This Week in the Law Library ... June 2, 2025

This week in the Law Library we’re looking at bar exam resources, reviewing basic legal research skills for summer, reminding you about library services during our migration to a new library services platform, and celebrating Pride Month and National Caribbean-American Heritage Month.

Congratulations! You have made it through law school but now the bar exam looms. Don’t worry, the Law Library’s got your back. When you’ve caught your breath and you’re ready to start your bar studying, we have resources that can help. Check out our Bar Exam Research Guide.

The July 2025 bar exam will be held in three locations: Cincinnati, Columbus, and Cleveland. 

Examinees will be tested at the following locations:

• Cincinnati: University of Cincinnati College of Law, 2925 Campus Green Dr., Cincinnati, OH 45221
• Columbus: Ohio Union, 1739 N. High St., Columbus, OH 43210
• Cleveland: Cleveland State University College of Law, 1801 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44115

Accommodations testing will be located at OSU Moritz College of Law (Drinko Hall, 55 W. 12th Ave., Columbus, OH 43210).

Learn more: Ohio Bar Exam

5 More Resources to Help You Study for the Bar Exam

The Bar Exam is not a sprint, it’s a marathon so pace yourself! Check out this week’s Bar Exam Resource highlights below.

• The Bar Exam Toolkit Podcast
  • Tune in to this podcast for advice on all aspects of the exam, from writing a passing essay to surviving bar prep with your sanity intact. View the archive for older episodes.
• The National Jurist – Bar Exam Articles
  • The National Jurist has published many articles on the bar exam. You can view them all here.
• ABA Law Student Division Material: Bar Admissions & Exam Resources
  • Law students can join the ABA's Law Student Division for free, and access many resources, including: Bar Admissions & Exam resources 
• JD Advising, How to Pass the Bar Exam the First Time Exam
  • This is a step-by-step approach on how to study and prepare for the bar exam.
• Valerie Keene, Bar Exam Tips, Crush the Bar Exam (June 2, 2025)
  • This article provides a general overview of what you can expect when studying for the bar exam.

Be sure and take a look at our previous May 27 and May 19 posts on Bar Exam Resources.

Previously, we covered basic tips to think about before starting a research project and the initial steps to take. This week we will look at consulting secondary sources.

A good secondary source can explain the law around your issue and cite you to primary sources. It can save you a lot of time and effort!

Types of Secondary Sources

There are different types of secondary sources and some may be more helpful to you than others. Secondary sources can only be persuasive, they can never be mandatory or binding on a court of law. The persuasive value of a secondary source depends on its author. Below are some secondary sources that you might remember from your legal research classes and some tips on when to use them.

Research Guides

Start by searching for a research guide on a subject. Law librarians write guides on researching specific areas of law that will identify good secondary sources, as well as relevant primary sources in that subject area. Here at the Robert S. Marx Law Library, we have over 80 research guides that can help you with a summer project! These guides are available 24/7. If one of our guides doesn’t have the information you’re looking for, type in your legal subject and the terms +research +guide in your favorite search engine.

Legal Encyclopedias

Legal encyclopedias are great places to start if you need an overview of a legal subject or don’t know much about the subject. There are two general legal encyclopedias: (1) American Jurisprudence 2d (Am. Jur.) and Corpus Juris Secundum (C.J.S.). Many states also have legal encyclopedias. The Ohio legal encyclopedia is Ohio Jurisprudence 3d (Oh. Jur.).

Treatises, Practice Guides and Handbooks

Practice guides and handbooks are secondary sources that are very practitioner oriented. Often the practice guides and handbooks will include forms and procedural information.Treatises give you more in-depth treatment of subjects than the practice guides and handbooks. Treatises are usually written by experts and scholars in the field.

Law Review Articles

Law review articles are journal articles written by students, practitioners, and scholars. Law review articles are often good resources for cutting edge, controversial, or new developments in the law.

American Law Reports

American Law Reports contain two kinds of material: articles (also sometimes called annotations) and cases. The articles are what you would be interested in for research purposes. Articles cover a topic through cases that focus on a particular point of law. These articles collect the cases from a variety of state and federal courts or jurisdictions and arrange them according to how the courts have ruled. American Law Reports are great to use for researching narrow topics, doing a survey of existing law, identifying trends in the law, and finding persuasive case law.

