Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, (AANHPI) is celebrated throughout the month of May. It originated in 1978 when Congress passed a joint resolution that became Pub. L. 95-419. This law directed the President to issue a proclamation designating the week beginning on May 4, 1979 as Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week. Pub. L. 95-419 was amended in 1990 by Pub. L. 101-283 which expanded the observance of Asian/Pacific American Heritage week to the month of May in 1990. Finally, in 1992, Congress passed Pub. L. 102-450 which permanently designated May of each year as “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month.”
This informative CRS Report Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month Speech Resources: Fact Sheet provides excellent summary of both Public Laws and Proclamations pertaining to Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month. Although May is the designated month to commemorate Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month, it is not meant to be the only time of year. Find resources to learn, teach, experience, and reflect on AANHPI history and heritage beyond May.
UConn Law Library will be closed Monday, May 26th, in observance of Memorial Day. Memorial day became a federal holiday in 1971 , and is intended to honor those who have died during the performance of their military duties. Connecticut General Statutes Section 1-4 designates the last Monday in May as Memorial Day or Decoration Day.
Memorial Day, originally known as Decoration Day, was first celebrated after the Civil War, to commemorate both the Confederate and Union soldiers who fought and died in the war. Over the years, as Decoration Day became Memorial Day, it came to include American military personnel who perished in all wars.
President Lyndon Johnson proclaimed Waterloo, New York as the Birthplace of Memorial Day. This proclamation noted that the patriotic tradition of observing Memorial Day began one hundred years ago in Waterloo, New York. Boalsburg, Pennsylvania also claims to have held the first observance, dating back to October 1864. Several other towns also declare they were the first to hold an observance.
Curious to see when exactly Connecticut first declared Decoration Day a legal holiday. I turned to HeinOnline’s Session Laws Library.
Narrowing the jurisdiction to Connecticut, I searched for “Decoration Day” in italics, and found the answer in the index: Decoration Day- Made a Legal Holiday. From here, I found the Public Act quickly after this search. The answer? 1874!
For more information on Memorial Day, check out this blog from In Custodia Legis from the Library of Congress, as well as this blog from UConn Today, Memorial Day and UConn: War and Peace Through the Decades showing a University of Connecticut’s connection to the holiday
Memorial Day is commemorated in many ways in Connecticut, ranging from community parades to backyard cook-outs, fireworks and formal ceremonies. No matter how you spend this day, remember those who’ve lost their lives to preserve our freedom. It bears mentioning that this blog and the freedom to publish it would likely not be possible without the sacrifices of those who died fighting for our country.
Summer is upon us! Whether you are preparing for a summer internship or post-graduate plans, there are online resources available to you. Here’s what you need to know about access to Bloomberg Law, Lexis Nexis, Westlaw and library databases. Need a dose of research help? Research & Instruction librarians are available throughout the summer to assist with job or internship questions!
Westlaw
Returning Students
You can use Thomson Reuters products, including Westlaw®, Practical Law, and CoCounsel over the summer for non-commercial research. You can turn to these resources to gain understanding and build confidence in your research skills, but you cannot use them in situations where you are billing a client. Examples of permissible uses for your academic password include the following:
Summer coursework
Research assistant assignments
Law Review or Journal research
Moot Court research
Non-Profit work
Clinical work
Externship sponsored by the school
You do not have to do anything to gain access to these tools over the summer. If you have any questions, please contact your Thomson Reuters Academic Account Manager.
Graduates
You can use Thomson Reuters products, including Westlaw, CoCounsel and Practical Law, for 6-months after graduation. Your “Grad Elite” access gives you 60-hours of usage per month to gain understanding and build confidence in your research skills. While you cannot use it in situations where you are billing a client, Thomson Reuters encourages you to use these tools to build your knowledge of the law and prepare for your bar exam.
Lexis access continues through the summer with no restrictions on time or usage.
Graduates
After graduation, you will have access to Lexis until December 31, 2025 with no registration required, or restrictions. Use the same Lexis account log on credentials you used in law school. On July 1, 2025, graduates’ accounts will automatically switch to our graduate portal. This customized version of the Law School homepage includes graduate-specific content and choice of a graduation gift, including extended access to a selection of products from LexisNexis® such as Law360, Practical Guidance, or a LexisNexis eBook. Graduates have access to most of the same content and features available during law school, excluding public records, Protégé, Law360, and Practical Guidance.
Graduates’ Lexis Rewards points will expire on June 30, 2025; points must be spent or donated before that date.
Aspire Program
The LexisNexis ASPIRE Program provides 12 months of free access to federal and state cases, codes, regulations, law reviews, Shepard’s® Citation Service, and Matthew Bender® treatises to graduates who are engaged in verifiable 501(c)(3) public interest work.
