January 02, 2013
Bankruptcy Law Practitioners: Internet Resources Aren't Just for Consumers
The Internet has a variety of resources on bankruptcy law, and many of them are targeted to the consumer. However, there are resources valuable for the practitioner, whether you are an experienced bankruptcy attorney or new to this practice.
Barbara Fritschel
State Bar of Wisconsin Bankruptcy-related Resources
A variety of bankruptcy law resources are available through the State Bar website, WisBar.org. A search on WisBar will bring up several Wisconsin Lawyer™ articles and other practice resources, including standards of review in the Seventh Circuit and common pitfalls in bankruptcy appeals.
Subscribers to State Bar of Wisconsin PINNACLE® Books UnBound, a subscription-based online library, can also access bankruptcy-related chapters of various titles in this library, such as Wisconsin Business Advisor: Collections & Bankruptcy, Wisconsin Attorney’s Desk Reference, and Wisconsin Judicial Benchbook, Vol. II: Civil. PINNACLE also offers several on-demand programs, including BYP Bankruptcy Basics, Beyond the Basics and the Annual Update (Eastern/Western District).
Jan. 2, 2012 – The next time you are searching for bankruptcy resources online, try one of these sites.
Eastern District/Western District Bankruptcy Courts – While these pages are likely well known to practitioners as a source for local rules, it is worth the time to regularly explore the Eastern District and Western District bankruptcy court pages. Recently, both courts have added opinion searches, which can be limited to a particular judge. While the search engines are not as powerful as Westlaw or Lexis, it is free and upgrades are in progress.
Rules and Code – Copies of the bankruptcy rules are available from Cornell’s Legal Information Institute. This is a great site to download the rules changes, which are effective annually on Dec. 1. This year, changes have been made to Bankruptcy Rules 1007, 2015, 3001, 7054, and 7056. The Cornell search function is an easy way to search the Bankruptcy Code online and also offers an RSS feed for updates to Title 11.
U. S. Trustees – The U.S. Trustees’ website provides copies of the United States Program and Practices Manual and Means Testing Information, which includes data and multipliers by date when the case is filed.
Bankruptcy Law Project – The Bankruptcy Law Project is a free online database that has both current and historical versions of the Bankruptcy Code. Enter a date from 1980 forward to see how the code read on a specific day.
American Bankruptcy Institute – The American Bankruptcy Institute links to the Bankruptcy Case Blog, legislative updates under consideration by Congress, and online continuing educations programs.
Blogs – There are more than 200 blogs dealing with bankruptcy law. While most blogs are for consumers, there are two blogs practitioners might want to follow: Credit Slips and National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center. Law professors post information about credit, finance, and bankruptcy to Credit Slips. The National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center blog focuses on current cases. A noteworthy law firm blog is business-finance-restructuring.weil.com from Weil, Gotshal & Manges. It was nominated for the ABA best 100 law blogs of 2012.
About the Author
Barbara Fritschel, U.W.-Madison 1980, is the federal courts librarian for the Eastern District of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.
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