UHLC Nota Bene

A few weeks ago, the U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) and the Library of Congress released for the first time public access to electronic versions of digitized historical content. The GPO has partnered with the Library of Congress to release the digital version of the  bound Congressional Record from 1981-1990  on GPO's   GovInfo website ( https://www.govinfo.gov/ ). This release covers debates and proceedings of the 98th thru the 101st Congresses, exactly as it appears in the permanent bound editions. Prior to this release, there were no official digital releases of the Congressional Record during the 1980s that the public could access freely online. The GPO and the Library of Congress  released the digital version of the historical Congressional Record for the 1990s in September and will continue to collaborate on this important project and release digital versions of the bound Congressional Record back to the first one published by GPO on March 5, 1873. ...

Every four years after the presidential election, the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs or the House Committee on Government Reform releases the new edition of The Plum Book.   According to the govinfo website, this publication includes information regarding “over 7,000 Federal civil service leadership and support positions in the legislative and executive branches of the Federal Government that may be subject to noncompetitive appointment, nationwide.”   The Plum Book was first published in 1952 as a way to identify presidentially appointed positions. The 2016 Plum Book is now available on the govinfo website as a PDF file , but it is also available as a mobile website , which will allow users to filter the positions in a number of ways such as by agency, location, and appointment type.  

Wolters Kluwer has just published the 7th edition of Federal Jurisdiction by Erwin Chemerinsky , which is now available on the law library's new titles shelf (located next to the public computer terminals across from the reference desk, under the call number KF8858.C48 ). This source, a part of the Aspen Student Treatise Series , covers topics related to constitutional and statutory limits on federal court jurisdiction, federal court relief against governments and government officers, and federal court review of state judgments and proceedings. There is a table of cases, subject index, and the appendices contain the full text of the U.S. Constitution along with relevant statutes. This treatise is is an excellent source to supplement exam preparation.

Bloomberg BNA has just published the 2016 edition of the U.S. International Tax Guide ( KF1276.A2H47 ), which is now available in the law library . This handbook is an excellent source for U.S. tax attorneys involved in international tax. It provides an overview of topics related to general principles of international taxation, taxation of foreign persons' U.S. activities and U.S. persons' foreign activities. Matters pertaining to U.S. income tax treaties, and withholding and compliance are also discussed. There are numerous examples available throughout this book that will illustrate international tax concepts. There are also annotations to relevant primary sources of tax law including the Internal Revenue Code, Treasury Regulations, tax cases, administrative pronouncements, and the Internal Revenue Manual. This source is also available electronically on BloombergLaw.com .

Want to learn more about the upcoming presidential and congressional transitions? There’s an app for that.  The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently launched its Priorities for Policy Makers app (available free of charge for iPhone or Android), which is intended to “help President-elect Donald Trump and the next Congress tackle critical challenges facing the nation, fix agency-specific problems, and scrutinize government areas with the potential for large savings,” according to Gene Dodaro, Comptroller General of the United States and head of the GAO. The app allows users to search by agency or topic, and provides brief summaries of relevant issues as well as links to more detailed GAO reports.  You can also find GAO priority recommendations on the agency’s Presidential and Congressional Transition web pages.

Back in February, President Obama issued an executive order establishing the Federal Privacy Council (FPC), defined as “the principal interagency forum to improve the Government privacy practices of agencies and entities acting on their behalf.” Given the amount of private information handled by the federal government—everything from medical records to income tax returns—it makes sense for agencies to coordinate their efforts to keep that information secure.  From a legal researcher's perspective, one of the more interesting developments to come out of the FPC is the creation of its Law Library , a compilation of laws, regulations, and supplemental materials pertaining to “the creation, collection, use, processing, storage, maintenance, dissemination, disclosure, and disposal of personally identifiable information (PII) by departments and agencies within the Federal Government.” The Law Library's resources are not new—the site consists mostly of links to other government w...

The Law Library’s subscription to HeinOnline now includes a new resource in its collection of over fifty resource groups for primary and secondary legal sources: Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture, & Law . This collection brings together a vast array of legal content and materials related to slavery in the United States and the English-speaking world. This includes every statute passed by every colony and state on slavery, every federal statute dealing with slavery, and all reported state and federal cases on slavery.  Beyond these primary legal materials the collection every English-language legal commentary on slavery published before 1920 and more than a thousand pamphlets and books on slavery from the 19th century. The collection also word searchable access to all Congressional debates from the Continental Congress to 1880 along with many modern histories of slavery.  Edited by Paul Finkelman, an expert on slavery and American legal history, the colle...