Restatements

Restatements of the Law are highly regarded uniform statements of the law produced by the American Law Institute (ALI), an organization comprised of prominent American judges, lawyers, and law professors. They are heavily annotated and may be adopted by jurisdictions. Each restatement is arranged first by chapter, then by topic and title, and then by section. Restatement sections generally begin with a “black letter” statement of the law followed by comments, illustrations, and reporter notes. Case annotations to the Restatements can be useful to find how a Restatement provision has been applied by a particular court.

Learn more about researching in secondary sources in our Researching Secondary Sources Guide or watch our videos on finding and searching within the various secondary source types.

The OhioLINK consortium, which includes the University of Cincinnati Libraries, is upgrading the Library Services Platform (LSP) in summer 2025 to Ex Libris Alma/Primo VE.

This cloud-based, enterprise system software is the backbone of day-to-day library operations (acquisitions, cataloging, circulation/fullfillment, etc.). The new system will provide user benefits to help students, faculty and other library users find (and access) information critical to learning, teaching and research. Its user-friendly interactions will be more user intuitive.

Although we are working to minimize any disruption to services, the cut over to the new system will impact acquisitions and summer borrowing of print materials among other OhioLINK institutions.

Currently

OhioLINK and Search Ohio borrowing and renewals will be unavailable. Physical books from other Ohio universities, as well as materials from public libraries, will not be able to be requested nor will previously borrowed materials be able to be renewed. While OhioLINK and SearchOhio services are unavailable, work with us to find alternatives that fulfill teaching and research needs.

June 25, 2025 

We go live with Alma, Primo and Rapido (replaces OhioLINK requesting)

The Library LSP upgrade website includes more information on the project, including a FAQ.

About Pride Month

Pride Month is commemorated each year in the month of June to honor the 1969 Stonewall uprising in New York City. The Stonewall Inn was a popular gay bar that police raided on Jun 28, 1969. The raid resulted in days of protest and the uprising is often cited as a catalyst for LGBTQ+ activism.

UCBA Library Pride Month Display

This display of select books celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community. Topics include: memoirs, parenting, poetry, and even popular culture icons. There is something for everyone! 

Cincinnati Pride Parade and Festival

Cincinnati's Pride Parade will take place Saturday, June 28, 2025 at Sawyer Point & Yeatman's Cove.

5 Resources to Learn More About LGBTQ+ Legal Issues & History

• June ABA 21-Day LGBTQ+ Equity Habit Building Challenge ©
  • This Challenge is modeled after the “21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge©,” which was conceived several years ago by diversity expert Dr. Eddie Moore, Jr. to advance deeper understandings of the intersections of race, power, privilege, supremacy, and oppression. The goal of the Challenge is to assist each of us to become more aware, compassionate, constructive, engaged people in the quest for equity, and specifically to learn more about the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and many communities included under the “LGBTQ+ umbrella.” It transcends our roles as lawyers. Non-lawyers are also welcome to participate. The Challenge invites participants to complete a syllabus of 21 daily, short assignments (typically taking 15-30 minutes), over 21 consecutive days, that includes readings, videos, or podcasts. The assignments seek to expose participants to perspectives on elements of LGBTQ+ histories, identities, and cultures. This Challenges cannot possibly highlight all of the diversity of experiences and opinions within the LGBTQ+ community itself, much less substitute for learnings about any other community. This syllabus is but an introduction to what we hope will be a rewarding journey that extends far beyond the limits of this project.
• ABA, LGBTQ+ Legal Trailblazers
  • Learn more about trailblazing LGBTQIA+ people – especially those in the legal profession – in US history. View short bios and see highlights of women recently honored by the various ABA Goal III Entities, including activists, judges, and other trailblazers.
• ABA, Commission on Domestic & Sexual Violence, LGBTQI+ Legal Access Project
  • Myths and biases against members of the LGBTQI+ community can lead to systemic discrimination. Law enforcement may not have resources for an LGBTQI+ victim who calls for assistance or prosecutors may be challenged in how to prove a criminal case against an LGBTQI+ perpetrator in a same-sex relationship before a jury. Family Courts may not have established protocols for all victims looking to file for a civil protective order. Legal service providers may need to develop intake infrastructures that are accessible for LGBTQI+ victims. These factors– among many others– prevent LGBTQI+ victims from seeking and obtaining protection under the law. The LGBTQI+ Legal Access Project provides individualized support, training, and technical assistance to address domestic and sexual violence in LGBTQI+ communities.
• ABA, Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity, LGBTQ+ Webinars
  • Visit the SOGI LGBT Webinar page to watch videos of past programs, which include Combating LGBT Implicit Bias in the Legal Profession, Title VII US Supreme Court Decision, Sexual Orientation: The Legal Case for Coverage Under Title VII and more.
• Administrative Office of the United States Courts, LGBTQ Pride Month
  • Learn about the federal judge who led the way for others in the judiciary.

