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106-515: Stanford Law School employs more than 90 full-time and part-time faculty members and enrolls over 550 students who are working toward their Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree. Stanford Law also confers four advanced legal degrees: a Master of Laws (LL.M.), a Master of Studies in Law (M.S.L.), a Master of the Science of Law (J.S.M.), and a Doctor of the Science of Law (J.S.D.). Each fall, Stanford Law enrolls

212-873: A Juris Doctor program, applicants must have completed a minimum of two or three years of study toward a bachelor's degree and scored well on the North American Law School Admission Test . Notwithstanding the formal requirements, nearly all successful applicants have completed undergraduate degrees before admission to a JD program. The JD in Canada is considered to be a bachelor's degree qualification. All Canadian Juris Doctor programs consist of three years and have similar content in their mandatory first year courses, including public law, property law, tort law, contract law, criminal law and legal research and writing. Beyond first year and other courses required for graduation, course selection

318-429: A bar examination , except from the state of Wisconsin. United States Patent and Trademark Office also involves a specialized " Patent Bar " which requires applicants to hold a bachelor's degree or the equivalent in certain scientific or engineering fields alongside their Juris Doctor degree in order to practice in patent cases —prosecuting patent applications — before it. This additional requirement does not apply to

424-415: A 2011 study, and has achieved the second-highest (per capita) placement rate for U.S. Supreme Court clerkships, according to a 2013 finding. Stanford Law alumni have clerked for the U.S. Supreme Court every year for the past 40 years. Based on a 2012 to 2014 average, Stanford Law has also achieved the second-highest (per capita) placement rate for federal judicial clerkships, and for the class of 2014, reported

530-619: A J.D. class of approximately 180 students, giving Stanford the smallest student body of any law school ranked in the top fourteen ( T14 ). Stanford also maintains eleven full-time legal clinics, including the nation's first and most active Supreme Court litigation clinic, and offers 27 formal joint degree programs. Stanford first offered a curriculum in legal studies in 1893, when the university hired its first two law professors: former U.S. president Benjamin Harrison and Nathan Abbott - who attended Boston University School of Law . Abbott headed

636-514: A JD, graduates must pass a bar examination to be licensed to practice law. The American Bar Association does not allow an accredited JD degree to be issued in less than two years of law school studies. In the United States, the JD has the academic standing of a professional doctorate (in contrast to a research doctorate ), and is described as a "doctor's degree – professional practice" by

742-1092: A Religious Liberty Clinic, and an Intellectual Property and Innovation Clinic. The Supreme Court Litigation Clinic has successfully brought over thirty cases before the Court, making it one of the most active Supreme Court practices of any kind. The clinic has served as lead counsel or co-lead counsel on the merits in numerous cases, including Kennedy v. Louisiana (2008), Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts (2009), United States v. Windsor (2013), Riley v. California (2014), and Bourke v. Beshear (2015). Launched in 2013, Stanford's Law and Policy Lab provides further opportunities for experiential learning. The Policy Lab allows second- and third-year students to enroll in faculty-supervised policy practicums, where students work in small teams to conduct policy research and analysis for real-world clients. Topics have ranged from wildlife trafficking to prison realignment to copyright reform, and prior clients include California Attorney General Kamala Harris , Governor of California Jerry Brown ,

848-508: A bachelor's degree as a pre-requisite for virtually all students entering law school, it became a bachelor's degree in name only. The didactic approaches that resulted were revolutionary for university education and have slowly been implemented outside the United States, but only recently (since about 1997) and in stages. The degrees which resulted from this new approach, such as the MD and the JD, are just as different from their European counterparts as

954-486: A bachelor's degree for law could be due to the fact that admittance to most nineteenth-century American law schools required only satisfactory completion of high school. The degree was nevertheless somewhat controversial at the time because it was a professional training without any of the cultural or classical studies required of a degree in England, where it was necessary to gain a general BA prior to an LLB or BCL until

1060-515: A consequence of the need for practical education in law, the apprenticeship program for solicitors emerged, structured and governed by the same rules as the apprenticeship programs for the trades. The training of solicitors by a five-year apprenticeship was formally established by the Attorneys and Solicitors Act 1728. William Blackstone became the first lecturer in English common law at

1166-597: A degree. Because in the United States there were no Inns of Court, and the English academic degrees did not provide the necessary professional training, the models from England were inapplicable, and the degree program took some time to develop. At first the degree took the form of a B.L. (such as at the College of William and Mary), but then Harvard, keen on importing legitimacy through the trappings of Oxford and Cambridge, implemented an LLB degree. The decision to award

