Located in Jerome L. Greene Hall on the university's Morningside Heights campus, it holds over 1.3 million volumes, and as of 2021[update], it is the second largest academic law library in the United States.
"[3] Its collections grew to 95,581 volumes by 1921, when the library began an effort to rapidly expand in preparation for Columbia Law School's centennial.
The Columbia University Law Library Association was formed, with the goal of encouraging donations, creating a student loan collection for students unable to purchase their own books, and protecting the library's existing collections.
[4] Notable acquisitions throughout the library's history include the von Richthofen library, which consisted of 4,250 volumes on local laws in medieval Germany and was purchased in 1929;[5] and the 1951 donation of some 1,100 volumes on copyright from Edwin P. Kilroe, assistant district attorney of New York County and legal counsel at the Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation.
[8] Other rare items in the possession of the library include a 1482 copy of the Corpus Juris Civilis, one of 15 printed drafts of the Constitution of India, and 22 incunabula (including three copies of Nicholas Statham's Abridgment, as well as volumes from the private collections of Richard Harison, John Jay, Samuel Johnson, James Kent, and Melvin Krulewitch.