those kinds of releases and settlements.  Searching LUCY WIELAND in the KEYWORDS index will reveal if our new chief judge has ever authored a program at a Minnesota continuing legal education program.

So, if you are not yet using the KEYWORDS index of HCLL’s online catalog, give it a try.  As always, public services staff at the law library are available to assist you.