Bloomberg Law
Returning Students
Bloomberg access continues through the summer, this access is automatic (no registration required) and is unlimited and unrestricted.
Graduates
2025 graduates have continuous access for six months following graduation, through November 30, 2025. This access is automatic (no registration required) and is unlimited and unrestricted (if students register for Bloomberg Law access before graduation). For any questions on using Bloomberg Law, students and graduates continue to have free access to the 24/7 Help Desk at (888) 560-2529 or help@bloomberglaw.com.
Alumni are always welcome to use the library and seek research help from the reference librarians. If you stay in the area as you begin your legal careers, remember that the majority of our electronic resources can be accessed by any patron from within the library, including Westlaw. We look forward to see you back in the library!
The UConn Law Library wants to extend our congratulations to UConn Law Class of 2025! Remember although you will be transitioning from the role of student to alumni, please remember that the law library wants to help you continue your path to that of lawyer.
Studying for the Bar? Check out our summer library hours so you can maximize your study time.
Still making employment decisions? Use the tools in our Career Resources Research Guide to research potential employers and the right fit!
Research question? Don’t forget, you can always chat, call or email a law librarian a reference question throughout your entire legal career!
We are always happy to help you find resources and many of our databases are available for in-library use – that means you will have to come back and visit!
Congratulations and we wish you the best of luck on the bar exam and your legal practice.!
The first week of May is also the start of law school finals. The Law Library, along with Student Affairs and the Mental Health Counseling team, would like to remind our law students, faculty, and staff about the importance of supporting their mental health and encourage everyone to practice wellness and self-care. The Student Wellness Research Guide contains helpful online resources and books available at the law library related to the topics of stress-relief, wellness, and mindfulness with a particular focus on law school and/or the legal profession.
If you find yourself feeling overwhelmed by exam stress, remember that the law library is there to help you every step of the way. UConn law library has a team of knowledgeable reference librarians ready to assist students with their research needs. Whether struggling to find relevant materials for a paper or need guidance on navigating complex legal databases, reference librarians are there to help, reach out to us! We are passionate about connecting students with the resources they need to succeed!
UConn Law Library is excited to launch a new series of student-authored posts with a thought piece on a timely topic – presidential immunity. In this inaugural post, UConn Law 3L William Roberts comments on the current debates surrounding the concept of presidential immunity. As courtrooms and headlines continue to spotlight this issue, this piece offers a sharp-well-researched overview that invites readers to think critically about the limits of executive power. We are proud to feature this work and look forward to sharing more student perspectives in the weeks ahead.
William Roberts, UConn School of Law class of 2025
I am a Teacher’s Assistant for Professor Chill’s Legal Profession course. We are required to take a course in professional responsibility because in 1974 the ABA mandated this course in response to the Watergate scandal.1 In the Watergate scandal, President Nixon ordered the Attorney General to fire the special prosecutor to protect the President’s allies from a criminal investigation. Twenty-nine lawyers were convicted or pleaded guilty to perjury, fraud, obstruction of justice, campaign law violations, and conspiracy. According to Lerman, “[t]he nation was horrified to find that so many elite lawyers had facilitated massive corruption in government.”2 Professional responsibility courses were deemed necessary to “prevent another shameful episode.”3
Prosecutorial independence has been a critical component for upholding the rule of law. Removing politics from prosecution was a central reason in creating the Department of Justice to begin with and prosecutorial independence is deeply entrenched in the nation’s history.4 And yet, in what can only be described as a bullshit5 opinion, the so-called originalists of the Court—Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh—obliterated the very concept of prosecutorial independence in their presidential immunity ruling by overtly stating for the first time in history that “[t]he President may discuss potential investigations and prosecutions with his Attorney General and other Justice Department officials. . . .”6 The Roberts Five decided this specifically in reference to an allegation that Trump repeatedly threatened to fire the Acting Attorney General for personal political reasons—the very same action that horrified the nation and forced Nixon to resign!
The dissent laid out the stark consequences for allowing such an irresponsible vision of Presidential immunity. Sotomayor writes, “[t]his new official-acts immunity now ‘lies about like a loaded weapon’ for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation.”7 This warning is entirely obvious to anyone who values the rule of law. Indeed, not three months into his second term President Trump has already realized this warning. He—very expressly and very publicly—directed the DoJ to investigate private citizens that Trump personally disagrees with. The first is Miles Taylor, who exercised his First Amendment rights and published an anonymous book that said he was part of the secret “resistance” to President Trump. 8 The second is Chris Krebs, a former Trump official in his first term who took his oath to the Constitution seriously and refused to denounce the legitimacy of the 2020 election that Trump lost. 9 The Roberts Five, the White House, and Trump’s sycophants will have us believe that we must take Trump’s word at face value, that these orders are for the best interest of the nation to punish the definitely real crimes the individuals have committed. Bullshit. 10 There is zero evidence that either of them committed any sort of crime. 11 Indeed, Trump paradoxically accuses Miles Taylor of simultaneously both disclosing sensitive information and fabricating those stories he disclosed. The 2020 election has been endlessly litigated and zero evidence has ever been produced of election-determinative impropriety. The real reason these two are being targeted is because Trump personally dislikes them. We do not have to pretend that this is anything but political persecution.
