Research Support

Law School faculty members are given the highest priority by our reference librarians. We try to respond to faculty requests immediately. If lengthy research is required, you will be contacted promptly with an estimate of the amount of time this research will take.

Reference Office Contact: 625-4309; law-ref@umn.edu, Chat Reference.
Voice mail & email are checked frequently during our reference office hours.

Feel free to contact any of our reference librarians directly if you would like their assistance:

• Vicente Garces, 612-624-2597, garce003@umn.edu
• Scott Dewey, 612-625-0187, shdewey@umn.edu
• Loren Turner, 612-625-2905, lturner@umn.edu
• Michael Hannon, mhannon@umn.edu
• Andrew Martineau, 612-624-5334, amartine@umn.edu
• Sandy Jacobson, 612-625-4309, jacobsos@umn.edu
• Cindy Schriber, 612-625-4309, schri120@umn.edu

Our reference librarians are available to consult with faculty research assistants. To utilize this service, please refer your RA to a member of the reference staff or to the reference office to arrange a consultation. A formal orientation is offered for faculty RAs once a year. You can arrange to allow your RA to borrow items from the law library and other libraries on campus by downloading and completing the Application for Proxy Borrowing Privileges form.

The Law Library provides access for Law School faculty members to Bloomberg Law, Lexis and Westlaw. Contact Vicente Garces, 624- 2597, garce003@umn.edu or the Reference Office (law-ref@umn.edu, 625-4309) to register for access.

The Law Library posts a selective monthly list of new books and other items acquired in the previous month.  Librarians can also arrange for you to receive current awareness services that are tailored to your interests. Some of the more popular services of general interest are listed below. To identify the best means for you to keep current, please contact Vicente Garces at 624-2597 or garce003@umn.edu.

Monthly New Books List

Faculty members may request delivery of this monthly list via email attachment or in hard copy by contacting the library’s ASAP service at 625-9534 or x-asap@umn.edu.

Routing Service

The Law Library will route current issues of periodicals and other serials to your office. To add your name to the routing list for a specific title, please contact David Zopfi-Jordan at 625-1513 or  x-asap@umn.edu.

Current Index to Legal Periodicals (CILP) 

This weekly service indexes 500+ legal periodicals into over 100 subject headings. In addition to the subject index, it lists the table of contents for each new journal issue covered. Weekly issues archived back to 1999 may be browsed or downloaded.

SmartCILP 

This weekly electronic service selectively lists articles indexed in Current Index to Legal Periodicals (CILP) according to your subject interests. Follow the instructions available here for creating your own profile listing the subject headings and/or the periodicals that you wish to track. Based on this profile, you will receive weekly email updates listing the new articles that are of interest to you. If you have questions or need assistance in creating or editing a profile, please contact Vicente Garces   (garce003@umn.edu).

Legal Scholarship Network 

This service offers separate electronic “journals” with abstracts of working papers and articles on various legal topics. The Law Library will assist you in becoming a subscriber to the journals in your areas of interest, after which you will receive new issues of the journals via email.

Berkeley Electronic Press Legal Repository

Bepress Legal Repository contains working papers and pre-prints from legal scholars and professionals. In addition, the bepress Legal Repository includes articles from bepress’ roster of peer-reviewed journals and dissertations from top law programs.  Bepress also offers an alert service called bealerts to help you track newly published content tailored to your interests.

Database Alerts (Bloomberg Law, Lexis & Westlaw) 

A number of our research databases including, Bloomberg Law, Lexis and Westlaw offer an alerts feature that allows you to track the development of issues by running predefined searches in databases and on a schedule that you choose. Our reference librarians can help formulate and set up searches to run according to your needs and interests. Results can be delivered to you electronically or in hard copy.

The library guide, Off-Campus Access to Electronic Resources, provides information on locating and logging into resources, as well as creating links that connect to our server successfully. Information on using additional tools to facilitate access to library resources from off-campus locations is also included.

If your research requires a visit to a library off-campus, the Law Library is happy to assist you in accessing the collections and services at other research libraries. Please contact Vicente Garces (garce003@umn.edu) to arrange access to libraries in the United States and abroad.

The Book Proposal Book: A Guide for Scholarly Authors., By Laura Portwood-Stacer. Available in eBook format from JSTOR ebooks

Information for Submitting Articles to Law Reviews & Journals, Rostron, Allen K. and Levit, Nancy, (Revised Aug. 18, 2023). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1019029 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1019029.

Abstract
This document contains information about submitting articles to law reviews and journals, including the methods for submitting an article, any special formatting requirements, how to contact them to request an expedited review, and how to contact them to withdraw an article from consideration. It covers 195 law reviews.

Information for Submitting Articles to Specialty & Non-Flagship Law Journals, Goodyear, Michael, (August 28, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3682908 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3682908

Abstract
This document contains charts with information about submitting articles to specialty (non-flagship) law journals at ABA-accredited law schools in the United States, including links to the journal’s page, the accepted methods for submitting an article, special formatting or length requirements, whether the journal accepts outside student submissions, and whether the journal offers any non-traditional publishing options. It covers over 450 law journals.

Modern Legal Scholarship: A Guide to Producing and Publishing Scholarly and Professional Writing. By Christine Nero Coughlin, Sandy Patrick, Matthew T Houston & Liz M Johnson. Law Library Reserve KF250.C684 2020.  Link to catalog record (includes table of contents). 

The Legal Scholar's Guidebook. By Elizabeth E. Berenguer. Law Library Reserve KF250 .B47 2020. Link to catalog record.

In Search of the Read Footnote: Techniques for Writing Legal Scholarship and Having It Published., By Christian C. Day, 6 Legal Writing: J. Legal Writing Inst. 229 (2000). Available on HeinOnline. 

How to Write a Law Review Article, By Richard Delgado, 20 U.S.F.L. Rev. 445 (1986). Available on HeinOnline.