Sources of Law
Legal research is the systematic process of conducting enquiry by identifying and retrieving information to support or make rational legal decision. In its broadest sense, legal research includes step by step approach of discovering the fact, evaluating of the facts and application of the fact in solving legal issues. Legal research is holistically, the process of finding an answer to a legal question or checking for legal precedent that can be cited in a brief or at trial.
Law Library as a Centre for Legal Research and Depository of Legal Resources
Law library belongs to the special library category of library as it serves special research needs of lawyers in their day-to-day business of providing legal advice, assistance, representation and other services to the clients. Law library is the library that is found within the law firms, court, faculties of law in universities, Law Schools, and other legal institutions to serve as a research unit that supplies research resources, legal information services and research-support assistance to the lawyers for the day-to-day legal operations.
A law library is the library set up to provide legal materials to assist judicial officers, other members of the court and their clients in case of the court, law scholars and students in academic institutions and other law officers in ministries, police stations and other law related bodies.
The law library is as important as the law profession itself because “Legal profession needs information on how to determine the case, argue or represent a client before the law court, and how to pass the law examination”. The law library is very crucial in all aspect of legal profession, as it encourages scholarly research by maintaining an environment conducive to study.
The heartbeat of every law library is the holdings of legal information resources containing primary and secondary sources of law in its disposal
Information Resources in Law Libraries
Law libraries are rich with numerous materials that contain sources of law. Both the primary and secondary sources of law are predominant in the law library for research purposes. The law library serves as a law laboratory where legal professionals resort to in search of laws or authorities without which, it is impossible to dispense right legal advice, agreement, justice, opinion and other legal transactions. Information resources in law library are in both print and electronic format which contain laws and other legal related matters. With respect to the sources of law, information resources in law library are divided into the following categories:
- Primary information sources
- Secondary information sources
Primary Information Resources in Nigerian Law Libraries
Primary resources are legal information resources that constitute laws or ground norms, precedents and binding authorities that determine the decision or judgment of the court. They are regarded as primary resources because they contain primary sources of law. The materials contain first-hand legal information that has not been diluted. Example of primary information resources include:
Constitution (1999 Nigerian Constitution), Statutes, Acts, Decrees, Rules, Codes, Ordinances (Federal and State Government bodies), Parliament Debates, bills, Law Reports or Court Judgments (Supreme Court, State High Courts, Tribunals, Special Courts).
Secondary Information Resources in Nigerian Law Libraries
Secondary information sources are the materials that contain information derived or extracted from the primary sources of law and have undergone diluted processes or certain alterations. They include text books of different practice areas and others, Journals /Law reviews, Law digests, inter alia.
Research Support-Services of the Law Libraries
Law library provides myriads of services to the patrons. Based on the purpose of this study, attention should be given to research services provided by the law libraries other than the general services of the law library. The law library will help you find the information you need by helping you select and use the proper sources depending on your needs, resources, and location. However, as the general rule implies, research librarians do not perform research for the users or give legal advice but only support researchers through provision of their needed information resources that facilitate their research activities. The research services of the law library include the following:
1. Research and Reference
This is the kind of services provided by the library through the law librarian. The librarian handles a wide variety of research requests, ranging from those requiring a quick or ready answer to an extensive or critical analysis or examination of issues and resources. No request is too small or too large, they all required expertise and in-depth knowledge of the sources of law and in some cases, laws itself.
2. Research Guidance / Training
Law library provides research guidance and training to the legal researchers on relevant material, help develop research strategies for different kinds of research and develop research guides. The law librarians ensure that researchers are properly guided on how to navigate various legal databases, legal e-portals and offline legal tools.
3. E-Resources Access Support
Another research service of a law library is assisting researchers in both accessing and using the many electronic resources. Most law libraries in Nigeria subscribed to varieties of legal databases of both local and foreign jurisdiction including Lawpavilion, Legalpedia, Heinonline, Bloomberg, Westlaw, and LexisNexis, Practical law and so on.
4. Current Awareness
The law librarian gathers the research interest or areas of the researchers and notify them of new resources and services that may be of interest to you. Services offered may include notification of the changes in law or new publications notifications through emails, text messages, news feed, phone call, fax or by words of mouth, new acquisitions notices, routing of journals issues and so on.
5. Document Delivery
The librarian will conduct a literature search, obtain the books, articles and other materials that the researcher needs for his or her research. If such materials are not available in the Library, alternative measure might be taken to obtain the resources from another library through inter-library loan, purchase a copy or another avenue. Once the concerned material or information is retrieved, it will be delivered to the requester either in print or electronically, according to the researchers’ preference (Some libraries charge a fee for this service).