Free Access to Law Movement
Encyclopedia
The Free Access to Law Movement is the umbrella name for the collective of legal projects across several common law
countries to provide free online access to legal information such as case law
and legislation
. The movement began in 1992 with the creation of the Cornell Law School
Legal Information Institute by Tom Bruce and Peter Martin. The name Legal Information Institute
has been widely adopted by other projects. It is usually prefixed by a country or region identifier.
is the project providing Australia
n and New Zealand
legal information.
, Ireland
, Northern Ireland
, Scotland
, United Kingdom
, and the European Union
.
It was set up after a long and hard campaign by barrister Laurie West-Knights QC, Lord Saville and Lord Justice Brooke
, who were concerned about the lack of availability of court judgments to ordinary court users and were inspired by the Australian LII.
. It is a non-profit organization
managed by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada
.
From http://www.slaw.ca/2011/07/28/colin-lachance-34-well-spent:
Recognizing from the outset the interdependency of succeeding in the CanLII
project and addressing the legal profession’s interest in affordable electronic access to legal information, Canada’s law societies knew that progress required substantial and ongoing commitment. Accordingly, through their umbrella organization, the Federation of Law Societies of Canada, the 14 member societies committed in 2000 to an initial 16-month funding allocation of close to $500K. Viewed from the perspective of individual lawyer and notary members of the law societies, that worked out to approximately $7.40 per full-time-equivalent law society member.
When CanLII
officially launched in 2001, it did so with 18 collections comprising approximately 20,000 documents.
By early 2003, with annual law society contributions now at $14 per member, CanLII featured 65 case law and statutory collections containing over 150,000 documents and the database was growing at a rate of 1000 decisions per week. As the goal of access to current information was nearly achieved, attention turned to enhancing site functionality and utility through the addition of hyperlinks between decisions, de-identification of named persons where required to meet privacy obligations, and addition of historical collections.
10 years from launch, CanLII
now hosts nearly 1 million documents across over 170 collections; adds over 125,000 decisions each year; and receives over 20,000 visits each day. Beyond mere usage stats, CanLII also boasts several professional grade tools such as the Reflex record for case citations, the Satal tool for point-in-time comparison of statutes, and, more recently, search-based RSS feeds and deep-linking functionality to support sophisticated research and reference practices.
Annual funding of CanLII’s core operations continues to come from the provincial and territorial law societies. The current contribution is approximately $34 per FTE law society member.
Critical contributions from many other parties have supported the development of a free resource that is both deep and broad. To help CanLII approach (or in some cases far exceed) a targeted case law depth of at least 10 years for superior and appellate courts, Canada’s provincial law foundations have provided substantial funding grants for the scanning, digitizing and publishing of pre-2003 case law. CanLII has also received considerable indirect financial benefit from LexUM through low cost access to leading edge technology and service as LexUM’s prior affiliation with the University of Montreal allowed it to attract support from a variety of sources and LexUM’s own passionate commitment to CanLII led to the sharing of its technological advancements. Beyond these resources, CanLII has benefitted from contributions of incalculable value from the many volunteers and supporters among its board members, law society and Federation representatives and professional advisors, and the Courts and other public agencies.
Through a decade of investment by the legal profession, CanLII has become a robust and respected legal research tool, however much of what is desirable and technologically possible has not been pursued for lack of funding. CanLII has room to improve in delivering on its core functionality, but its stability also allows it and its users to dream of much grander possibilities.
Law society funding at current levels could support evolutionary growth, but the demands of today’s sophisticated user of legal information and search call for development at costs and at a pace that may exceed the appetite of CanLII’s traditional funders. Moreover, responding to public demand for improved access to justice and to legal information requires that CanLII direct greater energy and resources to generating public awareness of its service and to the education of users.
[click on the author's name for more information]
from Hong Kong
(and some publicly available secondary material
through computer technology. HKLII was developed and is jointly operated by the University of Hong Kong's Department of Computer Science and Faculty of Law, with the assistance of the Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII).
at the Cornell Law School
provides free legal information for the United States
. It was the original LII project, founded in 1992.
and Canterbury
. It contains decisions of many decision generators that are not available anywhere else, including from commercial operators. It operates using voluntary labour and grants from the New Zealand Law Foundation.
, Cook Islands
, Federated States of Micronesia
, Fiji Islands, Kiribati
, Marshall Islands
, Nauru
, Niue
, Papua New Guinea
, Pitcairn Island, Samoa
, Solomon Islands
, Tokelau
, Tonga
, Tuvalu
, and Vanuatu
.