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1272-472: A donation by Stanford Law graduate George E. Crothers ), allowed the school to grow, while the 1948 inaugural publication of the Stanford Law Review (helmed by future U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher '49) helped to augment the law school's national reputation. The decision that Stanford should remain a small law school with a very limited enrollment emerged during this period. For

1378-514: A graduate JD one. An Australian Juris Doctor consists of three years of full-time study, or the equivalent. The course varies across different universities, though all are obliged to teach the Priestley 11 subjects per the requirements of state admissions boards in Australia. JDs are considered equivalent to LLBs, and graduates must meet the same requirements to qualify, including undergoing

1484-402: A great change in United States university legal education. For a short time beginning in 1826 Yale began to offer a complete "practitioners' course" which lasted two years and included practical courses, such as pleading drafting. United States Supreme Court justice Joseph Story started the spirit of change in legal education at Harvard, when he advocated a more "scientific study" of the law in

1590-505: A modern professional school when it began requiring a bachelor's degree for admission. The 1940s and 1950s brought considerable change to the law school. After World War II caused the law school's enrollment to drop to fewer than 30 students, the school quickly expanded once the war ended in 1945. A move to a new location in the Outer Quadrangle, as well as the 1948 opening of the law school dormitory Crothers Hall (the result of

1696-410: A more central role in the preparation of lawyers and consequently improved their coverage of advanced legal topics to become more professionally relevant. Over the same period, American law schools became more scholarly and less professionally oriented, so that in 1996 Langbein could write: "That contrast between English law schools as temples of scholarship and American law schools as training centers for

1802-483: A non-professional, short-term, or part-time job nine months after graduation. According to the American Bar Association, of 2014 Stanford Law graduates, 90.9% are employed in a position that required the graduate to pass the bar exam; 2.7% are employed in a position in which the employer sought an individual with a J.D. or in which the J.D. provided a demonstrable advantage in obtaining or performing

1908-576: A practical training. On the Australian Qualifications Framework , the Juris Doctor is classified as a "masters degree (extended)", with an exception having been granted to use the term "doctor" in the title (other such exceptions include Doctor of Medicine, Doctor of Dentistry and Doctor of Veterinary Medicine). It may not be described as a doctoral degree and holders may not use the title "doctor". The JD degree

2014-462: A profession open only to the elite in England, as institutions for training developed in what would become the United States they emerged as quite different from those in England. Initially in the United States the legal professionals were trained and imported from England. A formal apprenticeship or clerkship program was established first in New York in 1730 — at that time a seven-year clerkship

2120-430: A rigorous scientific method, such as that developed by Story and Langdell . In the words of Dorsey Ellis, " Langdell viewed law as a science and the law library as the laboratory, with the cases providing the basis for learning those 'principles or doctrines' of which law, considered as a science, consists. ' " Nonetheless, into the year 1900, most states did not require a university education (although an apprenticeship

2226-424: A school and which provided a practical legal education, as opposed to the one offered in the universities which offered an education in the theory, history and philosophy of law. The universities assumed that the acquisition of skills would happen in practice, while the proprietary schools concentrated on the practical skills during education. In part to compete with the small professional law schools, there began

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2332-492: A second degree. Two of them conferred a doctorate and the other two a baccalaureate degree. The change from LLB to JD was intended to end "this discrimination, the practice of conferring what is normally a first degree upon persons who have already their primary degree". The JD was proposed as the equivalent of the German J.U.D., to reflect the advanced study required to be an effective lawyer. The University of Chicago Law School

2438-434: A semester system to a quarter system to align itself with Stanford's other graduate schools. Stanford also expanded its upper-level offerings in international law, by adding new clinics, academic centers, and simulation courses, and expanded its joint degree programs. Stanford Law School is known for its student-to-faculty ratio (7.3 to 1), one of the lowest in the country. The first-year class of approximately 180 students

2544-588: A substantial contribution to the field over many years – a standard of professional experience beyond that required for a Doctor of Philosophy . In the United States, the LLD is invariably an honorary degree. The first university in Europe, the University of Bologna , was founded as a school of law by four famous legal scholars in the 11th century who were students of the glossator school in that city. This served as

2650-556: A thesis in their third year of law school. Because the JD degree was no more advantageous for bar admissions or for employment, the vast majority of Marquette students preferred to seek the LLB degree. As more law students entered law schools with previously awarded bachelor's degree degrees in the 1950s and 1960s, a number of law schools may have introduced the JD to encourage law students to complete their undergraduate degrees. As late as 1961, there were still 15 ABA-accredited law schools in

2756-510: A third of the class clerks for a judge; about half join law firms. According to Stanford Law School's official 2014 ABA-required disclosures, 90.4% of the Class of 2014 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation, excluding solo-practitioners. Stanford's Law School Transparency under-employment score is 3.2%, indicating the percentage of the Class of 2014 unemployed, pursuing an additional degree, or working in

