Victory for the Consumer Caucus

On Saturday, November 5th, the AALL Executive Board unanimously approved a motion to recognize the new AALL Caucus on Consumer Advocacy. This wonderful result was the culmination of efforts led by Michael Ginsborg that built on years of work by other law library consumer advocates: Kendall Svengalis, Jack Montgomery, and Joe Stephens, who continue to guide and inspire us. We should also express appreciation for the instrumental endorsement of the Caucus by the Private Law Libraries Special Interest Section under the leadership of Steve Lastres. As a long-time member of the Academic Law Libraries Special Interest Section, I would have liked to have seen ALL-SIS join PLL-SIS in endorsing the petition. That did not happen. However, no law library today is immune from the pressures of the marketplace, and we need to stand together in advocating for the needs of our institutions and users. I hope that the ALL-SIS leadership will come around to this point of view. In the meantime, however, although I know that the really hard work is still ahead of us, it feels good to savor the victory.