LEGALST R1B: Race and the Law

In addition to the UC Digital Collections and the large Doe Moffitt Library, there are several subject specific libraries on campus.  If your legal studies topic overlaps or intersects with another discipline, such as public health, business, social welfare, psychology, education, ethnic studies, governmental studies, you should consider a visit to the relevant specialty library.  Check the Libraries webpage for links to each specialty library's collections, hours and services.  You will also see links to some of the special collections at Doe Moffitt, and the rich archival and special collections at the Bancroft Library.

Digital collections span the globe.  Fortunately, the web makes it possible to search these collections, although full-text viewing is not always guaranteed (free or otherwise).  Although search engines such as Google may be useful as a start, the best way to search any digital collection is to use the search engine most closely affiliated with the content.  For example, to search the African American/American Memory online collection produced by the Library of Congress, use its native search engine.

"I'm writing a paper on World War II." 

Often students start their research with a very general topic, even though they may realize the topic is too large to deal with in a 10-15 page paper.  Faculty and librarians tell them, "You have to narrow this down."  But how do you narrow a topic?

Thought experiments to try:

• Think about your topic from the disciplinary perspective.  If you are in a sociology class, ask a sociological question about World War II, like "How did WWII affect women?"  If it's a political science class, your question might be something like "How did WWII affect presidential elections in the US?"

• Think about subsets or aspects of your topic.  Some good aspects are:
  • by place, such as a country or region
  • by time period, such as a century, decade or year 
  • by population, such as men, women, ethnic group, youth, children or elderly

You can combine these ideas, "What were the major impacts of WWII on women in France, in the decade after the war?"

Take a look at our brief tutorial on topic selection and narrowing. (Slides 5-9 of the tutorial deal with topic narrowing.)

Books. Search the UC Libraries' catalogs to find both e-books and books in print at UCB. The Oskicat catalog searches the UC Berkeley collection.  Melvyl searches the UC-wide collections.  UC has purchased several e-book collections that can be searched individually. See UCB's e-book collections for links to e-books by publisher/vendor. Each has its own search engine.  Most e-book collections are multi-disciplinary. Use UC's excellent Interlibrary Loan service for anything you can't find.

Find Dissertations by searching Dissertations and Theses (Dissertation Abstracts) Full Text, which indexes graduate dissertations from over 1,000 North American, and selected European, graduate schools and universities from 1861 to the present. Dissertations published since 1980 include brief abstracts written by the authors and some feature 24-page excerpts. The database offers full text for most of the dissertations added since 1997 and some full text coverage for older graduate works.Also see Find Dissertations and Theses for other specialized sources.

Dissertations completed at UC Berkeley can be found in OskiCat, using the feature allowing you to limit to dissertations/theses.Older dissertations not available full text may be obtained through Interlibrary Loan or using the "Request" option in Melvyl.

To search legal studies in relation to other subjects, such as psychology, social welfare and poverty, business, art history, music, healthcare, consult the subject –based resources on the Library’s Subjects A-Z webpage.    In addition to Doe Library, there are many subject-specific libraries at Berkeley.  You might want to visit one, such as the Education Psychology Library, Social Welfare Library, Public Health Library, Ethnic Studies Library, or Business Library to peruse their collections and/or to consult with a Librarian specialist.

• LexisNexis Academic
  Includes over 6,000 individual titles of international, national and local newspapers and wire services; radio and television transcripts; and business, medical, industry, and legislative magazines, journals, and newsletters. Wide geographic coverage and translations from foreign-language sources, as well as news services like the Associated Press, Agence France Press, El Pais and Xinhua (New China) News Agency.
  
• CQ Researcher Plus Archive
  A weekly publication covering the most current and controversial issue stopics. Includes complete summaries and bibliographies. Part of the CQ Electronic Library collection.
  
