Mario Diaz Cruz Collection

The Mario Diaz Cruz Collection is the contents of the law firm library of Mario Diaz Cruz, Sr., a prominent Cuban attorney who practiced law in Havana from 1915 to 1958. It covers many primary and secondary Cuban legal materials, such as La Jurisprudencia al Dia (the Supreme Court decisions since 1913) and Colección Legislativa, and also has several primary and secondary sources from civil law countries with significant historic ties to Cuba - such as France, Spain, and Italy – and materials from European and South American countries as well as the United States. It contains complete collections of private law journals such as Revista de Derecho Privado (Spain), Revista de Legislación y Jurisprudencia (Spain), Rivista di Diritto Privato (Italy), Revue Trimestrelle de Droit Civil (France) and foreign law: Nouvelle Revue Historique de Droit Francais et Etranger (France). Titles from Cuba include Revista Cubana de Derecho, Revista del Colegio de Abogados, and Oriente Revista General de Derecho. The Mario Diaz Cruz Collection contains various resources that demonstrate the evolution of Cuban society prior to the revolution, and beyond. Legal materials focus private law, including commercial law, property, wills and trusts, banking, contracts and constitutional law. Additional historic documents include treatises on the Cuban sugar industry and the teaching materials used by Mario Diaz Cruz, Sr. as a professor.

The FIU Law Library acquired Mario Diaz Cruz, Sr.’s library in January 2007. After Mario Diaz Cruz, Sr.’s death in 1958, the Collection was transferred to his son, Mario Diaz Cruz, Jr., who brought it from Havana to Miami in 1959. Thereafter, the Collection was acquired by the Rainforth Foundation of Coral Gables that eventually donated the Collection to the FIU Law Library.