Library Associations Join Nolo Press
in Self-Help Books Suit
Nolo Press filed a petition for declaratory judgment in Travis County (Tex.) District Court March 17 against the Texas Unauthorized Practice of Law Committee, which has been investigating the publisher of popular self-help legal books. The Texas Library Association, the American Association of Law Libraries, and six concerned individual Texans filed the suit jointly with Nolo.
In the lawsuit, Nolo expects to establish that—contrary to the charges brought by the committee—self-help books and software do not practice law because they do not have clients. The suit also hopes to establish that a prohibition on plain-English self-help law resources would violate the Texas Constitution.
Nolo attorney Pete Kennedy, of the Austin law firm of George and Donaldson, said in a press release that “the UPLC’s efforts to remove these useful publications from the stores and libraries in Texas runs contrary to this state’s long and proud history of individuality, independence, and self-reliance.”
Posted March 22, 1999.
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