It cannot be overstated how instrumental the Presidential Immunity decision was in creating this overt politicization of the DoJ. In a Reuter’s interview in 2018, Legal Ethics law professor Rebecca Roiphe of New York Law School said that the norm of prosecutorial independence was “stronger than people make it out to be.” 12 She noted Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein’s efforts to preserve the principle of DoJ independence, and stated that she believed the institution was strong enough to withstand Trump’s attacks. Roiphe’s prediction turned out to be mostly correct. Trump did, in fact, try many times to direct investigations into his political opponents in his first term. 13 While some investigations did indeed occur, such as against Andrew McCabe, most of them did not, resisted by DoJ officials who believed in the importance of prosecutorial independence and the rule of law. And certainly, Trump never signed an Executive Order officially directing the DoJ to investigate individuals.
However, both Roiphe and Fordham Law Ethics Professor Bruce Green admitted that in 2018 the concept of prosecutorial independence was not yet settled by Supreme Court precedence. Well, the Roberts Five settled the issue. And now we’re here. Second term Trump wasted no time in starting politically motivated criminal prosecutions green lit by the Supreme Court.
How can any DoJ official resist now when the Supreme Court explicitly abolished the concept of prosecutorial independence that our nation cherished for so long? The ramifications of the immunity decision are as damaging as they are obvious.
The oldest of the Roberts Five is Justice Clarence Thomas, born in 1948. He graduated from Yale Law School in 1974, the same year the ABA mandated professional responsibility courses. Perhaps Thomas was not required to take a professional responsibility course, but all the others certainly were. By judicial fiat, the Roberts Five have created a whole new wave of political corruption by lawyers, completely ignoring the lessons learned from Watergate. Only this time, I fear the nation at large will not recoil in horror as we did half a century ago. At the very least, I will.
About the Author
William Roberts is a 3L at UConn School of Law. He has both undergraduate and graduate degrees in chemistry and will be entering the field of patent law upon graduation.
References
1Lisa G. Lerman, et al., Ethical Problems in the Practice of Law 44–46 (2023).
2Id.
3Id.
4Andrew Nisco, Note, The Independent Attorney General: An Analysis of Why the Office Should be Insulated from Presidential Political Imperatives, 36 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 743, 759 (2023) (“[P]rosecutorial independence was of such paramount importance that Congress created a department to insulate prosecutors from political influence.”); Bruce A. Green & Rebecca Roiphe, Can the President Control the Department of Justice?, Ala. L. Rev., Forthcoming, Fordham Law Legal Studies Research Paper, at 38–68 (Feb. 20, 2018) https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3126856 (detailing the nation’s history of prosecutorial independence).
5If you’ll forgive the vulgarity, this term refers to “statements by a speaker who is indifferent to the truth or falsity of what is espoused.” Michael L. Smith, Is Originalism Bullshit?, 28 Lewis & Clark L. Rev. 779, 788 (2025) (quoting Harry G Frankfurt, On Bullshit, in The Importance of What We Care About: Philosophical Essays 130 (1988)). The speaker is not misrepresenting facts, which may or may not be true, but is instead misrepresenting the speaker’s intentions. Id. In the legal context, Smith argues this term applies to decisions in which the Court has started with a conclusion in mind and worked backwards from there. See id. at 809–10 (“Unlike the genuine interpreters, each of these [disingenuous] actors had a conclusion in mind before embarking on their originalist analysis.”) The dissent to the immunity case discusses the majority’s complete lack of historical and textual basis for their decision. Trump v. U.S., 603 U.S. 593. 659–67 (2025) (Sotomayor, J., dissenting). This strongly suggests that the majority—who often stylize themselves as originalists and/or textualists—indeed started out with the result in mind, “Trump must be immune” and worked backwards from there.
6Trump v. U.S., 603 U.S. 593, 620 (2024).
7Id. at 684 (Sotomayor, J., dissenting) (quoting Korematsu v. U.S., 323 U.S. 214, 246 (1944)).