The documents on the PacLII website consist mainly of primary materials such as court decisions and legislation but also include decisions of various tribunals and panels or secondary information such as court rules or bench books. There is additionally a Pacific Islands Treaty Database.
PacLII is an initiative of the University of the South Pacific
School of Law with assistance from AustLII. PacLII is a signatory to the Montreal Declaration on Public Access to Law and participates in the Free Access to Law movement, a grouping of a number of world wide organizations committed to publishing and providing access to the law for free. PacLII is based at the Emalus Campus of the USP in Port Vila
, Vanuatu
.
USP School of Law is has its headquarters in Port Vila. Its students come from more than 12 Pacific Island countries. Most of them do not have easy access to the legal materials from across the region which they need to undertake their studies. PacLII was started by the School of Law as a means to overcoming the tyrannies of distance. It has grown to become a service to governments, legal professionals, NGOs, students, academics and members of the public and has been widely recognized as an example of excellence in promoting access to legal information.
.
Common law
Common law is law developed by judges through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive branch action...
countries to provide free online access to legal information such as case law
Case law
In law, case law is the set of reported judicial decisions of selected appellate courts and other courts of first instance which make new interpretations of the law and, therefore, can be cited as precedents in a process known as stare decisis...
and legislation
Legislation
Legislation is law which has been promulgated by a legislature or other governing body, or the process of making it...
. The movement began in 1992 with the creation of the Cornell Law School
Cornell Law School
Cornell Law School, located in Ithaca, New York, is a graduate school of Cornell University and one of the five Ivy League law schools. The school confers three law degrees...
Legal Information Institute by Tom Bruce and Peter Martin. The name Legal Information Institute
Legal Information Institute
The Legal Information Institute is a non-profit, public service of Cornell Law School that provides no-cost access to current American and international legal research sources online at . The organization is a pioneer in the delivery of legal information online. Founded in 1992 by Peter Martin and...
has been widely adopted by other projects. It is usually prefixed by a country or region identifier.
Declaration on Free Access to Law
In October 2002 the meeting of LIIs in Montreal at the 4th Law via Internet Conference, made the following declaration as a joint statement of their philosophy of access to law. There were some further modifications of the Declaration at the Sydney meeting of LIIs in 2003 and at the Paris meeting in 2004.WorldLII
The World Legal Information Institute is the umbrella project for all the other LII projects. From the WorldLII website all other databases can be searched.AustLII
The Australasian Legal Information InstituteAustralasian Legal Information Institute
The Australasian Legal Information Institute is an institution operated jointly by the Faculties of Law of the University of Technology Sydney and the University of New South Wales. It is notable for establishing Australia's largest on-line database on Australian legislation and case law...
is the project providing Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n and New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
legal information.
BAILII
The British and Irish Legal Information Institute is the project providing legal information on England and WalesEngland and Wales
England and Wales is a jurisdiction within the United Kingdom. It consists of England and Wales, two of the four countries of the United Kingdom...
, Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, and the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
.
It was set up after a long and hard campaign by barrister Laurie West-Knights QC, Lord Saville and Lord Justice Brooke
Henry Brooke (judge)
Sir Henry Brooke is a retired British judge. He became a Lord Justice of Appeal in 1996, and became Vice-President of the Civil Division of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales in 2003...
, who were concerned about the lack of availability of court judgments to ordinary court users and were inspired by the Australian LII.
CanLII
The Canadian Legal Information Institute is the project providing legal information on CanadaCanada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. It is a non-profit organization
Non-profit organization
Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...
managed by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada
Federation of Law Societies of Canada
The Federation of Canadian Law Societies is the national coordinating body of Canada's 14 law societies. It was formed in 1972 to coordinate policies of provincial and territorial law societies.-Reforms:...
.
From http://www.slaw.ca/2011/07/28/colin-lachance-34-well-spent:
Recognizing from the outset the interdependency of succeeding in the CanLII
CanLII
The Canadian Legal Information Institute is a non-profit organization created and funded by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada, on behalf of its 14 member law societies...
project and addressing the legal profession’s interest in affordable electronic access to legal information, Canada’s law societies knew that progress required substantial and ongoing commitment. Accordingly, through their umbrella organization, the Federation of Law Societies of Canada, the 14 member societies committed in 2000 to an initial 16-month funding allocation of close to $500K. Viewed from the perspective of individual lawyer and notary members of the law societies, that worked out to approximately $7.40 per full-time-equivalent law society member.