• Historical Abstracts
  Indexes over 2,000 journals, as well as historical book reviews and dissertations, published worldwide about all aspects of world history (excluding US and Canada) from 1450 to the present. Articles covered were written from 1954 to the present
  
• America: History and Life
  Indexes over 2,000 journals published worldwide on the history of the US and Canada from prehistory to the present. Includes all key English-language historical journals; selected historical journals from major countries, state, and local history journals; and a targeted selection of hundreds of journals in the social sciences and humanities.
  
• Worldwide Political Science Abstracts
  Indexes books, journals, and dissertations within the field of political science and related to international relations, law and politics, political economy, public administration, and public policy. Search can be combined with PAIS and International Bibliography of the Social Sciences.
  
• PAIS International
  Indexes books, journals, government documents, statistical directories, grey literature, research reports, conference reports, and web sources related to public policy, politics, economics, and social issues worldwide. Includes publications from over 120 countries. Some of the indexed materials are published in French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. The Archive covers English-language material only. Search can be combined with Worldwide Political Sciences Abstracts and International Bibliography of the Social Sciences.
  
• International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS)
  Indexes over 3000 journals, books, chapters, and book reviews in the fields of economics, political science, sociology, and anthropology from more than 100 countries. More than 70 languages are represented, with 30% percent of records published in languages other than English. Search can be combined with PAIS and Worldwide Political Science Abstracts.
  
• Project MUSE
  250 scholarly journals in the humanities and social sciences. Topics include literature and criticism, history, the visual and performing arts, cultural studies, education, political science, gender studies, economics and many others.
  
• Social Sciences Citation Index (Web of Knowledge)
  Indexes over 1,700 journals spanning 50 disciplines, as well as covering individually selected items from over 3,300 of the world's leading scientific and technical journals, and provides searching of footnoted citations. Use the link above, then under Current Limits, specify Social Sciences Citation Index. For more guidance on using this database see the following tutorials: Creating Alerts and Creating an RSS Feed.
  
• Criminology: A SAGE Full-Text Collection
  Includes the full-text of 23 journals published by SAGE and participating societies, some journals going back 23 years. Covers such subjects as Criminal Justice, Juvenile Delinquency, Corrections, Forensic Psychology, and Family and Domestic Violence.
  
• Sociological Abstracts
  Indexes over 1,900 journals, books, dissertations, and reviews in the social sciences on sociological topics as well as selected anthropology, criminology, demography, law, social psychology, and urban development.(Search all CSA/Illumina Social Sciences databases.)
  
• PsycINFO
  Indexes over 1300 journals, conference proceedings, books, reports, and dissertations in psychology and enriched with literature from psychiatry, education, business, medicine, nursing, pharmacology, law, linguistics, and social work.
  
• Social Work Abstracts
  Indexes more than 450 journals related to social work on topics such as homelessness, AIDS, child and family welfare, aging, substance abuse, legislation, and community organization. Platform change: this database is now available on the EBSCOhost platform.
  
• Academic Search Complete
  A multidisciplinary index to articles in more than 10,900 journals and other publications in English, Spanish, German, French, Italian and Portuguese; full-text is available for over 5300 journals.
  
• Social Services Abstracts
  Indexes scholarly and professional journals worldwide related to the fields of social work, social welfare, human services, community development, and social policy. (Search all CSA/Illumina Social Sciences databases.)
  
• Education Full Text (plus Education Index Retro)
  Indexes articles from English-language periodicals and yearbooks published in the United States and elsewhere on all topics related to education.
  
• ERIC
  Indexes books, journals, reports, proceedings, statistical data, tests, dissertations, audiovisual materials, and ERIC documents on education research and practice.
  

Although much government information can be found via open access government portals online (such as USA.gov), the UCB Library has purchased additonal resouces for more in-depth and historical reseasrch. In addition to the following resources, be sure to check the Library's Government Information webpages as well as the Government Studies Library website.