8White House, Presidential Memoranda, Addressing Risks Associated with an Egregious Leaker and Disseminator of Falsehoods, April 9, 2025 https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/addressing-risks-associated-with-an-egregious-leaker-and-disseminator-of-falsehoods/.
9White House, Presidential Memoranda, Addressing Risks from Chris Krebs and Government Censorship, April 9, 2025 https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/addressing-risks-from-chris-krebs-and-government-censorship/.
10See supra, note 5.
11Aaron Blake, Trump Crosses the Rubicon on Ordering Investigations of Foes: About as Stunning as the Concept of Trump’s Executive Actions Targeting Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor is Their Substance, Wash. Post Online (Apr. 10, 2025) https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/04/10/trump-doj-ivestigations-krebs-taylor/.
12 Alison Frankel, DoJ Independence, Entrenched and Ingrained, Will Survive Trump: Historian, Law Prof, Reuters (May 21, 2018) https://www.reuters.com/article/world/doj-independence-entrenched-and-ingrained-will-survive-trump-historian-law-p-idUSKCN1IM2DO/.
13Adam Klasfeld, Ryan Goodman, Chronology of a Dozen Times Trump Pushed to Prosecute His Perceived Enemies, Just Security (Sept. 3, 2024) https://www.justsecurity.org/98703/chronology-trump-justice-department/.
As this semester concludes, we want to pay tribute to our graduating library student employees! Sinead Brennan-Gatica, Farah Jean, Olivia Kaminski and Josh Maddox have been instrumental in keeping the library services running! They assist with faculty research and staff the desk on weekends, nights, and during finals. They assist students with course reserves, printing, scanning and library computers and are a terrific source of information about the library and law school. In the words of Anne Rajotte, Associate Director of Research, Instruction, and Scholarship:
Sinead and Olivia are a vital part of our student employee team. As our weekend workers, we would not have been able to be open Saturdays and Sundays without them. We will miss them!
Our Research Assistants work behind the scenes conducting legal research for the law school faculty members, greatly contributing to the research needs of the law school, law library and society as a whole. Tanya Johnson and Adam Mackie note the contribution Josh, Farah and Olivia have made to the law library:
Farah and Josh have been the backbone of our research assistant team for the past two years. Last May, we were also fortunate to have Olivia join us, and her contributions quickly became an integral part of our work. The quality of their efforts has enabled us to meet the research needs of our faculty, contributing to the reputation of the library and ultimately, UConn Law. We can’t thank them enough and wish them all the best with what comes next!
To all of our graduating 3L’s, thank you! We wish you all the best and hope you stay in touch as you embark upon your legal careers! We will miss you all!
Senator Gaylord Nelson promoted Earth Day, calling upon students to fight for environmental causes and oppose environmental degradation. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was formed later that year and legislation was passed to increase recycling and conservation efforts.
For ideas on what you can do to protect the environment check out the Earth Day page at the EPA and Earth day.org for activities taking place throughout the world and to register for an Earth Day activity in Connecticut or your home state! Check out the as well. In the meantime, enjoy the weather and UConn Law School campus!
Image courtesy Alexis Rockman, created for Earthday.org
Keeping track of executive orders (EOs) and other policy decisions is vital for remaining current with the evolving legal environment, they are critical to understanding how the shifting political landscape will impact national governance, law, and policy.
UConn Law Library features a new research guide titled Presidential Actions Resources and Trackers to resources that help track, analyze, and interpret the executive orders and policy changes that will define the new administration. This resource includes executive order resources, trackers, federal funding, state resources and advocacy info that will help you stay informed and engaged with these critical developments.
Also featured are links to pages for resources geared towards immigrants and LGBTQIA+ alike to understand their rights during our current political era. Be sure to check out our Advocacy Organizations and Connecticut Actions tabs to learn more about how your involvement can help marginalized groups find peace and prosperity.
UConn Law Library is highlighting Women’s History month by showcasing resources focusing on women and the law.
We March On – Celebrating 100 Years of Women’s Suffrage Exhibit was designed to commemorate the 100th anniversary of this achievement. The online exhibit features a historical narrative, recognizes the efforts of the suffrage movement in Connecticut, and showcases contributions to women’s equality by women at UConn School of Law.
Originally produced as six large banners, which were on display at the UConn Law Library, We March On was intended as a traveling exhibit. The online version was created during COVID so that more people could learn about these important individuals and events. Accompanied by stunning period photos and powerful quotes, it’s a riveting view of this movement.
The We March On research guide contains additional information about women at UConn Law, the Equal Rights Amendment and a multitude of resources dedicated to this subject.
Keeping track of executive orders (EOs) and other policy decisions is vital for remaining current with the evolving legal environment, they are critical to understanding how the shifting political landscape will impact national governance, law, and policy.