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Law Reporting and Public Access in the Courts: Is Too Much a Good Thing?

Part 2: The New York Experience

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2020

Charles Dewey Cole Jr.
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Abstract

Beginning in the early 1800s, New York has followed a comprehensive model of law-reporting with official law reports. This article by Charles Dewey Cole, Jr. looks at the influence of James Kent in establishing comprehensive law-reporting in New York, reviews the 1938 legislation that created the law reporting bureau and charged the state reporter with reporting almost all appellate court and selective trial court decisions, describes the state reporter's current publication practices and considers both the advantages of and the challenges presented by comprehensive official law-reporting. The article is based on a June 2019 presentation given at the annual conference of the British and Irish Association of Law Librarians in Bournemouth.

Keywords

public accesslaw reportinglegal historyNew YorkUS law
Type
Selection of papers from the BIALL Conference 2019
Information
Legal Information Management , Volume 19 , Issue 4 , December 2019 , pp. 230 - 235
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2020. Published by British and Irish Association of Law Librarians

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References

Footnotes

1 Grant Gilmore, The Ages of American Law 28 (1977).

2 Id.

3 Lawrence M. Friedman, A History of American Law 291 (1973).

4 Grant Gilmore, The Ages of American Law 28 n.14.

5 Id.

6 Id.

7 Frederick C. Hicks, Men and Books Famous in the Law 145 (1921).

8 Lawrence M. Friedman, A History of American Law 119.

9 1804 N.Y. Laws ch. 68, § 1.

10 But How Are their Decisions To Be Known?: Celebrating 200 Years of New York State Official Law Reporting 13 (2004), available at http://www.nycourts.gov/reporter/files/history.pdf

11 Frederick C. Hicks, Men and Books Famous in the Law 146; see 1814 N.Y. Laws ch. 193.

12 See 4 James Kent, Commentaries on American Law iii (1830).

13 But How Are their Decisions To Be Known?: Celebrating 200 Years of New York State Official Law Reporting 14–15.

14 1938 N.Y. Laws, ch. 494, § 1.

15 See N.Y. Judiciary L. § 430.

16 2018 Annual Report of the State Reporter ¶ 7, available at http://www.nycourts.gov/reporter/annual2018.htm

17 N.Y. Judiciary L. § 431.

18 Id.

19 Id.

20 See Selection of Opinions for Publication available at http://www.nycourts.gov/reporter/Selection.shtml.

21 N.Y. Judiciary L. § 434[5](b).

22 2018 Annual Report of the State Reporter ¶ 2A.

23 Id.

24 Id.

25 Id.

26 Id.

27 Id.

28 171 A.D.3d 1200 (2d Dep't 2019).

29 171 A.D.3d at 1201.

30 N.J. Ct. R. 1:36–2(a).

31 2018 Annual Report of the State Reporter ¶ 2A.

32 58 Misc. 3d 1204(A) (Sup. Ct. Kings County 2017).

33 2018 Annual Report of the State Reporter ¶ 2A.

34 2018 Annual Report of the State Reporter ¶ 3.

35 N.Y. Civ. Prac. L. & R. 5529(e).

* The photograph of James Kent that is used in this article is available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hon._James_Kent,_Chancellor_-_NARA_-_528731.jpg and is in the public domain as part of a project of the National Archives and Records Administration.