Book Collection

The library's book and microform collection consists of more than 150,000 volumes dating from 1488 to the present. We currently follow the Standard for County Law Libraries approved by the State, Court, and County Special Interest Section of the American Association of Law Libraries for collection development.

The Pennsylvania collection contains two copies (more if needed) of all current Pennsylvania primary and secondary sources including constitutions, statutory law, case law, and administrative law. There is a complete collection of treatises and continuing legal education materials. Our appellate court brief collection dates from 1853 to present.

We maintain a state collection for surrounding states contiguous to Pennsylvania borders as well as California and Florida. The treatise collection contains the West Hornbook and Nutshell series, form books, Restatements of the Law, loose-leaf services, and single/multi-volume treatises on all areas of the law. The periodical collection consists of more than 400 titles, but for more current titles, one needs to access Duquesne's collection.

As a federal government depository, we collect approximately 13 percent of the materials offered by the Government Printing Office, including U.S. Reports, Congressional Record, C.F.R., Federal Register, administrative agency decisions, and all congressional publications since 1978.

The library has an extensive rare book collection, possessing most of the primary and secondary treatises in Anglo-American law dating back to the 16th century.

Microform Collection

The library has an extensive microform collection of over 2,500 rolls of film and 500,000 pieces of microfiche. We have complete back files of Congressional Globe and Record, C.F.R. and Federal Register. Congressional publications since 1978, all states court reports pre-1920s, all states-attorneys-general opinions, U.S. Supreme Court briefs since 1974, complete set of Pennsylvania county reports, Pennsylvania appellate court briefs since 1980 (Commonwealth since 1970), eight states superseded statutes, older Federal administrative law materials, and some English case law.

Video Collection

The library has more than 200 video tapes, including more than 100 trial cases from CourtTV.

CD-ROM and Diskette Collection

The library maintains a small CD-ROM collection consisting mostly of CDs provided as part of the federal depository program. There are also a growing number of treatises and form books that include diskettes for forms that are also available for use by patrons.