When CanLII
CanLII
The Canadian Legal Information Institute is a non-profit organization created and funded by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada, on behalf of its 14 member law societies...
officially launched in 2001, it did so with 18 collections comprising approximately 20,000 documents.
By early 2003, with annual law society contributions now at $14 per member, CanLII featured 65 case law and statutory collections containing over 150,000 documents and the database was growing at a rate of 1000 decisions per week. As the goal of access to current information was nearly achieved, attention turned to enhancing site functionality and utility through the addition of hyperlinks between decisions, de-identification of named persons where required to meet privacy obligations, and addition of historical collections.
10 years from launch, CanLII
CanLII
The Canadian Legal Information Institute is a non-profit organization created and funded by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada, on behalf of its 14 member law societies...
now hosts nearly 1 million documents across over 170 collections; adds over 125,000 decisions each year; and receives over 20,000 visits each day. Beyond mere usage stats, CanLII also boasts several professional grade tools such as the Reflex record for case citations, the Satal tool for point-in-time comparison of statutes, and, more recently, search-based RSS feeds and deep-linking functionality to support sophisticated research and reference practices.
Annual funding of CanLII’s core operations continues to come from the provincial and territorial law societies. The current contribution is approximately $34 per FTE law society member.
Critical contributions from many other parties have supported the development of a free resource that is both deep and broad. To help CanLII approach (or in some cases far exceed) a targeted case law depth of at least 10 years for superior and appellate courts, Canada’s provincial law foundations have provided substantial funding grants for the scanning, digitizing and publishing of pre-2003 case law. CanLII has also received considerable indirect financial benefit from LexUM through low cost access to leading edge technology and service as LexUM’s prior affiliation with the University of Montreal allowed it to attract support from a variety of sources and LexUM’s own passionate commitment to CanLII led to the sharing of its technological advancements. Beyond these resources, CanLII has benefitted from contributions of incalculable value from the many volunteers and supporters among its board members, law society and Federation representatives and professional advisors, and the Courts and other public agencies.
Through a decade of investment by the legal profession, CanLII has become a robust and respected legal research tool, however much of what is desirable and technologically possible has not been pursued for lack of funding. CanLII has room to improve in delivering on its core functionality, but its stability also allows it and its users to dream of much grander possibilities.
Law society funding at current levels could support evolutionary growth, but the demands of today’s sophisticated user of legal information and search call for development at costs and at a pace that may exceed the appetite of CanLII’s traditional funders. Moreover, responding to public demand for improved access to justice and to legal information requires that CanLII direct greater energy and resources to generating public awareness of its service and to the education of users.
[click on the author's name for more information]
Cylaw
Cylaw provides since 2002 free access to primary legal materials from Cyprus.HKLII
The Hong Kong Legal Information Institute (HKLII - pronounced 'H K Lee') HKLII's mission is to provide free access to primary legal materialsPrimary authority
A primary authority is a document that establishes the law on a particular issue, such as a case decision or legislative act. The search for applicable primary authority is an important part of the process of legal research....
from Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
(and some publicly available secondary material
Secondary authority
In law, a secondary authority is an authority purporting to explain the meaning or applicability of the actual verbatim texts of primary authorities .Some secondary authority materials are written and published by governments to explain the laws in simple,...
through computer technology. HKLII was developed and is jointly operated by the University of Hong Kong's Department of Computer Science and Faculty of Law, with the assistance of the Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII).
LII (Cornell)
The Legal Information InstituteLegal Information Institute
The Legal Information Institute is a non-profit, public service of Cornell Law School that provides no-cost access to current American and international legal research sources online at . The organization is a pioneer in the delivery of legal information online. Founded in 1992 by Peter Martin and...
at the Cornell Law School
Cornell Law School
Cornell Law School, located in Ithaca, New York, is a graduate school of Cornell University and one of the five Ivy League law schools. The school confers three law degrees...
provides free legal information for the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. It was the original LII project, founded in 1992.
NZLII
New Zealand Legal Information Institute (NZLII) is run out of AustLII but the majority of the data is provided by staff at the Universities of OtagoUniversity of Otago
The University of Otago in Dunedin is New Zealand's oldest university with over 22,000 students enrolled during 2010.The university has New Zealand's highest average research quality and in New Zealand is second only to the University of Auckland in the number of A rated academic researchers it...
and Canterbury
University of Canterbury
The University of Canterbury , New Zealand's second-oldest university, operates its main campus in the suburb of Ilam in the city of Christchurch, New Zealand...
