The Law Library accepts rare books as gifts and occasionally purchases rare material based on the following criteria.
Criteria for Acquisition: General Materials
Books dated as follows, although these dates are not absolute:
- Books and scholarly articles on a single topic printed in the United States before 1870.
- Books and scholarly articles on a single topic printed outside the United States before 1800.
- Publications done in intervals (such as journals, magazines, and reporters) printed in the United States or elsewhere before 1820.
- Books of substantial historical interest, regardless of date of printing that cannot be obtained on the open market, either as in-print publications or as reasonably priced and easily available secondhand books.
- Books that have a unique value or quality by virtue of their physical publication (e. g., limited editions, private printings, etc.), their past ownership or association, or internal notes or annotations of significance.
- Books with a significant market value.
- English nominatives that are original editions of English named reports covering cases before 1870.
Criteria for Acquisition: Arkansas Legal Materials
- Books important to the legal history of Arkansas. This category includes biographies of Arkansas lawyers and jurists.
- Pre-1950 Arkansas legal treatises.
- Arkansas state and territorial primary law published 1850 or earlier.
- ACTS OF ARKANSAS published before 1900.
- Arkansas legal periodicals.
- ARK-LAW, the Arkansas Law School yearbooks.
- Exceptions to these criteria are made for items of significant value.