Restatement and Reform: A New Perspective on the Origins of the American Law Institute

1990 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. E. H. Hull
Keyword(s):  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Driving Force ◽  
Law School ◽  
University Of Pennsylvania ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
American Law ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The Law ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Law Professors

At the December, 1945, annual meeting of the Association of American Law Schools, William Draper Lewis, who had directed the American Law Institute since its founding, made a startling confession about the founding of the ALI. Everett Fraser, then president of the AALS, had enticed Lewis to speak by complimenting the former University of Pennsylvania Law School dean: “People [at the AALS] talked of a Juristic Center. In the American Law Institute you made it a reality.” There was some truth to this—Lewis was the driving force behind the creation of the ALI. Fraser nevertheless mischaracterized Lewis's achievement. According to an unpublished, recently discovered typescript of Lewis's informal remarks, Lewis chided Fraser, “you know that there is not a word of truth in what [you] said… [because in] doing what I could to establish the American Law Institute, I did not create but rather for the time being killed any attempt to establish a legal center.” Lewis conceded many members of the AALS in the early 1920s “desired to start a Judicial Center conceived of as a place where law professors could meet, usually in the summer, discuss law, carry on legal researches and write legal books.” Lewis claimed he had torpedoed that plan; he had something very different in mind for the ALI “Elihu Root and [I] used this [AALS Committee on a Juristic Center] to summon a group of prominent lawyers to meet with the members of the Committee, and that by the work of that larger group grew the American Law Institute and its Restatement of the Law… it is not true that the American Law Institute is a Juristic Center. It is what Mr. Root and I intended it to be: an organization to carry out specific legal projects for the constructive improvement of the law and its administration.”

The Proliferation of Case Method Teaching in American Law Schools: Mr. Langdell's Emblematic “Abomination,” 1890-1915

2006 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-247 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce A. Kimball
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Professional Education ◽  
Legal Education ◽  
The United States ◽  
Law School ◽  
Case Method ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
American Law ◽  
Law Professors

Case method teaching was first introduced into American higher education in 1870 by Christopher C. Langdell (1826-1906) of Harvard Law School (HLS), where it became closely associated with—and emblematic of—a set of academic meritocratic reforms. Though regnant today, “the ultimate triumph of [Langdell's] system was not apparent” for many years. The vast majority of students, alumni, and law professors initially derided it as an “abomination,” and for two decades case method and the associated reforms were largely confined to Harvard. During the subsequent twenty-five years between 1890 and 1915, a national controversy ensued as to whether case method teaching—and the concomitant meritocratic reforms—would predominate in legal education and, ultimately, professional education in the United States.

scholarly journals Lost in Translation in the Law School Classroom: Assessing Required Coursework in LL.M. Programs for International Students*

2007 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 396-446 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie M. Spanbauer
Keyword(s):  
International Students ◽  
Training Programs ◽  
Law School ◽  
Law Students ◽  
Degree Programs ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
School Classroom ◽  
American Law ◽  
The Law ◽  
Lost In Translation

Many law schools have opened their doors to international students, inviting them to participate in the following types of programs: (1) LL.M. programs designed exclusively or primarily for international students, (2) LL.M. programs designed primarily for U.S.-trained lawyers and law students to which international students are admitted, (3) S.J.D. and J.S.D. degree programs to which international students are admitted, (4) J.D. programs to which international students are admitted, and (5) Intensive prelaw training programs for international students entering American law schools.

scholarly journals Educational Background and Stratification in the Legal Academy: Invasion of the Body Snatchers… or More of the Same?

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather A. Haveman
Keyword(s):  
School Culture ◽  
Educational Background ◽  
Law School ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
Advanced Degrees ◽  
Legal Scholarship ◽  
Arts And Sciences ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Law ◽  
Law Professors

