Research Guide for Foreign LL.M. Students and Visiting Scholars: Books

There are four LUC libraries in Chicago from which LUC students and faculty may borrow books:  the Law Library, Lewis Library (6th floor of the Corboy Law Center), the Cudahy Library (located on LUC's Rogers Park campus). and the Health Sciences Library (located in Maywood).  The Lewis Library focuses its collection on business, education, social work, and communications, and the Cudahy Library primarily serves LUC undergraduates and undergraduate faculty. 

LUC's online catalog contains bibliographic records for all of the LUC Libraries' materials.  The catalog may be searched by title, author, keyword, and subject, and searches may be limited by location (e.g., Law Library).  The LUC Libraries utilize the Library of Congress Classification System to shelve its books, and Library of Congress Subject Headings to classify its materials.  Both of these systems are used heavily in academic libraries in the U.S. Examples of Library of Congress Subject Headings pertaining to U.S. law are:

Law--United States

Lawyers--United States

Legal Composition

Legal Research--United States

Enrolled LUC students and faculty may request books through intercampus loan via the online catalog with their LUC barcode numbers.  A van travels between LUC's three campuses in Chicago delivering books.  Enrolled LUC students and faculty may also access LUC electronic books listed in the online catalog with their LUC logins and passwords. 

WorldCat is a database that contains the records of holdings of libraries throughout the world.  Members of the LUC law community have access to the subscription version of WorldCat through the Law Library's web page.

Enrolled LUC Law students and faculty may borrow materials from other libraries using ILLiad.  Please see a reference librarian for help setting up an ILLiad account.

There are a number of series of study aids that are extremely popular with U.S. law students that foreign LL.M. students may also find helpful.

West publishes a series of books called "Nutshells." Each book in the series summarizes a specific area of law. The Law Library owns all of the books in the series,although not necessarily the most current versions, and they are shelved on the third floor. The complete series is also available to LUC Law students via the "West Academic Study Aids" subscription.  Below is a complete list of all of the books contained in the "Nutshell" series.

West's Nutshell Series

Another series popular with U.S. law students is Wolters Kluwer's "Examples & Explanations." Each book summarizes a specific area of law and provides useful hypos. The Law Library owns all of the books in the series, and the most recent editions are on reserve behind the circulation desk. Below is a complete list of all of the books contained in the "Examples & Explanations" series. The Law Library also has an electronic subscription to the ""E & E" series via the "Wolters Kluwer Online Study Aid Library."

There are several Web-based initiatives that serve as online repositories for books:

HathiTrust:  HathiTrust is a partnership of over 50 major research institutions and libraries. Works that are in the public domain contained in the HathiTrust database are available to all researchers. Many search options are offered, including full-text.

Google Books:  Books contained in Google Books come from two sources:  1)  The Library Project and 2)  The Partner Program.  Books included from the partnered Library Project that are no longer in copyright may be viewed in full text, while only snippets of books still in copyright are available.  Only previews of books are available through the Partner Program.

The following books serve as introductions to various aspects of U.S. law, legal research, and legal writing. Please see a reference librarian if you need additional help finding books.

Copies of Black's Law Dictionary (11th edition) are located in the 3rd Floor reference section. Bilingual legal dictionaries are located in the 3rd Floor reference section in the K52 range.  Bilingual legal dictionaries are available in English/Spanish, English/French, English/German, and English/Italian.

The Law Library's "Law & Popular Culture" collection is located on the 3rd floor in the Law Library's "Living Room."   The collection focuses on books that portray the attorney in a variety of contexts.  U.S. and foreign authors are included, although all of the books are in English.  Local authors that may be of interest are Laura Caldwell, Lowell Komie, and Scott Turow.