Our collection of United States legal materials benefits from the fact that we have been around for so long. We have an extraordinarily deep collection of federal, California and other state’s materials. Unlike many law libraries, we have continued to collect widely for all 50 states.
We are a selective depository for U.S. government documents, so we collect congressional material and administrative decisions, as well as law related federal documents that are of interest to students, faculty, lawyers and the general public.
As one of the major, public legal research facilities in the western United States the Law Library also supports the practicing bar and the needs of the general public, to the extent that their needs overlap with the educational mission of the Law School. To that end we purchased a wide range of practice materials, such as treatises, form books, explanatory texts and legal research guides.
To supplement the print collection, the Law Library subscribes to a variety of web databases for accessing primary law as well as secondary sources. Access to these electronic sources supplements our print resources, but these databases do not replace them. With the acceptance of the web as a research tool, our faculty and students are requesting access to electronic sources more than ever. When possible, we add electronic access as well as subscribe to electronic only publications.