*Abstract*: Since the 1960s, law schools have seen an influx of faculty with graduate training and research presences in fields outside the law – primarily in the social sciences, statistics, and the humanities, but also in biology and medicine – which has brought “interdisciplinarity” into law schools, in the form of scholarship under the banners of “law and [ ]” or “critical [ ] studies.” As their names suggest, these lines of inquiry either seek to extend traditional legal scholarship with complementary insights from external disciplines or else seek to question (if not overturn) traditional legal scholarship based on such insights. The rise of interdisciplinarity has been discussed in depth, with some scholars arguing that the rise of interdisciplinarity has strengthened the legal academy by broadening legal curricula and legal scholarship beyond traditional disciplinary law, while others aver that the rise of interdisciplinarity has reduced the autonomy of law in the university by introducing “alien” ideologies and practices. To trace this phenomenon, we use data-science methods to gather and analyze “big data” on the educational backgrounds of all faculty who held tenured and tenure-track positions in all accredited law schools in the United States in the 2011-12 academic year. Our analysis reveals a persistent increase in law-school faculty with PhDs, but most of those are faculty with both PhDs and JDs. This suggests that law schools have not been invaded by PhD-toting “pod people” importing alien values and practices from the arts and sciences Rather than reducing the autonomy of the law, the influx of PhD-trained faculty is more likely to be promoting an intellectual culture and academic practices that are a hybrid of the traditional legal academy and the arts and sciences, which involves taking only selected external elements and adapting them to fit traditional law-school culture and practices, rather than adopting them wholesale to replace traditional law-school culture and practices. Such hybridization would yield more of (almost) the same culture and practices. Our analysis also reveals that although PhD-trained faculty are concentrated in the most prestigious law schools, the influx of PhD-trained faculty has trickled down the ranks to many less prestigious schools. This suggests that PhD credentials have become an important axis of competition in the law school market, in which prospective law professors increasingly accumulate advanced degrees to compete for law-school positions, and law schools increasingly hire candidates with multiple advanced degrees to compete in prestige and media rankings. Finally, our analysis shows that male law professors are far more likely than their female counterparts to hold PhDs, but male professors are also far more likely than their female counterparts to be employed by top-tier law schools when they do not hold PhDs. The gender gap in the stratification of law faculty across the law-school prestige hierarchy indicates that even though the training of legal academics has changed, patterns of inequality in achievement have persisted.

The Principle, Politics, and Finances of Introducing Academic Merit as the Standard of Hiring for “the teaching of law as a career,” 1870–1900

2006 ◽  
Vol 31 (03) ◽  
pp. 617-648 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce A. Kimball
Keyword(s):  
Professional Practice ◽  
Law School ◽  
Professional Experience ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Professional Schools ◽  
Class Rank ◽  
Academic Fields ◽  
American Law ◽  
Academic Merit ◽  
Law Professors

Compared to the practice in other professional schools and academic fields at universities, law professors are hired at a young age based primarily upon their academic merit determined through grades, class rank, and school rank. This emphasis upon narrowly defined academic merit—apart from achievement demonstrated through original scholarship or experience in professional practice—first emerged during “the professionalization of the American law professor” between 1870 and 1900 at Harvard Law School (HLS). Though normative today, this outcome was neither necessary nor uncontested. In the late nineteenth century the new standard of hiring faculty according to their academic merit was energetically opposed by those favoring the antecedent standard of professional experience and reputation. Only when financial considerations counterbalanced that traditional standard did hiring decisions tip in favor of the new principle. Not until the early 1900s, when the second generation of academic meritocrats dominated the HLS faculty, did the new hiring standard become unequivocally established as policy in the school and, by extension, in legal education.

How institutional and ecological forces shape the career profiles of organizational leaders: An analysis of US law school deans, 1894–2009

2020 ◽  
pp. 001872672091596
Author(s):  
Young-Chul Jeong ◽  
Huseyin Leblebici ◽  
Ohjin Kwon
Keyword(s):  
Law School ◽  
Social Forces ◽  
Organizational Leaders ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
Late 19Th Century ◽  
Social Transformations ◽  
The Us ◽  
American Law ◽  
The One ◽  
Degree Of Similarity

How do macro social forces shape the career profiles of organizational leaders? The aim of the article is to answer this question by examining how institutional and ecological forces have influenced the careers of law school deans in the US from the late 19th century to the present. Specifically, we focus on the coexistence of two social forces—professionalization and the diversity of an organizational population. On the one hand, we view professionalization as a converging institutional force that promotes homogeneity among leader career profiles. The diversity of an organizational population, on the other hand, is viewed as a diverging ecological force that increases heterogeneity among leader career profiles. We show how these two opposing forces have left different imprints on leader career profiles with a unique career data of 1396 deans in American law schools from 1894 to 2009. We utilize optimal matching analysis to assess the degree of similarity (or dissimilarity) among deans’ career sequences and test our hypotheses. This study contributes to our understanding of the link between macro social transformations and leader career profiles.

Influences of New England Law on the Middle Colonies

1983 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 238-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
George L. Haskins
Keyword(s):  
New England ◽  
The United States ◽  
Law School ◽  
University Of Pennsylvania ◽  
Mother Country ◽  
The World ◽  
Middle Colonies ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Law ◽  
The University

On October 3, 1881, William Henry Rawle, the distinguished Philadelphia lawyer and scholar, addressed students at the University of Pennsylvania Law School hoping to illustrate, ‘in a very general and elementary way,’ the differences between the growth of English and early Pennsylvania jurisprudence. ‘It would have been more interesting and more broadly useful,’ Rawle apologized to his audience, ‘if the attempt could have been extended to embrace the other colonies which afterwards became the United States, for there would have been not only the contrast between the mother country and her colonies, but the contrast between the colonies themselves.’ Rawle was confident that such an examination would have revealed how ‘in some cases, one colony followed or imitated another in its alteration of the law which each had brought over, and how, in others, the law was changed in one colony to suit its needs, all unconscious of similar changes in another.’ ‘Unhappily,’ Rawle explained, ‘this must be the History of the Future for the materials have as yet been sparingly given to the world.’