• CQ Researcher Plus Archive
  A weekly publication covering the most current and controversial issue stopics. Includes complete summaries and bibliographies. Part of the CQ Electronic Library collection.
  
• American Factfinder (U.S. Census Bureau)
  Interactive, searchable database used to find population, housing, industry and business statistics from the U.S. Census. Data collected in Census 2000, the 1990 Census of Population and Housing, the American Community Survey and the 1997 Economic Census. Allows uses to compile census data into tables, maps and downloadable files, which can be viewed or printed.
  
• CQ MoneyLine
  Provides tracking of the flow of money in politics at the federal level with some state information from 1980 to the present. Enables tracking of contributions from Political Action Committees (PACs), individual donors to politicians, elected officials, and party committees; follow soft money through 527 groups, and retrieve information on thousands of lobbyists, indexed by client and issue.
  
• American Presidency Project
  Contains all major publications of the U.S. Office of the President, including: Public Papers of the President, Inaugural Addresses, Executive Orders, Signing Statements, and other information such as radio addresses, party platforms, videos of debates, and popularity polling data. This project was developed by two political science professors at UCSB.
  
• Bureau of Economic Analysis
  Provides time series data for national and state income accounts and international trade and investment. Also includes U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) by industry and input-output tables for select years.
  
• Bureau of Labor Statistics
  Presents up-to-date U.S. economic statistical information in areas such as 'Inflation and Spending' and 'International Statistics.' Also available are the latest numbers for the Consumer Price Index, unemployment rate, and the Producer Price. Provides past and current statistics for the U.S. economy as a whole; regional economic data can be obtained by clicking the state on a color-coded map.
  
• Living Room Candidate: Historical Presidential Campaign Commercials
  An archive of historic and current political advertisements from television and the internet. Most clips include transcripts.
  

These links will guide you to various sources for statistics and data.  If you are interested in manipulating a dataset on your own, please visit the Doe Library's Data Lab in 189 Doe.

• Proquest Statistical Datasets
  Provides fast and easy one-stop shopping to more than 5.3 billion (and growing) data points from licensed and public domain datasets. Sources of data include local, state and international governments and organizations. Allows for customization of the data by selecting subjects, variable of interest, and the ability to view your data in side-by-side tables, charts and even maps. Also provides quick graphs and chats for statistics in the news.
  
• ProQuest Statistical Insight
  Provides access to indexing and statistical tables from three key sources: American Statistics Index (ASI; 1973-present), Statistics Reference Index (SRI; 1980-present), and Index to International Statistics (IIS; 1983-present). The American Statistics Index links to many full text documents published 1994-present.
  
• Roper Center for Public Opinion Research
  Contains domestic and international survey data. The Center's Public Opinion Location Library (iPOLL) gives online access to a database including poll questions asked in US from 1936 to present.
  
• Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)
  Consortium of 325 institutions working together to acquire and preserve social science data. Maintained at University of Michigan, ICPSR receives, processes, and distributes data on social phenomena in 130 countries. Includes survey data, census records, election returns, economic data, and legislative records.
  

Researching the law involves discovering judicial cases, statutes and codes, executive orders, congressional hearings, legislative history, administrative regulations and much more.  Although many resources are available via open access online through government and other portals, the UCB Library has purchased several resources that permit more in-depth and historical research.

• Hein Online
  Provides full text to the early issues of many legal journals and law reviews, the Federal Register (1936-six months ago), US Supreme Court Library (1754-present) and treaties and agreements.
  
• LexisNexis Academic
  Includes over 6,000 individual titles of international, national and local newspapers and wire services; radio and television transcripts; and business, medical, industry, and legislative magazines, journals, and newsletters. Wide geographic coverage and translations from foreign-language sources, as well as news services like the Associated Press, Agence France Press, El Pais and Xinhua (New China) News Agency.
  
• LegalTrac
  Indexes journals, law reviews, and magazines related to legal research and commentary on case studies, government regulations, the practice of law, statutes, taxation, and international law.
  