2862-433: A university degree has been a prerequisite to initiating an articling clerkship. The education in law schools in Canada was similar to that in the United States at the turn of the 20th century, but with a greater concentration on statutory drafting and interpretation, and elements of a liberal education. The bar associations in Canada were influenced by the changes at Harvard, and were sometimes quicker to nationally implement

2968-474: Is divided into six smaller sections of 30 students each. The academic program is flexible. First-year students (or 1Ls) are required to take Civil Procedure, Contracts, Torts, and Legal Research & Writing during the autumn quarter, and Criminal Law, Constitutional Law, Federal Litigation, and one elective during the winter quarter. In the spring quarter, they take Federal Litigation, Property, and enroll in electives. Stanford Law offers 280 course titles beyond

3074-798: Is elective with various concentrations such as commercial and corporate law, taxation, international law, natural resources law, real estate transactions, employment law, criminal law and Aboriginal law. After graduation from an accredited law school, each province's or territory's law society requires completion of a bar admission course or examination and a period of supervised articling prior to independent practice. United States jurisdictions other than New York and Massachusetts do not recognize Canadian Juris Doctor degrees automatically. Likewise, United States JD graduates are not automatically recognized in Canadian jurisdictions such as Ontario. To prepare graduates to practise in jurisdictions on both sides of

3180-673: Is the Stanford Law Review , which has been ranked as the top law review by the Washington & Lee Law Review Rankings in both 2013 and 2014. Advocacy skills are tested in the Marion Rice Kirkwood Moot Court competition. The Robert Crown Law Library at Stanford holds 500,000 books, 360,000 microform and audiovisual items, and more than 8,000 current serial subscriptions. In August 2008, Stanford Law School changed its grading system, which no longer relies on traditional letter grades, joining Yale Law School ,

3286-490: Is the dominant common-law law degree in Canada, having replaced many of the nation's former LLB programs. Unlike other jurisdictions, the Canadian LLB was historically typically second-entry undergraduate degree that required the prior completion of another undergraduate degree. The University of Toronto became the first law school to rename its law degree in 2001. As with the second-entry LLB, in order to be admitted to

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3392-666: The California Law Revision Commission , the U.S. Copyright Office , the U.S. Department of Energy , the U.S. Department of the Treasury , and the White House Office of Management and Budget . Students and alumni routinely report high satisfaction with their academic experience. In surveys conducted by Above the Law , Stanford Law received an "A+" from both students and alumni for their satisfaction with Stanford's academic program, and

3498-511: The Inns of Court . The 1728 act was amended in 1821 to reduce the period of the required apprenticeship to three years for graduates in either law or arts from Oxford, Cambridge, and Dublin, as "the admission of such graduates should be facilitated, in consideration of the learning and abilities requisite for taking such degree". This was extended in 1837 to cover the newly established universities of Durham and London, and again in 1851 to include

3604-580: The Socratic method (a method of examining students on the reasoning of the court in the cases studied). Therefore, a graduate, high-level law degree was proposed: the Juris Doctor, implementing the case and Socratic methods as its didactic approach. According to professor J. H. Beale , an 1882 Harvard Law graduate, one of the main arguments for the change was uniformity. Harvard's four professional schools – theology, law, medicine, and arts and sciences – were all graduate schools, and their degrees were therefore

3710-500: The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California , as the first assistant dean for minority admissions. Henderson expanded minority enrollment from a single student to approximately a fifth of the student body. Stanford Law's commitment to diversity continues today, and The Princeton Review currently ranks Stanford Law as one of the ten best law schools for minority students. Earning national recognition in

3816-459: The University of California, Berkeley School of Law , and Harvard Law School . Students now receive one of four grades: honors, pass, restricted credit, or no credit. Unlike Harvard Law School and Yale Law School, Stanford Law School enforces strict curves which cap the number of honors grades to around 30%. As part of Stanford's grade reform, the law school no longer awards the honors of the Order of

3922-495: The common law that applied in most jurisdictions. Professional training for practicing common law in England was undertaken at the Inns of Court , but over time the training functions of the Inns lessened considerably and apprenticeships with individual practitioners arose as the prominent medium of preparation. However, because of the lack of standardization of study, and of objective standards for appraisal of these apprenticeships,

4028-433: The 100 largest law firms in the United States; 94 of the largest law firms employ Stanford Law alumni as attorneys. Consistent with Stanford's expertise in law and technology, Stanford Law graduates currently work or have previously worked as general counsels for many of the leading high-tech companies, including Microsoft, Google, Cisco, eBay, Yahoo!, Qualcomm, Oracle, and Genentech. The law school's alumni include several of

