Cataloging of law materials

Most libraries use LC (Library of Congress) or DDC ( Dewey Decimal Classification ). Some law libraries use other classifications in conjunction with these. Like a library serving a medical school may not use LCC’s R (Medicine) but rather NLM’s (National Library of Medicine) W and late Qs, legal Canadian libraries may use Canadian KF ( Common law ). Law libraries in Commonwealth countries (specially Australia and the UK) may use Moys K rather than LCC’s K (Law) or DDC’s 340, which like Canadian KF arranges Common law jurisdictions together by topic rather than first by jurisdiction.

“For the most part, the basic materials in a Law library may be found by means of publishers’ indexes and digests, Separate access to them through a catalog, therefore, is unnecessary. Many libraries find that statutes, administrative regulations and decisions, Court Reports with their auxiliary citators, digests, indexes, encyclopedias, and some periodicals can be ade- quately covered by short form cards. Topical loose-leaf services which integrate all types of basic materials fall in this group, also. However, treatises, casebooks, government documents, essays and similar col- lections, bar association reports and other miscellaneous items are not indexed, and must be controlled through cataloging with special emphasis upon subject headings.”

Assignment of subject headings in Law Libraries

The Library of Congress Tentative Headings and Cross References for a Subject Catalogue of American and English Law (1911) was the first generally used subject heading list.(1)

Because this list became out-of-date and was not revised, Columbia University published Subjed Headings in Anglo-American and International Law Used in the Dictionary Catalog of the Columbia University Law library .(2) Another list was brought out in 1956 by McLaury as List of Subject Headings for Small to Medium-Sized Law Libraries (Mainly Anglo-American).(3)

The Library of Congress Subject Headings list is the one most frequently used today because of its scope and currency.(4) Few law libraries follow it entirely, however. Modifications are made to fit the type of library and clientele. Omission of such superfluous subjects as law, legal, and law and legislation, use of direct terms, and deletion of geographical subdivisions, or their use in reversed order as main headings, are common instances of adaptation.

Main source: “Law Cataloguing”, Carleton W. Kenyon

Moys Classification and Thesaurus

Elizabeth M. Moys (Betty) started work on her “Moys Classification for Legal Materials”as a project leading to her becoming a Fellow of the Library Association (Great Britain). After university graduation, library training, and experience as a law cataloguer in a leading London law library, Ms Moys worked in two African countries. The second of these was as Librarian of the then new University of Lagos in Nigeria, where she had the opportunity of classifying the law collection, while simultaneously building up the schedules of her scheme. She returned to England and, after many years in academic libraries, retired and become a well established legal indexer. She published a journal for legal indexers under the title: Brief Entry.

At the time of her creation of the classification, there were no LCC schedules for law. Her scheme arranges common law jurisdictions by topic (as does the Canadian adaptation of LCC’s KF), and non common law jurisdictions by jurisdiction (as does LCC). It has dual notation: Class K, as in Library of Congress and 340 as in DDC, so may be substituted for either K or 34X, as some libraries substitute NLM’s W for LCC’s R.

The demand for a legal classification in Commonwealth countries lead to its being published by Butterworths. The 4th edition, published by Bowker-Saur, is in print.

Moys differs from Canadian KF in that it uses all of K (or 34X), and so numbers are shorter, two letters and three numbers plus decimals at most.

K Journals and reference books
KA Jurisprudence
KB General and comparative law
KC International law
KD Religious legal systems
KE Ancient and medieval law
KF-KN Common law
KM Public law
KN Private law
KR Africa
KS Latin America
KT Asia and Pacific
KV Europe
KW EC

When building a number using a table, be careful to add one less than the number in the table, if the table is showing the breakdown of a series of number.

It was used in the University of British Columbia Law Library, is used at the British Columbia Court House Library, and some other libraries in western Canada. (Eastern Canada tends to use a Canadian adaptation of KF for common law.) Moys is also used in Australia, England, Nigeria, and other commonwealth countries.

Moys considers fewer countries to be common law than Canadian KF. For Moys it’s England and Wales, Ireland, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United States, and West Indies. Canadian KF adds India, Singapore, Hong Kong, South Africa, and former British colonies of Africa.

The common law countries have their own numbers for primary materials. There is a jurisdiction and a topic index, which can also be used as a list of subject headings. As you see above, there is a sequence for the EC/EU as well as Europe as a whole and European countries.

