Law Library Journal now follows Universal Citation Guide

For Immediate Release
March 21, 2000

Contact:
Peter Beck
AALL Director of Publications
(312) 939-4764 ext.19
pbeck@aall.org

Beginning with the new volume year (vol. 92), Law Library Journal is following the rules of the Universal Citation Guide and the recommendations of the AALL Committee on Citation Formats.

Law Library Journal, published quarterly, is the official journal of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL). It primarily contains scholarly articles on law, legal materials, and librarianship. Frank Houdek (Law Library Director and Professor of Law, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois) is the editor.

The Universal Citation Guide (UCG) was published in 1999 and results from the efforts of the AALL Committee on Citation Formats to provide a model for legal citation (for cases, statutes, constitutions, and administrative regulations) that is functional regardless of the format of the information. After the AALL Executive Board passed a resolution adopting the UCG and recommending its incorporation in the publication and citation of legal information, and in the further hope of having Law Library Journal serve as a model for other publications, the Law Library Journal and AALL Spectrum Editorial Board and Advisory Committee approved the use of the UCG in Law Library Journal, effective with the first number of volume 92 (Winter 2000). (For more information on the UCG, visit AALLNET at http://www.aallnet.org/products/pub_universal.asp)

Paul George, Co-Chair of the Citation Formats Committee, points out that "publishers of information -- whether primary materials or secondary resources -- need to insure that they provide citation elements that enable the user to cite those materials regardless of format. For secondary resources, this includes sequentially numbering the articles just as cases are numbered by the courts and also including paragraph numbers, which frees us from citations tied to page numbers. In implementing paragraph numbers in its print version, AALL continues its leadership role by enabling our professional journal to be cited with the same citation by both today's reader using the paper format and tomorrow's reader using a future electronic version."

In those instances where issuing bodies have provided the means to use the citation form called for by the UCG (e.g., states adding paragraph numbers to their cases), that form will be followed in citations to authority. Otherwise, the citation conventions of The Bluebook will continue to be used by Law Library Journal.

The American Association of Law Libraries exists to promote and enhance the value of law libraries to the public, the legal community, and the world; to foster the profession of law librarianship; and to provide leadership in the field of legal information. Founded in 1906 for both educational and scientific purposes, the Association represents 4,800 law librarians affiliated with law firms; law schools; corporate legal departments; courts; and local, state, and federal governments.