4134-656: The 100 most influential lawyers in America, and in 2014, a study by Reuters identified former Dean Kathleen M. Sullivan and Professors Jeffrey L. Fisher, Pamela S. Karlan, and Brian Wolfman as among the 66 most successful appellate litigators before the U.S. Supreme Court . Stanford Law School alumni practice in 61 countries, 50 U.S. states, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, the Marshall Islands, and Washington D.C. Stanford Law alumni are partners at 87 of

4240-551: The 1980s and 1990s, the law school embarked on innovating its curriculum. Stanford offered new courses focusing on law and technology, environmental law , intellectual property law, and international law, allowing students to specialize in emerging legal fields. In 1984, it launched its first clinical program, the East Palo Alto Community Law Project. By the 21st century, a new focus on interdisciplinary education emerged. In 2009, it transitioned from

4346-432: The 19th century. At the time he was a lecturer at Harvard. Therefore, at Harvard the education was much of a trade school type of approach to legal education, contrary to the more liberal arts education advocated by Blackstone at Oxford and Jefferson at William and Mary. Nonetheless, there continued to be debate among educators over whether legal education should be more vocational, as at the private law schools, or through

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4452-420: The 2014 "Midlevel Associates Survey" conducted by The American Lawyer magazine found that based on mid-level associates' assessments of their legal education, Stanford Law placed in the top five law schools for effectively preparing its graduates for law firm life. Outside of the classroom, Stanford Law students run over fifty student organizations and publish seven legal journals. The most influential journal

4558-570: The BA was not required (although those not holding a BA had to produce a certificate to prove they had not only been in residence but had actually attended lectures for at least three terms). These degrees specialized in Roman civil law rather than in English common law, the latter being the domain of the Inns of Court, and thus they were more theoretical than practically useful. Cambridge reestablished its LLB degree in 1858 as an undergraduate course alongside

4664-581: The BA, and the London LLB, which had previously required a minimum of one year after the BA, become an undergraduate degree in 1866. The older nomenclature continues to be used for the BCL at Oxford today, which is a master's level program, while Cambridge moved its LLB back to being a postgraduate degree in 1922 but only renamed it as the LLM in 1982. Between the 1960s and the 1990s, law schools in England took on

4770-463: The Bar unanimously adopted a resolution recommending to all approved law schools that they give favorable consideration to the conferring of the JD degree as the first professional degree, in 1962 and 1963. By the 1960s, most law students were college graduates having previously obtained a bachelor's degree, and by the end of that decade, almost all were required to be. Student and alumni support were key in

4876-472: The Coif or Graduation with Distinction. Between 4,000 and 5,000 students apply for admission each year. Selection is competitive: the median undergraduate grade point average of admitted students is 3.92 and the median LSAT score is 173 (out of 180). Beyond numbers, Stanford places considerable emphasis on factors such as extracurricular activities, work experience, and prior graduate study. About three quarters of

4982-449: The English universities. The nature of the JD can be better understood by a review of the context of the history of legal education in England. The teaching of law at Cambridge and Oxford Universities was mainly for philosophical or scholarly purposes and not meant to prepare one to practice law. The universities only taught civil and canon law (used in a very few jurisdictions, such as the courts of admiralty and church courts) but not

5088-468: The Inns of Court was a mix of moot court -like practice and lecture, as well as court proceedings observation. By the fifteenth century, the Inns functioned like a university, akin to the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge , though very specialized in purpose. With the frequent absence of parties to suits during the Crusades , the importance of the lawyer role grew tremendously, and

5194-400: The Inns of Court. Even though it took nearly 150 years since common law education began with Blackstone at Oxford for university education to be part of legal training in England and Wales, the LLB eventually became the degree usually taken before becoming a lawyer. In England and Wales the LLB is an undergraduate scholarly program and although it (assuming it is a qualifying law degree) fulfills

5300-473: The JD and once again granting only the LLB, with only law schools in Illinois holding out. This changed in the 1960s, by which time almost all law school entrants were graduates. The JD was reintroduced in 1962 and by 1971 had replaced the LLB, with many schools offering a JD as a replacement to their LLB alumni. Canadian and Australian universities have had graduate-entry law programs that are very similar to

5406-448: The JD is a doctoral degree in the US, lawyers usually use the suffix " Esq. " as opposed to the prefix "Dr.", and that only in a professional context, when needed to alert others that they are a biased party – acting as an agent for their client. An initial attempt to rename the LLB to the JD in the US in the early 20th century started with a petition at Harvard in 1902. This was rejected, but