scholarly journals The gathering momentum for animal rights

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
David FAVRE
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
The United States ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
The Past ◽  
Substantial Progress ◽  
The Law ◽  
Law Professors ◽  
Made In

The focus of this article is to track the progress that has been made on behalf of<br />animals within the legal institutions of the United States. While there is an obvious focus on<br />the adoption of new laws, there are many steps or changes that are necessary within broader<br />legal intuitions if substantial progress is to be made in the changing and enforcing of the<br />laws. For example, at the same time that legislatures must be convinced of the need for<br />change, so must the judges believe in the new laws, otherwise enforcement of the law will be<br />not forthcoming.<br />Besides the court and the legislature, legal institutions include law schools, legal publications,<br />and the various associations of lawyers and law professors. What is the visibility and<br />credibility of animal issues within these institutions? Without progress within all aspects of<br />the legal community, success on behalf of animals is not possible. We in the United States<br />have made progress, particularly in the past ten years, but we have much yet that needs to be<br />done. By charting the progress and lack of progress in the United States, the readers in<br />Brazil and other countries will have some landmarks by which to judge the progress of the<br />issue of animal rights/welfare within their own country.

scholarly journals How Should We Assess Interviewing and Counseling Skills?

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 57 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence Grosberg
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Law School ◽  
First Century ◽  
Counseling Skills ◽  
Gold Standard Method ◽  
American Law ◽  
Student’S Performance ◽  
Method Of Assessment ◽  
Law Professors

<p>The need to teach interviewing and counseling skills has long been established among clinical legal educators. Even among our non-clinical colleagues, these skills are recognized as integral to competent lawyering. While there remains considerable difference of opinion within the United States as to whether teaching such skills should be in a required course or simply be available as an elective, there is no doubt that a twenty-first century American law school must include the teaching of these skills in its curricular array.</p><p>This paper first briefly describes the structure of legal education in the United States (insofar as clinical and skills teaching is concerned) and the almost total absence of any bar admission training or apprenticeship requirements. If the law schools are not required to fully train all future lawyers and the bar admission authorities likewise disavow responsibility for doing so, should clinical law professors assume the burden? I then go on to discuss the primary clinical evaluation technique of directly observing the student's performance, sometimes referred to as the gold standard method of assessment. Against the backdrop of the assertion that it is beneficial to use multiple methods of assessment, I then describe the several methods I have used to address the question of how best to assess interviewing and counseling skills. As an aside, it becomes clear that much more empirical analysis is in order.</p>

scholarly journals Law School Learning Outcomes: Legal English Course Contribution

2021 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-146
Author(s):  
Elena Vyushkina
Keyword(s):  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Legal Education ◽  
Oral Communication ◽  
Professional Associations ◽  
Field Studies ◽  
Law School ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
Legal Writing ◽  
American Law ◽  
Russian Law

Abstract Standards of professional legal education are developed by different organizations: in some countries these are governmental bodies, in others these are professional associations. Apart from a country these standards include Learning Outcomes which shape law schools’ curricula. Both American and European standards mention, to different extent, written and oral communication in the legal context, but a number and contents of subjects directed at developing and mastering professional communicative competency differ a lot. There are disciplines totally devoted to the competency named (e.g. legal writing) as well as courses in which communicative skills are an integral constituent for their successful completion (e.g. basis of negotiations/mediation/client consultation). The article goal is to find a place and role of a Legal English (LE) course in achieving learning outcomes connected with professional communicative competence. The methodology incorporated desk and field studies. The literature review is aimed at identifying current state of affairs in American law schools, as they provide first-class legal education recognized all over the world, and in Russian law schools, as the author works in this system and is interested in its development. A questionnaire was designed to explore Russian law school graduates’ assessment of practicality of subjects they had studied for their professional activities. The analysis of literature and Internet sources allowed to specify the ways of teaching written and oral communication in American law schools and to highlight the situation in Russian legal education. It shows that the Russian system is characterized by predominance of teaching theory of substantive and procedural rules of law and lack of curriculum disciplines aimed at cultivating skills and competencies. A survey of Russian law schools’ recent graduates indicates that most of communicative, in a broad sense, skills, which they use in their everyday work, were obtained within their LE classes. So, complementing a LE course with modules devoted to different aspects of legal writing and specific patterns of lawyer-client, lawyer-lawyer, lawyer-judge communication will definitely contribute to achieving learning outcomes which are put forward by legal education standards.

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