Main Source: https://special-cataloguing.com/node/1429

List of Legal Materials

Administrative decisions (Law Materials)
Administrative regulations (Law Materials)
Attorneys general’s opinions (Law Materials)
Bar journals (Law Materials)
Casebooks (Law Materials)
Citators (Law Materials)
Claims (Law Materials)
Codes (Jewish law) (Law Materials)
Codices (Law) (Law Materials)
Concordats (Law Materials)
Consilia (Law Materials)
Constitutional convention materials (Law Materials)
Constitutions (includes (Law Materials)
Court decisions and opinions (Law Materials)
Court rules (Law Materials)
Courtroom art (Law Materials)
Customary laws (includes Coutumes, Custumals and RechtsbÃ¼cher) (Law Materials)
Dockets (Law Materials)
Executive orders (Law Materials)
Hornbooks (Law) (Law Materials)
Indulgences (Canon law) (Law Materials)
Intergovernmental agreements (Law Materials)
Judicial statistics (Law Materials)
Jury instructions (Law Materials)
Law commentaries (Law Materials)
Law digests (Law Materials)
Law for laypersons (Law Materials)
Law reviews (Law Materials)
Legal forms (Law Materials)
Legal Instruments (see below) (Law Materials)
Legal maxims (Law Materials)
Legislative histories (including Legislative bills) (Law Materials)
Legislative materials (includingnLegislative bills and Legislative hearings) (Law Materials)
Loose-leaf services (Law Materials)
Medieval Town laws (Law Materials)
Military regulations (Law Materials)
Model acts (Law Materials)
Official gazettes (Law Materials)
Orders in council (Law Materials)
Privileges and immunities (Law Materials)
Proclamations (including Royal ordinances) (Law Materials)
Records and briefs (Law Materials)
Repertories (Law) (Law Materials)
Resolutions (Law) (Law Materials)
Responsa (Jewish law) (Law Materials)
Restatements of the law (Law Materials)
Statutes and codes (including Municipal ordinances and Session laws) (Law Materials)
Travaux prÃ©paratoires (Treaties) (Law Materials)
Treaties (Law Materials)
Trial and arbitral proceedings (Law Materials)
Uniform laws (Law Materials)
Year books (English law reports) (Law Materials)

In relation to Legal Instruments:

Affidavits (Law Materials)
By-laws (Law Materials)
Charters and articles of incorporation (Law Materials)
Legal Instruments (cont.) (Law Materials)
Commercial arbitration agreements (Law Materials)
Contracts (including Collective labor agreements and Deeds) (Law Materials)
Cooperative agreements (Law Materials)
Legal memorandums (Law Materials)
Legal petitions (including Remonstrances) (Law Materials)
Patents (Law Materials)
Wills (Law Materials)
Writs (Law Materials)

Notes

1. Library of Congress. Tentative Headings and Cross-References for a Subject Catalogue of American and English Law. Washington, D.C., US. Government Printing Office, 1911.

2. Subject Headings in Anglo-American and International Law Used in the Dictionary Catalog of the Columbia University Law Library. New York, Columbia University School of Library Service, 1939.

3. McLaury, Helen, comp. List of Subiect Headings for Small to Medium Sized Law Libraries (Mainly Anglo-American) . Chicago, Northwestern Uni-versity, Elbert H. Gary Library, 1956.

4. Library of Congress. Subject Headings Used in the Dictionary Catalogs of the Libray of Congress. 6th ed. Washington, D.C., Library of Congress, 1957.

Conclusion

References and Further Reading

About the Author/s and Reviewer/s

Author: international

Mentioned in these Entries

Annotations, Classification of Law Materials, Common law, Comparative Law Classification (Max Planck Institute), Court Reports, Dewey Decimal Classification, General Division Classification (Max Planck Institute), How to search legal journal indexes?, KF Modified, Law Classification, Law library, Legal Thesaurus, Legal research: Law of Libraries and Archives, Library of Congress Classification Class K, List of Legal Databases and Indexes, Moys Classification and Thesaurus for Legal Materials, Municipal law Classification (Max Planck Institute), Public International Law Classification (Max Planck Institute), Thesaurus of Law GenreForm Terms, Thesaurus.

Cataloging for legal materials