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5512-455: The JD programs in the United States, but typically called the LLB. Some students at these universities advocated for the renaming of the graduate-entry LLB to the JD to recognise the graduate characteristics of the program and to obtain a so-called doctoral-level qualification. The traditional law degree in Australia is the undergraduate Bachelor of Laws ( LLB ). Beginning in the 2010s, many Australian universities now offer JD programs, including

5618-456: The JD which have been implemented around the world. As stated by Hall and Langdell, who were involved in the creation of the JD, the JD is a professional degree like the MD , intended to prepare practitioners through a scientific approach of analysing and teaching the law through logic and adversarial analysis (such as the casebook and Socratic methods). This system of curriculum has existed in

5724-405: The LLB although in some, including Oxford and Cambridge, it is the BA in law. Both of these can be taken with "senior status" in two years by those already holding an undergraduate degree in another discipline. A few universities offer "exempting" degrees, usually integrated master's degrees denominated Master in Law (MLaw), that combine the qualifying law degree with the legal practice course or

5830-418: The LLB programs in the early 1900s at Stanford University and Yale continued to include "cultural study", which included courses in languages, mathematics and economics. An LLB, or a Bachelor of Laws, recognized that a prior bachelor's degree was not required to earn an LLB. In the 1850s there were many proprietary schools which originated from a practitioner taking on multiple apprentices and establishing

5936-597: The LLB-to-JD change, and even the most prominent schools were convinced to make the change: Columbia and Harvard in 1969, and Yale (last) in 1971. Nonetheless, the LLB at Yale retained the didactical changes of the "practitioners' courses" of 1826, and was very different from the LLB in common law countries, other than Canada. Following standard modern academic practice, Harvard Law School refers to its Master of Laws and Doctor of Juridical Science degrees as its graduate level law degrees. Similarly, Columbia refers to

6042-475: The LLM and the JSD as its graduate program. Yale Law School lists its LLM, MSL, JSD, and Ph.D. as constituting graduate programs. A distinction thus remains between professional and graduate law degrees at some universities in the United States. The English legal system is the root of the systems of other common-law countries, such as the United States. Originally, common lawyers in England were trained exclusively in

6148-488: The Latin for "Doctor of Jurisprudence" – Jurisprudentiae Doctor – literally means "teacher of legal knowledge". The JD is not to be confused with Doctor of Laws or Legum Doctor (LLD). In institutions where the latter can be earned, e.g., Cambridge University (where it is titled "Doctor of Law", though still retaining the abbreviation LLD) and many other British institutions, it is a higher research doctorate, representing

6254-481: The Midwest. After the 1930s, the LLB and the JD degrees co‑existed in some American law schools. Some law schools, especially in Illinois and the Midwest, awarded both (like Marquette University, beginning in 1926), conferring JD degrees only to those with a bachelor's degree (as opposed to two or three years of college before law school), and those who met a higher academic standard in undergraduate studies, finishing

6360-688: The Stanford Public Interest Foundation. Additionally, in 1966, the school sought to academically diversify its student body by collaborating with the Stanford Business School to create its first joint-degree program. A year earlier, in 1965, the law school enrolled its first black student, Sallyanne Payton '68, and in 1972, the school hired its first female law professor, Barbara Babcock , and its first professor of color, William B. Gould IV . In 1968, Stanford appointed Thelton Henderson , future judge of

6466-487: The United States Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics . In Australia, South Korea, and Hong Kong, it has the academic standing of a master's degree , while in Canada, it is considered a second-entry bachelor's degree . To be fully authorized to practice law in the courts of a given state in the United States, the majority of individuals holding a JD degree must pass

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6572-411: The United States during a movement to improve training of the professions. Prior to the origination of the JD, law students began law school either with only a high school diploma, or less than the amount of undergraduate study required to earn a bachelor's degree. The LLB persisted through the middle of the 20th century, which by then turned into a postgraduate degree requiring the previous completion of

6678-426: The United States for over 100 years. The JD program generally requires a bachelor's degree for entry, though this requirement is sometimes waived. As a study of the substantive law and its professional applications, the JD curriculum has not changed substantially since its creation. As a professional degree, JD programs typically allow practitioners. It requires at least three academic years of full-time study. While

6784-497: The United States which awarded both LLB and JD degrees. Thirteen of the 15 were located in the Midwest, which may indicate regional variations in the United States. It was only after 1962 that a new push — this time begun at less-prominent law schools — successfully led to the universal adoption of the JD as the first law degree. The turning point appears to have occurred when the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to

6890-441: The United States, William Livingston , in 1745 in a New York newspaper that the clerkship program was severely flawed, and that most mentors There were some few mentors that were dedicated to the service, and because of their rarity, they became so sought-after that the first law schools evolved from the offices of some of these attorneys, who took on many clerks and began to spend more time training than practicing law. In time,