• ProQuest Congressional
  One stop shopping for U.S. congressional publications. Provides index and abstracts of congressional publications back to 1789, including full text of published Congressional Hearings from 1824-present (unpublished until 1979), full text Committee Prints from 1830-present, full text Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports from 1916-present, full text United States Congressional Serial Set (and its various former titles) from 1789-present, and legislative histories from 1970-present. For more information on how to find hearings, consult the Congressional Tutorials homepage
  
• ProQuest Legislative Insight
  Provides access to more than 18,000 professionally researched legislative histories of US Law. Histories include the Public Law itself, all versions of related bills, law-specific Congressional Record excerpts, committee hearings, reports and prints, Presidential signing statements, and CRS reports. 1929-present
  
• Legal Information Institute (LII)
  Indexes Supreme Court decisions and opinions under the auspices of Project Hermes, as well as over 500 of the Court's most important historic decisions.
  
• Thomas: Legislative Information on the Internet
  Provides access to a wide range of legislative information on the Congress, including the full text of the Congressional Record and bills from the 103rd to the present, as well as a directory of congressional committees and members of Congress. Excellent resource for finding quick, online legislative histories and the full-text of Congressional Committee reports.
  
• NCJRS (National Criminal Justice Reference Service) Abstracts Database
  Indexes over 170,000 criminal justice books, journal articles, and reports published by the US Department of Justice, other local, state, and Federal government agencies, international organizations, and the private sector are indexed. Access is also provided to more than 7,000 full text documents through the NCJRS Virtual Library linked to the database.
  
• Index to Legal Periodicals and Books/Index to Legal Periodicals Retrospective
  Index to Legal Periodicals and Books (1981 - present) indexes approximately 1000 legal journals, yearbooks, institutes, bar association journals, university publications and law reviews, and government publications from the United States, Puerto Rico, Great Britain, Ireland, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Also indexes some 1,400 monographs per year. Index to Legal Periodicals Retrospective (1918-1981) indexes over 500 legal periodicals back to 1918.
  
• LLMC - Digital
  Provides access to legal history from the 13th century to the present in jurisdictions all around the world, particularly the legal history of the United States, Haiti, Britain, and the British empire from the 18th century to the late 1900s. This includes runs of law reports from the Indian subcontinent; and reports from Australia, Ireland, and South Africa. In all of these cases, LLMC-Digital’s strength is in historical case reporters; the closer to the present one gets, the weaker the coverage becomes.
  

Here are some general news and newsmedia databases.  For a full listing of the Library's news resources, check this list.

• Access World News
  Provides full-text information and perspectives from over 600 U.S. and over 700 international sources. Offers strong regional coverage, indexing more than California newspapers such as Contra Costa Times (1995-current), Sacramento Bee (1984-current), San Francisco Chronicle (1985-current), and San Jose Mercury News (1985-current). Search categories include: California newspapers (121 titles), Greater Los Angeles (54 titles), major metropolitan titles (13 titles), Spanish-language news sources (48 titles), the World (almost 2000 titles), US (855 titles).
  
• Factiva
  Provides general and business news and information from more than 9,000 sources in 22 languages, including influential local, national and international newspapers, leading business magazines, trade publications, and news wires. Includes the exclusive combination of The Wall Street Journal (1979-present), the Financial Times, Dow Jones and Reuters newswires and the Associated Press, as well as Reuters Fundamentals, and Bureau van Dijk company profiles.
  
• LexisNexis Academic
  Includes over 6,000 individual titles of international, national and local newspapers and wire services; radio and television transcripts; and business, medical, industry, and legislative magazines, journals, and newsletters. Wide geographic coverage and translations from foreign-language sources, as well as news services like the Associated Press, Agence France Press, El Pais and Xinhua (New China) News Agency.
  
• ProQuest Newspapers
  Indexes the New York Times (1999-present), Los Angeles Times (1985-present), Wall Street Journal (1982-present).
  
