Asian-American Law Librarians Caucus Newsletter

Volume 1, Number 1 June 1995

In response to my previous letters, several members suggested that a newsletter would be helpful in keeping our members informed, especially those who do not attend the AALL and AALLC annual meetings every year. Fortunately two things happened shortly thereafter. First, Mr. Haibin Hu enthusiastically volunteered to edit and produce the newsletter. Second, there were enough members who contributed money to cover the costs for copying and mailing related to this newsletter. As a result, the Asian-American Law Librarians Caucus Newsletter is now a reality.

The goals of the Caucus, as stated in the Bylaws, are to enhance communications, exchange ideas and information, and address issues concerning Asian-American law librarians, Asian law, and the law library profession as a whole. I believe that the Newsletter will help us achieve these goals and soar to new heights in the months ahead. On behalf of all members of the Caucus, I want to extend our heartfelt congratulations to the debut of this Newsletter!

Welcome to the Asian-American Law Librarians Caucus Newsletter!

In the coming months, this Newsletter will be issued quarterly to serve as a bridge of communications among AALLC members. It will strive to serve the interests of our members and achieve the objectives of our organization.

To create a publication which is informative and useful to our members, I need your help! Please consider joining the Newsletter Committee as a volunteer, or submitting your ideas or contributions to me regularly. Working together, we will succeed.

This has been an exciting year for the Asian -American Law Librarians Caucus. I want to thank you all for giving me the opportunity to serve as your President.

The AALLC has grown considerably in the past several years. Past Caucus presidents, Dorothy Li, Heija Ryoo, and Dan Wade all labored long and hard to build and promote our organization. We owe them a great debt of gratitude. I am sure that the Caucus will continue to grow and prosper under the able leadership of Kai-yun Chiu, the coming President of AALLC.

Many members have volunteered their precious time and talent to serve on Caucus committees. Others have made donations to cover the operating expenses of Caucus projects. This spirit of cooperation is what is making the Caucus so special. I want to thank the chairs and members of all the committees for their hard work.

The Nominations Committee has nominated Nancy Cheng as the candidate for the office of Vice-President/President-Elect for 1995- 96. Nancy is the Director of the State of Utah Law Library. She has been very active in both AALLC and AALL affairs. On behalf of the Caucus, I want to express our sincere appreciation to Frank Bae, Chair, and Dorothy Li ,of the Nominations Committee for their excellent recommendations.

Due to her family's relocation, our former Secretary/Treasurer, Ellen Bull, resigned her position in January, 1995. We wish her well and look forward to her return to the law library profession in the near future. Wendy Hu, Technical Services Librarian at the U.S. Court of Appeals (2nd Cir.) Library in New York City, has graciously agreed to take on the responsibilities as our new Secretary/Treasurer. Her appointment by the Caucus Executive Committee became effective on March 9, 1995.

All programs of the Caucus at the 1995 AALL annual meeting are scheduled for Tuesday, July 18 (See the Calendar in this issue for details.) I want to thank Mon Yin Lung and Dan Wade for their superb planning for the program of Chinese legal history. Thanks are also due to Prof. Frank Liu for his excellent efforts in recruiting Prof. Pat Chew, of University of Pittsburgh Law School, to speak to our group and arranging for our group dinner. (See attached form for more information)

I am putting together an agenda for our business meeting in Pittsburgh. If you have any items to be discussed and acted upon by the members, please let me know ASAP. I look forward to seeing you all in Pittsburgh.

Membership Contributions
   $ 310.00
Disbursement
   $ 0.00
Balance (as of May 1, 1995)
   $ 310.00
Calendar of Events

The following events at the 1995 AALL annual meeting in Pittsburgh may be of interest to our members (See your convention program for location)

Tuesday, July 18

10:15-11:45am
Connected for Justice: Chinese Law -- The Past, Present, and Future

Mon Yin Lung (Moderator)

Dan Wade (Coordinator)

Robert C. Berring

Paul S. Fu

Dorothy Li

4:30-5:30pm 
AALLC Business meeting

5:30-6pm
Speech by Professor Pat Chew
University of Pittsburgh Law School

6:00-7:00pm
Asian Law Working Group meeting

7:30pm--?
Group Dinner at Mandarin Gourmet
Restaurant (Reservation form attached)

Minutes of 1994 AALLC Meeting

Wendy Hu

This year's Caucus meeting was held on July 10, 1994 at 5pm at Seattle Convention Center. Meeting was called to order by Faul Fu, President of AALLC. 35 members were present. The agenda covered the following items: the necessity of a membership directory, a $10 apiece membership contribution, and publication of a booklet to publicize the Caucus activities. There were discussions of the items. Paul Fu appointed four committees on publicity, directory, program, and nominations. He also suggested publishing a Caucus newsletter. Meeting adjourned at 6pm. The meeting was followed by an educational program on Japanese Legal History, to which the Caucus was a cosponsor. After that program, some members took a group tour of the Wing Luck Museum, which is devoted to Asian- American culture and experiences, and visited the University of Washington Law Library and its Asian Law collections. The day closed as the group had its dinner at a Japanese restaurant.

Program Committee:

A Progress Report
Mila Rush, Chair

The charge of the 1994/95 AALLC Program Committee is to submit, by the end of May, 1995, the proposed programs for Indianapolis and beyond. I will just relate what has been done by the Committee.

Since I received the President's call before the Seattle meeting, I was able to prepare for that meeting a list of past programs (1981- 1993) that covered Asian law, both jurisdictionally and topically. My purpose was to provide an angle to the background work that we could undertake, as well as to elicit suggestions for topics/ideas from the Caucus members. We now still accept suggestions from anyone. Of course, the later you contact us, the more developed we expect your proposal to be.

During the past year I have also been collecting materials on Asian law that I have come across in the electronic distribution lists that I subscribe to, as well as in my non- electronic reading. The postings on Int-Law and Law-Lib are a rich source of ideas on what topics for what jurisdictions are being asked for "out there." I am in the process of synthesizing these topics and jurisdictions covered.

Meanwhile, Bill McCloy is independently thinking of topics. I expect that Bill and I will be in constant contact in May as we put together our thoughts and ideas, as we critique each other's thinking, as we develop those topics that we decide on, and as we polish the same. (May 1)

People & Happenings

Mr. Wei Luo, Assistant Technical Services Librarian at Southern Illinois University School of Law Library, recently published "A Pathfinder to U.S. Export Control Laws and Regulations" (New York: William S. Hein, 1994). During a recent visit to Xiamen University Law School in Xiamen, China, he gave a presentation to law students on the U.S. export control regime. At the same campus, he also gave a talk to a group of faculty and students on use of the Internet.

Recent Publications of Interest

McClain, Charles, ed. Asian Americans and the Law (New York: Garland, 1994)

Kim, Hyung-chan. A Legal History of Asian Americans, 1790-1990 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1994)

McClain, Charles J. In Search of Equality: the Chinese Struggle against Discrimination in Nineteenth-Century America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994)

Hing, Bill Ong. Making and Remaking Asian America through Immigration Policy: 1850-1990 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993)