6996-465: The United States, such as that of the University of Maryland established in 1812, included much theoretical and philosophical study, including works such as the Bible, Cicero , Seneca , Aristotle, Adam Smith, Montesquieu and Grotius . It has been said that the early university law schools of the early 19th century seemed to be preparing students for careers as statesmen rather than as lawyers. At

7102-401: The United States. The historian Robert Stevens wrote that "it was Langdell's goal to turn the legal profession into a university educated one — and not at the undergraduate level, but through a three-year post baccalaureate degree." This graduate level study would allow the intensive legal training that Langdell had developed, known as the case method (a method of studying landmark cases) and

7208-459: The University of Oxford in 1753, but the university did not establish the program for the purpose of professional study, and the lectures were very philosophical and theoretical in nature. Blackstone insisted that the study of law should be university based, where concentration on foundational principles can be had, instead of concentration on detail and procedure provided by apprenticeship and

7314-558: The academic requirements for becoming a lawyer, further vocational and professional training as either a barrister (the Bar Professional Training Course followed by pupillage ) or as a solicitor (the Legal Practice Course followed by a " period of recognised training " ) is required before becoming licensed in that jurisdiction. The qualifying law degree in most English universities is

7420-438: The apprenticeship program was not considered sufficient to produce lawyers fully capable of serving their clients' needs. The apprenticeship programs often employed the trainee with menial tasks, and while they were well trained in the day-to-day operations of a law office, they were generally unprepared practitioners or legal reasoners. The establishment of formal faculties of law in United States universities did not occur until

7526-456: The bar professional training course in a four-year, undergraduate-entry program. Legal education in Canada has unique variations from other Commonwealth countries. Even though the legal system of Canada is mostly a transplant of the English system (Quebec excepted), the Canadian system is unique in that there are no Inns of Court, the practical training occurs in the office of a barrister and solicitor with law society membership, and, since 1889,

7632-406: The border, some pairs of law schools have developed joint Canadian-American JD programs. As of 2018, these include a three-year program conducted concurrently at the University of Windsor and the University of Detroit Mercy, as well as a four-year program with the University of Ottawa and either Michigan State University or American University in which students spend two years studying on each side of

7738-427: The border. Previously, New York University (NYU) Law School and Osgoode Hall Law School offered a similar program, but this has since been terminated. Two notable exceptions are Université de Montréal and Université de Sherbrooke , which both offer a one-year JD program aimed at Quebec civil law graduates in order to practice law either elsewhere in Canada or in the state of New York. York University offered

7844-469: The century, and even then the bar did not consider a university degree in admission decisions. Until the mid nineteenth century, most law degrees in England (the BCL at Oxford and Durham, and the LLB at London) were postgraduate degrees, taken after an initial degree in arts. The Cambridge degree, variously referred to as a BCL, BL or LLB, was an exception: it took six years from matriculation to complete, but only three of these had to be in residence, and

7950-413: The changes proposed in the United States, such as requiring previous college education before studying law. Legal education is rooted in the history and structure of the legal system of the jurisdiction where the education is given; therefore, law degrees are vastly different from country to country, making comparisons among degrees problematic. This has proven true in the context of the various forms of

8056-548: The country's best ranked universities (e.g. the University of New South Wales , the University of Sydney , the Australian National University , the University of Melbourne , Monash University , and Western Sydney University ). Generally, universities that offer the JD also offer the LLB, although at some universities, only the graduate-entry JD is offered. The University of Melbourne, for example, has phased out its undergraduate LLB program for

8162-469: The degree. Harvard, for example, refused to adopt the JD degree, even though it restricted admission to students with college degrees in 1909. Indeed, pressure from eastern law schools led almost every law school (except at the University of Chicago and other law schools in Illinois ) to abandon the JD and re‑adopt the LLB as the first law degree by the 1930s. By 1962, the JD degree was rarely seen outside

8268-541: The demand for lawyers grew. Traditionally Oxford and Cambridge did not see common law as worthy of academic study, and included coursework in law only in the context of canon and civil law (the two "laws" in the original Bachelor of Laws, which thus became the Bachelor of Civil Law when the study of canon law was barred after the Reformation) and for the purpose of the study of philosophy or history only. As

8374-555: The educational approaches differ. Professional doctorates were developed in the United States in the 19th century, the first being the Doctor of Medicine in 1807, but at the time, the legal system in the United States was still in development as the educational institutions were developing, and the status of the legal profession was at that time still ambiguous and so the professional law degree took more time to develop. Even when some universities offered training in law, they did not offer

