Judith Meadows
Director
State Law Library of Montana - Helena, MT
Believe in What You Do
Law Library Journal Fall, 2001
Like many others sharing their thoughts in this collection of essays, I have been a practicing law librarian for well over twenty years. What may be unusual about me is that I have had the same position in the same law library for nearly seventeen years. Early in my career I could not imagine staying in the same place for even a third of that time! What has given me the enthusiasm to stay and still be excited in my work? Changing environment, excellent staff, a supportive board, active involvement in professional associations—these are all important. But I think the biggest reasons for my continuing passion are the ability to invent the library as I go along, and the very nature of a public law library.
I work in an environment that is always changing. Public law librarians literally never know what is awaiting them when they arrive at work each day. Our clients are varied and can easily include appellate judges, practicing attorneys, college and high school students, and pro se litigants all within the same hour. Their problems and concerns are my guiding light, and they help determine the library's priorities. My staff members all take the clients' needs seriously. We are small enough in number that we all are able to meet in my office, where we discuss and sometimes debate an appropriate direction. I always have believed in collaboration as the best way of decision making for most scenarios. A staff that has a thirty-seven-year age difference, not to mention political and social diversity, also helps keep me on my toes.
This has been the best of times to be a librarian. To actually have been "there" as we moved into the electronic world has been a real pleasure for me. I've seen the rollout of LEXIS and Westlaw in the 1970s; the experimentation of the 1980s that brought us fax technology, CD-ROMs, and simultaneous remote database searching; and the arrival of the Internet and the online catalog in the 1990s. I have had the pleasure of taking a library that had a single OCLC terminal with a direct dial line to Dublin, Ohio, and helping it become one with an innovative program of digitizing legal briefs and other documents in order to provide users with remote access. The challenges, of course, have raised complex issues such as filtering and viruses that I never studied in library school twenty-five years ago. But they are also part of what makes the job so interesting. And who can imagine what lies ahead in the years I have before retirement?
I believe in the value of the law library—we are the ones who provide equal access to the law. In order to do that effectively, efficiently, and fairly, we must continually reconsider what we do and how we do it. Working at the reference desk each day reminds me of exactly how the library's services are used and how our intervention and assistance can make a difference in someone's life. Seeing someone who walked into the library bewildered, or even belligerent, leave thirty minutes later with an appropriate answer or referral is the reason I joined this profession. In my position of state law librarian I get to see laws being considered and passed in the legislature, interpreted by the judicial system, and applied by the citizenry. So, even though the prestige of holding an elective office,1 the adventure afforded through travel, and the delight of sharing friendships across the United States have all helped make my career very special, I can honestly say that the best part of my professional life has been the actual library work. I have been blessed.
1. Editor's Note: Judith Meadows has served as both treasurer (1992–95) and president (1997–98) of the American Association of Law Libraries, as well as chair of the State, Court and County Law Libraries Special Interest Section (1991–92).
For More Information About Law Librarianship or the AALL Recruitment Committee, contact committee chair Sarah Mauldin.