The Law Library in America.

The first law "libraries" in the USA were private collections maintained by individual early colonists who practiced in the field of law. These libraries were largely the practical texts and case law that needed to be referenced in the day to day work of their profession. The collections were small, and largely if not solely consisting of the work of English authors such as Coke, Blackstone, and Chitty (even by 1776, only 33 law volumes in total had been published in the colony). [1]

Although some private citizens were known to own books of law, even the wealthiest of judges and lawyers owned very few books, with the typical working library being between 5 and 20 volumes.[2]

In time, these private collections would form the seed of the early institutional and bar libraries that began to spring up in the 19th century.[3] The bar libraries were privately funded by the members of their various associations, and acted almost like private and exclusive clubs for these members. By this time, in no small part due to the independence of America from England, case law and books on theory and jurisprudence were being published by Americans, and the size of collections began to increase substantially. These libraries increasingly began to be funded by more formal "subscription" and "incorporation" methods, where members would buy an initial share in the library, and pay a yearly fee for access to the collection.

Concurrent with the development of the institutional law library, the notion of the public library began to become popular in the USA. These libraries were used by judges, attorneys, and members of the public who were not members of the bar associations, and were funded by the state. It was also around this time that the notion of librarianship as a profession began to gain ground, and these publicly funded libraries differed from the bar libraries in their organization of collected materials. Bar libraries had previously been arranged as one would arrange a private collection, either alphabetically, by loose subject matter, or some other seemingly random combination of techniques.






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Research notes:

I was getting ridiculously stuck with the early history of law libraries, so really thought I had to start somewhere in the middle. I had this journal article "up my sleeve" for quite some time, it is really quite long and a great history that goes much further...

I think I have to stop here for the moment though, at roughly 350 words it is getting too long to fit already and I think I can finish it off within other planned sections ..

One of the points I need to make is the difference between the profession in america compared to australia. In the USA "law librarians" are actually qualified solicitors who then choose to do a masters in library science, quite different from here. I think I will somehow work that into either the introduction or conclusion of the whole.




Law libraries in the USA were historically staffed not by librarians, but by legal professionals entrusted with a practical collection of legal texts needed to carry out their profession.

[1][2] ... etc etc..

Law Libraries and Librarians: A Revisionist History; or More Than You Ever Wanted to Know; Brock, Christine A.

67 Law Libr. J. 325 (1974)

Law Library Journal

Vols. 1-101#3 (1908-2009) Title Varies: Vol. 1-2#1 (1908-1909) as Index to Legal Periodicals and Law Journal

Law Library Lights

Vols. 1-52 (1957-2009)

Canadian Library Review

Vols. 1970-33 (1970-2008) Title Varies: Vols. 1970-14 (1970-1989) as Canadian Association of Law Libraries Newsletter-Bulletin; 15-28 (1990-2003) as Canadian Law Libraries

(I have removed some of the "copy and paste" highlighting from these URL's, and left some. I needed to show that I could create active links with the text as the link.. Will do more, but unfortunately Heinonline is a subscription service.. I will provide copies of articles from these journals if required)