• Historical Newspapers (ProQuest)
  Indexes articles from Chicago Defender (1905-1975), Chicago Tribune (1849-1986), Los Angeles Times (1881-1986), New York Times (1851-2004), San Francisco Chronicle (1865-1922), Wall Street Journal (1889-1990), and Washington Post (1877-1991).
  

What is plagiarism?

Plagiarism is a form of academic dishonesty, violating the Berkeley Campus Code of Student Conduct. The campus issues a guide to understanding plagiarism, which states:

Plagiarism is a serious violation of academic and student conduct rules and is punishable with a failing grade and possibly more severe action. For more information, consult the following UC Berkeley websites:

• Berkeley Campus Code of Student Conduct: http://students.berkeley.edu/uga/conduct.pdf
• Faculty Help Desk - Student Conduct (see section on plagiarism). University of California Berkeley: College of Letters & Sciences.

Citation Management.
Three citation management tools widely used at UC Berkeley are RefWorks, Endnote, and Zotero.  Each organizes citations and produces quick and easy bibliographies in many citation styles, including Chicago Manual of Style.  These tools provide for other common styles also, such as APA 6th, MLA or Turabian.  Learn more about citation and writing tools on the Doe Moffitt Guides webpage or the EDP Library's Citation Management webpage.

RefWorks is free for UC Berkeley students, faculty and staff. From many of UC’s databases, importing citations is seamless and easy.  Create correctly cited bibliographies, footnotes, and in-text citations.  New users can sign up at RefWorks.  Find tutorials and tips for using RefWorks on the EDP Library webpage.

Zotero is a free plug-in that works exclusively with the Firefox browser.  Sign up and view this tool at zotero.org.

EndNote is software that must be purchased.  It’s available from UC Berkeley’s Software Central.  Find tutorals and tips for using EndNote via the Library webpage.

More Information.
Consult the Doe/Moffitt Guides webpage for more help on citation styles and tools.

Why cite sources?
Whenever you quote or base your ideas on another person's work, you must document the source you used. Even when you do not quote directly from another work, if reading that source contributed to the ideas presented in your paper, you must give the authors proper credit.

Citations allow readers to locate and further explore the sources you consulted, show the depth and scope of your research, and give credit to authors for their ideas. Citations provide evidence for your arguments and add credibility to your work by demonstrating that you have sought out and considered a variety of resources. In written academic work, citing sources is standard practice and shows that you are responding to this person, agreeing with that person, and adding something of your own. Think of documenting your sources as providing a trail for your reader to follow to see the research you performed and discover what led you to your original contribution.

Research Advisory Service for Cal Undergraduates

Book a 30-minute appointment with a librarian who will help refine and focus research inquiries, identify useful online and print sources, and develop search strategies for humanities and social sciences topics.

Schedule, view, edit or cancel your appointment online (CalNetID required)

This service is for Cal undergraduates only. Graduate students and faculty should contact the library liaison to their department or program for specialized reference consultations.

Thesis research and writing can very specific and a single library session may not provide you with all the information you need.  You are more than welcome to contact a Librarian to ask a question, set up an appointment, or get more help with anything related to the Library and research. 

To schedule a Research Advisory appointment with one of the Librarians specializing in legal studies, political science, education, psychology or social welfare, click HERE or email Jill Woolums directly.

You can access UCB Library resources from off campus or via your computer or mobile device using one of two simple methods.

(NOTE: Using EndNote? Use VPN, not the Proxy Server)

Proxy Server
After you make a one-time change in your web browser settings, the proxy server will ask you to log in with a CalNet ID or Library PIN when you click on the link to a licensed resource. See the setup instructions, FAQ, and Troubleshooting pages to configure your browser.

VPN (Virtual Private Network)
After you install and run the VPN "client" software on your computer, you can log in with a CalNet ID to establish a secure connection with the campus network

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