The Law Librarian’s Role in the Scholarly Enterprise: Historical Development of the Librarian/Research Partnership in American Law Schools

Abstract

Professor Slinger's article describes the growth of law librarianship from its origins as a part-time job for law students and others into a vital component of legal education and scholarship. Allying itself with Harvard Law School Dean Christopher Columbus Langdell movement to make legal education part of the University Model, a generation of scholarly lawyer/librarians transformed law librarianship into a profession. As law librarianship grew in importance a further shift in emphasis from making the building of the collection paramount into one where a strong service component held equal rank; permitted law school librarians to support the scholarly efforts of law professors in ways that had never been done before and which are continuing to gain momentum today. The benefits of a law librarian/professor research partnership are enumerated in this article and faculty and law librarians are urged to work closely and proactively together to produce highly effective research.

Keywords: Law Librarians, Legal Research, Law Libraries, Scholarship, Research Partnership

JEL Classification: K00