8480-627: The first women to occupy Chief Justice or Associate Justice posts on supreme courts : former Chief Justice of New Zealand Sian Elias , retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor , and the late Chief Justice of Washington Barbara Durham . Other justices of supreme courts who graduated from Stanford Law include the late Chief Justice of the United States William Rehnquist , retired Chief Justice of California Supreme Court Ronald M. George , retired California Supreme Court Justice Carlos R. Moreno , and

8586-588: The first-year curriculum, and advanced courses range from White-Collar Crime to a Supreme Court Simulation Seminar. Additionally, because of the law school's proximity to other academic programs on campus, there is a strong focus on joint-degree programs and interdisciplinary learning, and upper-level students may take classes at Stanford's other professional and graduate schools. Stanford Law enables second- and third-year students to gain hands-on experience by working full-time in one of eleven legal clinics, including an Environmental Law Clinic, Criminal Defense Clinic,

8692-555: The highest placement rate for federal judicial clerkships at 30.5%. Stanford Law currently has the highest percentage of its graduates clerking for federal judges of any law school in the United States. The total cost of attendance (indicating the cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses) at Stanford Law School for the 2023–24 academic year is $ 112,364. A 2015 study by M7 Financial, which assessed law schools' "credit ratings" using data on average starting salaries, employment trends, and student loan obligations, found that Stanford Law had

8798-420: The idea took hold at the new law school established at the University of Chicago and other universities. By 1925, 80% of US law schools awarded the JD to students who had entered the program with an undergraduate degree, while granting undergraduate entrants the LLB. The change was initially rejected by the leading law schools of the time Harvard, Yale and Columbia. By the late 1920s, schools were moving away from

8904-414: The job, but which did not itself require an active law license; 2.7% are employed in other professional positions; 1.1% are pursuing graduate work full-time; 1.1% have a deferred employment starting date; and 1.6% are unemployed and seeking employment. Despite its small size, Stanford Law has the third highest (per capita) placement rate for law professors at the nation's 43 leading law schools, according to

9010-477: The late California Supreme Court Justice Frank K. Richardson . Doctor of Jurisprudence A Juris Doctor , Doctor of Jurisprudence , or Doctor of Law ( JD ) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law . In the United States , it is the only qualifying law degree. Other jurisdictions, such as Australia , Canada , and Hong Kong , offer both

9116-530: The latter part of the 18th century. With the beginning of the American Revolution, the supply of lawyers from Britain ended. The first law degree granted by a United States university was a Bachelor of Law in 1793 by the College of William and Mary , which was abbreviated L.B.; Harvard was the first university to use the LLB abbreviation in the United States. The first university law programs in

9222-516: The law department began its transition into an exclusively professional school when Stanford's Board of Trustees passed a resolution to officially change its name from Law Department to Law School. Eight years later, Frederic Campbell Woodward became the first dean of the law school, and in 1923, the law school received accreditation from the American Bar Association (ABA). In 1924, Stanford's law program officially transitioned into

9328-426: The law individually as expected. They were often employed to tedious tasks, such as making handwritten copies of documents. Finding sufficient legal texts was also a seriously debilitating issue, and there was no standardization in the books assigned to the clerk trainees because they were assigned by their mentor, whose opinion of the law may have differed greatly from his peers. It was said by one famous attorney in

9434-448: The law school also received an "A+" rating from students for practical/clinical training, career counseling, and financial aid advising. Based on surveys with students at the nation's 169 best law schools, The Princeton Review currently ranks Stanford Law as having the best "Classroom Experience", and students provided Stanford with the highest score (99) for its "Academic Experience Rating" and "Professors Interesting Rating". Additionally,

9540-421: The litigation of patent-related matters in state and federal courts. In the United States , the professional doctorate in law may be conferred in Latin or in English as Juris Doctor (sometimes shown on Latin diplomas in the accusative form Juris Doctorem ) and at some law schools Doctor of Law (JD), or Doctor of Jurisprudence (also abbreviated JD). " Juris Doctor " literally means "teacher of law", while

9646-438: The lowest student debt burden of any law school in the study. Often known simply as CodeX, this research center at Stanford University is focused on the application of technology to law, and is jointly operated by Stanford Law School and Stanford University School of Engineering. The Stanford Law School faculty ranks among the top three law faculties in the United States in terms of scholarly impact, and faculty members include

9752-539: The members of each entering class have one or more years of prior work experience and over a quarter have another graduate degree. The school also accepts a small number of transfers each year. According to ABA Required Disclosures, Stanford Law School had an average bar passage rate of 94.41% in 2022. In 2023, 94% of Stanford Law graduates passed the California Bar on their first attempt, the highest pass rate of all California law schools. Upon graduation, about