About National Caribbean-American Heritage Month

The Institute of Caribbean Studies’ (ICS) led the effort to establish the National Caribbean American Heritage Month (NCAHM) in 1999 which resulted in the first White House Caribbean American Community Briefing being held at the Clinton White House in 1999. In 2004 an official campaign for June as National Caribbean American Heritage Month was launched and a bill passed the House in June 2005, and the Senate in February 2006. President George Bush signed a proclamation on June 5, 2006.

You can view the live stream of oral arguments on the Court’s website or see them after the arguments take place in the Ohio Channel archives.

Tuesday, June 3, 2025

State v. Turner - (1) whether a common pleas court can accept a juvenile's guilty plea to charges arising in adult court for which probable cause wasn’t first found in juvenile court and (2) whether a juvenile facing charges in adult court for an offense that was the basis for transfer from juvenile court face charges for a different offense than the one charged.   Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Gault v. Clerk, Medina Cnty. Ct. of Common Pleas Clerk (2024-0757/2024-0999) - whether the plain language of Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2303.20(H) authorizes a county clerk of courts to impose a technology fee for “each page” when a record/index is created or does the "service referred to in Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2303.201(B)(1) limit the fee to one-dollar per record in order to fund technological advances and computerization of the office of the clerk of the court of common pleas. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Olentangy Loc. Sch. Dist. Bd. of Edn. v. Delaware Cty. Bd. of Revision (2024-0814/2024-0815) - (1) whether Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2506.01 creates an independent statutory right permitting appeals of all final decisions of administrative bodies and political subdivisions and (2) whether appeals are allowed under Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2506.01 if neither Ohio Rev. Code sec. 5717.01 nor Ohio Rev. Code sec. 5717.05 prohibit such appeals.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

In re Complaint of Ohio Power Co. v. Nationwide Energy Partners, L.L.C. - whether the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio Commission lawfully and reasonably applied the jurisdictional statute, Ohio Rev. Code sec. 4905.03(C), to determine NEP is not an “electric light company” or a “public utility” under Ohio Rev. Code sec. 4905.02(A) and is not subject to Commission regulation.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Wednesday, June 4, 2025

Rover Pipeline, L.L.C. v. Harris - whether the Board of Tax Appeals erroneously adopted a $5.67 billion appraisal as the taxable value of the entire Rover Pipeline and $3.67 billion as the taxable value of the Ohio section of the pipeline. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Eddy v. Farmers Prop. Cas. Ins. Co. - (1) whether Boone v. Vanliner Ins. Co., 91 Ohio St.3d 209, 744 N.E.2d 154 (2001) applies to an insurer’s privileged materials created during litigation between the insurer and its insured and (2) whether a trial court must conduct an in-camera inspection of documents created during litigation before releasing any documents once an insurer invokes attorney-client privilege.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Allied Health & Chiropractic, L.L.C. v. Ohio - whether Ohio’s one-subject rule allows the General Assembly to cure an initial violation by making an amendment to an offending statutory provision.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Columbus Bar Ass'n v. Cable - whether the Board of Professional Conduct's proposed suspension of an attorney from the practice of law is warranted when an attorney paid for solicitation and referral of personal injury clients.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Posted June 2, 2025 by Susan Boland

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