May 6, 2007 Law Librarian Rubens Medina Receives 2007 Federal 100 Award

Law Librarian of Congress Rubens Medina has received a Federal 100 Award for shepherding the 2006 upgrade of the Global Legal Information Network (GLIN), which gave legal researchers access to nearly 130,000 laws and related legal materials from nations across Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas – searchable in 13 languages. The Federal 100 Awards recognize individuals from government, industry and academia who significantly influence how the federal government buys, uses or manages information technology. Federal 100 winners are recognized for their risk-taking, vision and pioneering spirit in the federal IT community. Winners are nominated by Federal Computer Week readers and selected by an independent panel of judges. “The Federal 100 are people who drive change, who make government smarter and more efficient,” said Federal Computer Week Publisher Anne Armstrong. Medina, who attended the Awards Gala at the Ritz Carlton, in McLean, Va., accepted the award on behalf of the entire GLIN team from the Law Library of Congress. This year’s event can be accessed at www.fcw.com/events/fed100/2007/index.asp. GLIN is a noncommercial, cooperatively built database of legal information contributed by governments of countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. With increasing globalization and the growing complexity of lawmaking around the world, foreign, comparative and international legal information is in high demand. “GLIN serves this need,” Medina said, “and can offer officials in all countries a combination of experiences and specific methods of legal information processing.” GLIN can be accessed at www.glin.gov. The mission of the Law Library of Congress, the de facto national law library, is to make its resources available to members of Congress, the Supreme Court, other branches of the U.S. Government, and the global legal community, and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of law for future generations. The Law Library, celebrating its 175th Anniversary during 2007, contains the world’s largest collection of law books and other resources from all countries and provides online databases and guides to legal information worldwide through its Web site at www.loc.gov/law.