By the time you read this, the old news will be that Classification Plus, 1999, issue 3 includes KF.

Library of Congress issued K Tables: Form Division Tables for Law in spring 1999. It includes 24 form tables to be used in the K schedules except KD, KE, KF. The biggest impact of the new form tables are upon the K (Law in General ...), KDZ, KG-KH (Latin America), the K schedules for Europe , and any other K schedule into which you have reclassed a large collection. Many of us have begun to use the new form tables but I doubt if we will reclass to bring the older collections in conformity with the new form tables.

So that you can better understand where the changes occur between the old and new form tables, we will indicate the differences between the old and new form tables used in the subclass K (Law in General). K General contained four form tables: I, II, III, IV and “Under each” arrangements in the schedule itself. Subclass K now uses three form tables and within the forms and schedule itself, it uses at least three other form tables.

Old table number I II III IV

New table number K7 K8 K12 No replacement

Within the subclass, K230 and other such numbers for individual jurists use form table K4. Within form tables K7 and K8, there are referrals to form tables K5 and K6.

Rather than go through each of the form tables used in subclass K, we will just show you the differences in a couple of the form tables. It will be easier to understand if you consult the form tables as you read.

“K230 Jurisprudence ...Treaties, By author, A-Z” used to be arranged by an “Under each”:
.xA2	Collected ...By date
.xA3-Z	Separate works. By title
.x2A-Z	Criticism and interpretation

Now the arrangement is

.xA2	Collected works (Opera omnia). Selections. By date Including special categories of writing, e.g., responsa, etc.
.xA3-.xA39	Individual works. By title Including unannotated and annotated editions, translations, particular manuscript editions, and including textual criticism
.xA6-.xZ	Biography. Criticism

Under the old arrangement, Tesar’s Theory of Law would be K230.T46T44 , and under the new, K230.T46A38. If Wallen wrote an interpretation of Tesar’s works , it would be K230.T462W35 (old) and K230.T46W35 (new). Old separate works and new biography and criticism will be mixed together. Please note the addition of biography.

In the following section, old refers to subclass K form division table I and new refers to form table K7. When you compare these form tables, you will find the following changes:

Periodicals change from 1.2 to 1.3 while monographic series change from 1.4 to 1.5. These changes will only separate older and newer materials in the same categories. Old intergovernmental congresses and conferences had both general (1.6 and 1.7) and individual (2) numbers. The individual had “under each” numbers for general and for individual sessions. The new form tables use 2 .A-Z for intergovernmental congresses and conferences and 2.5 for ad hoc congresses of heads of states. Both of these numbers have “under each” arrangements. Probably the old 1.6 and 1.7 were never used much. However the old 2 had an elaborate “under each” which separated works in general from several meetings or sessions from the works resulting from individual sessions of a group like the Administrative Radio Conference. The new is easier but there will be interfiling of old and new form numbers. Actually the old form had already been changed from the original subclass K form table.

Treaties are the same in both form tables except the “under each” arrangement for individual treaties has been expanded in the new form table K5. Related agreements (old form .A4A-Z) has been moved after “works about the treaty” in the new form table (new .Z4-Z5). Old commentaries were .A3A-Z while new commentaries are in .A3-Z39. The old form would have a commentary by Smith under ....A3S65 and the new would have .S65. The new forms are better but again you will have a mixed arrangement of forms on the shelf and in your call number index. What will you do with editions that were once in .A3A-Z and now go in .A3-.Z39 ?

The section from statutes to general works has changed the most. Yes, it is for the better, but your collection will have some mixed forms. To illustrate, we will merge the old and new forms so that you can see the call number index and shelf arrangement. We will not bother repeating the whole form caption.

4-4.15 old statutes, regulations ...
4.2 new and old statutory digests, indexes ...
4.23 old court and administrative decisions
4.3 old dictionaries ... and new serial statutes (note expanded statute caption)
4.35 old form books
4.4 old yearbooks and new statutes
4.45 new opinions and recommendations
4.5 old societies and new indexes, digests ... of decisions ...reports
4.52-.53 new decisions and administrative rulings
4.6 old congress and new dictionaries...
4.8 new congresses
4.9 new surveys (would love to see scope note explaining this),
5 old collected works and new general works
5.2-.6 old forms, i.e. casebooks, addresses, general works, etc.

The new form for opinions and recommendations probably comes from the European communities use of these forms for parliamentary matters. The surveys form also comes from the European communities but really should be better defined. Is it like the old official reports captions we closed in KF? Congresses is now alphabetical by main entry. The congresses by date has been removed and I miss it dreadfully.

I invite you to compare old II and new K8. The pattern set by K7 continues in K8. K12 and old III are for topics covered by cutter numbers. K12 is about half the size of III. Topics covered by cutter numbers are fairly unimportant for the most part and probably do not even need a form table. However, time does improve the importance of some and the small table does allow for some subarrangement.

If you are reclassing and assigning call numbers from scratch, you should use the new form tables. If you are reclassing using others’ call numbers, you will have to decide whether to leave the forms as is or change. One choice will create more work and one will create a little mess.

Good luck in using the new forms and don’t you wish they could have been reduced even more?