. It contains decisions of many decision generators that are not available anywhere else, including from commercial operators. It operates using voluntary labour and grants from the New Zealand Law Foundation.
PacLII
The Pacific Islands Legal Information Institute collects and publishes legal materials from 20 Pacific Islands Countries on its website www.paclii.org which is hosted by AustLII. These countries are American SamoaAmerican Samoa
American Samoa is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the South Pacific Ocean, southeast of the sovereign state of Samoa...
, Cook Islands
Cook Islands
The Cook Islands is a self-governing parliamentary democracy in the South Pacific Ocean in free association with New Zealand...
, Federated States of Micronesia
Federated States of Micronesia
The Federated States of Micronesia or FSM is an independent, sovereign island nation, made up of four states from west to east: Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei and Kosrae. It comprises approximately 607 islands with c...
, Fiji Islands, Kiribati
Kiribati
Kiribati , officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. The permanent population exceeds just over 100,000 , and is composed of 32 atolls and one raised coral island, dispersed over 3.5 million square kilometres, straddling the...
, Marshall Islands
Marshall Islands
The Republic of the Marshall Islands , , is a Micronesian nation of atolls and islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, just west of the International Date Line and just north of the Equator. As of July 2011 the population was 67,182...
, Nauru
Nauru
Nauru , officially the Republic of Nauru and formerly known as Pleasant Island, is an island country in Micronesia in the South Pacific. Its nearest neighbour is Banaba Island in Kiribati, to the east. Nauru is the world's smallest republic, covering just...
, Niue
Niue
Niue , is an island country in the South Pacific Ocean. It is commonly known as the "Rock of Polynesia", and inhabitants of the island call it "the Rock" for short. Niue is northeast of New Zealand in a triangle between Tonga to the southwest, the Samoas to the northwest, and the Cook Islands to...
, Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...
, Pitcairn Island, Samoa
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...
, Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of . The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal...
, Tokelau
Tokelau
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400...
, Tonga
Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...
, Tuvalu
Tuvalu
Tuvalu , formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa and Fiji. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls...
, and Vanuatu
Vanuatu
Vanuatu , officially the Republic of Vanuatu , is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some east of northern Australia, northeast of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and southeast of the Solomon Islands, near New Guinea.Vanuatu was...
.
The documents on the PacLII website consist mainly of primary materials such as court decisions and legislation but also include decisions of various tribunals and panels or secondary information such as court rules or bench books. There is additionally a Pacific Islands Treaty Database.
PacLII is an initiative of the University of the South Pacific
University of the South Pacific
The University of the South Pacific is a public university with a number of locations spread throughout a dozen countries in Oceania. It is an international centre for teaching and research on Pacific culture and environment. USP's academic programmes are recognised worldwide, attracting students...
School of Law with assistance from AustLII. PacLII is a signatory to the Montreal Declaration on Public Access to Law and participates in the Free Access to Law movement, a grouping of a number of world wide organizations committed to publishing and providing access to the law for free. PacLII is based at the Emalus Campus of the USP in Port Vila
Port Vila
Port Vila is the capital and largest city of Vanuatu. Situated on the south coast of the island of Efate, in Shefa Province, the city population at last was 29,356, an increase of 55% on the previous census result . This suggests a 2007 population of about 40,000 or around 65% of the province's...
, Vanuatu
Vanuatu
Vanuatu , officially the Republic of Vanuatu , is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some east of northern Australia, northeast of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and southeast of the Solomon Islands, near New Guinea.Vanuatu was...
.
USP School of Law is has its headquarters in Port Vila. Its students come from more than 12 Pacific Island countries. Most of them do not have easy access to the legal materials from across the region which they need to undertake their studies. PacLII was started by the School of Law as a means to overcoming the tyrannies of distance. It has grown to become a service to governments, legal professionals, NGOs, students, academics and members of the public and has been widely recognized as an example of excellence in promoting access to legal information.
SAFLII
Southern African Legal Information Institute (SAFLII) provides free legal information from 16 countries in Southern Africa from Angola to Zimbabwe including South AfricaSouth Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
.
See also
- 4th Law via the Internet Conference in Montreal on 3 October 2002 representatives:
- Australasian Legal Information Institute
- British and Irish Legal Information Institute
- LexUM/Canadian Legal Information Institute
- Hong Kong Legal Information Institute
- Legal Information Institute (Cornell)
- Pacific Islands Legal Information Institute
- University of the West Indies Faculty of Law Library
- Wits University School of Law
- Representatives present at the 5th Law via the Internet Conference in Sydney, November 2003,