9858-399: The mentoring lawyer was expected to carefully select materials for study and guide the clerk in his study of the law and ensure that it was being absorbed. The student was supposed to compile his notes of his reading of the law into a " commonplace book ", which he would try to memorize. Although those were the ideals, in reality the clerks were often overworked and rarely were able to study

9964-609: The model for other law schools of the Middle Ages , and other early universities such as the University of Padua . The first academic degrees may have been doctorates in civil law ( doctores legum ) followed by canon law ( doctores decretorum ); these were not professional degrees but rather indicated that their holders had been approved to teach at the universities. While Bologna granted only doctorates, preparatory degrees (bachelor's and licences) were introduced in Paris and then in

10070-586: The most widely cited legal scholars in intellectual property law (Mark Lemley), legal history (Lawrence Friedman), and legal ethics (Deborah L. Rhode). A 2012 study found that five Stanford Law professors are among the 50 most relevant law professors in the nation, and a 2013 study found that 25 percent of Stanford Law School's tenured faculty have been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences . In 2013, The National Law Journal recognized Professors Jeffrey L. Fisher and Mark Lemley as two of

10176-515: The new Queen's University of Ireland . The Inns of Court continued but became less effective, and admission to the bar still did not require any significant educational activity or examination. In 1846, Parliament examined the education and training of prospective barristers and found the system to be inferior to that of Europe and the United States, as Britain did not regulate the admission of barristers. Therefore, formal schools of law were called for but were not finally established until later in

10282-487: The new program and assembled a small faculty over the next few years. The law department primarily enrolled undergraduate majors at this time and included a large number of students who might not have been welcome at more traditional law schools at the time, including women and students of color, especially Hispanic, Chinese and Japanese students. In 1900, the department moved from its original location in Encina Hall to

10388-565: The nineteenth century. Thus, even though the name of the English LLB degree was implemented at Harvard, the program in the United States was nonetheless intended as a first degree which, unlike the English B.A., gave practical or professional training in law. In the mid-19th century there was much concern about the quality of legal education in the United States. C.C. Langdell served as dean of Harvard Law School from 1870 to 1895, and dedicated his life to reforming legal education in

10494-538: The northeast side of the Inner Quadrangle. These larger facilities included Stanford's first law library. Beginning to focus more on professional training, the school implemented its first three-year curriculum and became one of 27 charter members of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS). In 1901, the school awarded its first professional degree, the Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.). Starting in 1908,

10600-771: The postgraduate JD degree as well as the undergraduate LL.B. , BCL , or other qualifying law degree depending on the requirements of the jurisdiction where the person will practice law. Originating in the United States in the late 19th century, the JD is the most common law degree in the country. The degree generally requires three years of full-time study to complete and is conferred upon students who have successfully completed coursework and practical training in legal studies. The JD curriculum typically includes fundamental legal subjects such as constitutional law, civil procedure, criminal law, contracts, property, and torts, along with opportunities for specialization in areas like international law, corporate law, or public policy. Upon receiving

10706-563: The profession no longer bears the remotest relation to reality". Initially there was much resistance to lawyers in colonial North America because of the role they had played in hierarchical England, but slowly the colonial governments started using the services of professionals trained in the Inns of Court in London, and by the end of the American Revolution there was a functional bar in each state. Due to an initial distrust of

10812-496: The role of universities became subsequently important for the education of lawyers in the English-speaking world. In England in 1292 when Edward I first requested that lawyers be trained, students merely sat in the courts and observed, but over time the students would hire professionals to lecture them in their residences, which led to the institution of the Inns of Court system. The original method of education at

10918-723: The third time in its history, the law school relocated in the 1970s, this time to its current location in the Crown Quadrangle. In the 1960s and 1970s, the law school aimed to diversify its student body. During this period, students established a large number of new and progressive student organizations, including the Women of Stanford Law, the Stanford Chicano Law Student Association, the Environmental Law Society, and

11024-408: Was often required) and most practitioners had not attended any law school or college. Therefore, the modern legal education system in the United States is a combination of teaching law as a science and a practical skill, implementing elements such as clinical training, which has become an essential part of legal education in the United States and in the JD program of study. The JD originated in

11130-417: Was required, and in 1756 a four-year college degree was required in addition to five years of clerking and an examination. Later the requirements were reduced to require only two years of college education. But a system like the Inns did not develop, and a college education was not required in England until the 19th century, so this system was unique. The clerkship program required much individual study and

11236-492: Was the first to offer the JD in 1902, when it was just one of five law schools that demanded a college degree from its applicants. While approval was still pending at Harvard, the degree was introduced at many other law schools, including at the law schools at NYU, Berkeley, Michigan, and Stanford. Because of tradition, and concerns about less prominent universities implementing a JD program, prominent eastern law schools like those of Harvard, Yale, and Columbia refused to implement

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