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The Study of Philosophy in Law Schools and Top Law Schools
Over the years, many readers of this Report--notably students wavering between graduate and professional school--have expressed interest in having information about opportunities for philosophical study in law schools. There are, of course, a number of similarities between the study of law and philosophy: lawyers and philosophers both hone their argumentative and dialectical skills (indeed, law is one of the few professions other than philosophy in which the analysis, construction and refutation of arguments is a central part of professional life); both are concerned with clarity and logical rigor; and many issues in law--affirmative action, abortion, privacy rights, punishment, contractual promises--have important philosophical dimensions. Legal philosophy has been a thriving area of debate in law schools ever since H.L.A. Hart's The Concept of Law (1961); and issues of moral and political philosophy have been discussed both in connection with legal philosophy, as well as constitutional law, torts, and contracts. There is a large legal literature on the philosophical foundations of criminal law (addressing, for example, issues about free will and moral responsibility, and the justification of punishment); and more recently, there has been a growing interest in law schools in philosophy of language, metaethics and Continental philosophy.
Unfortunately, a great deal of what passes for "philosophy" in law schools--even at some excellent law schools--is sophomoric. Students thinking of getting a legal education, but who want to keep their philosophical interests alive (or perhaps even pursue a career in legal academia), must pick their schools carefully.
Many publications rank law schools; none do it competently, and most produce rankings that are regarded as bad jokes by legal scholars and lawyers. (The most notorious are the U.S. News rankings, most notable for their bias in favor of small, private schools. For criticisms of the U.S. News "methodology," and an attempt to develop a ranking system based on more conventional academic criteria, see http://www.utexas.edu/law/faculty/bleiter/LGOURMET.HTM. This ranking is now the most serious competitor to U.S. News, and garners more than 2,500 hits per week during the peak application season.).
For purposes of students thinking about teaching careers, the most important factor is the scholarly distinction of the faculty. There are some 180 accredited law schools in the U.S., but the top 14 law schools in terms of faculty quality are (in alphabetical order) the following:
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Arguably competitive with the bottom end of the top 14 are such schools as Duke University, the University of California at Los Angeles and the University of Southern California. Graduates of these 17 schools also dominate the job market for law teachers.
The top school in terms of faculty quality is pretty much universally conceded to be Yale, with Harvard, Stanford, and, probably, Chicago rounding out the top four. (Of these four, only Yale and Chicago are really viable choices for students with philosophical interests.) After those four, judgements of quality become more contentious. Most would put Columbia, NYU, and UC Berkeley up there in the next cluster, and some would demote Chicago to this group as well. Older legal scholars would probably want to include Michigan and Virginia in the Columbia/NYU/Berkeley cluster, though both schools have fallen on hard times in recent years due to faculty losses, so it seems less credible now that they are still competitive with the top seven. A more au courant evaluation would suggest that Penn and Texas are competitive with Michigan and Virginia--and perhaps, so, too, are Cornell and Georgetown. Northwestern is another school that has suffered serious faculty losses, but it arguably remains competitive with Cornell and Georgetown still. Duke, UCLA, and USC, as noted, round out the top 17.
After these 17, there is another cluster of strong schools filling out roughly the top 25: Boston University, George Washington University, University of California/Hastings, University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign, University of Iowa, University of Wisconsin, and Vanderbilt University. Emory University, University of Arizona, University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Minnesota and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill might also belong in this cluster. These schools boast enough nationally distinguished faculty that an excellent student from one of these schools might have some chance of getting in to law teaching.
Students should bear in mind that intellectual standards in law schools are not the same as in philosophy departments. A good deal of work at places like Yale and Harvard would be considered sub-standard by scholars in the cognate disciplines, including philosophy. Nonetheless, there is a reasonable correlation between prestige of the law school and intellectual caliber of the faculty, but philosophy majors have repeatedly told me about their surprise and disappointment at some of what goes on in the classroom at leading law schools. This is why it pays for students with a serious interest in philosophy to investigate law schools with some care. Several of the top law schools are not worth considering for any student with a serious background in philosophy because of lack of philosophically competent faculty: Stanford, Cornell, Northwestern, USC. Several top law schools have an unfavorable ratio of superficial to serious interdisciplinary work in law & philosophy: Yale, Harvard, Duke, Georgetown. There are opportunities for serious philosophical study at these schools (especially Yale), but the student may have to pick and choose classes with some care.
Students with strong philosophy interests considering law school are obviously well-advised to weigh many other factors besides the opportunities for continued philosophical study and reflection. Since the program at most law schools, however, does include considerable opportunity for elective courses, philosophically-minded students may want to consider their philosophical opportunities.
For specialty rankings for law schools, see http://www.utexas.edu/law/faculty/bleiter/rankings/top_choices.html
Many universities now advertise joint J.D./Ph.D. programs (some schools which don't officially "advertise" them will permit students to pursue a J.D. and Ph.D. simultaneously anyway: Berkeley is an example). Students are well-advised to investigate how such "joint" programs work in reality, and whether there is any real coordination of faculty and interests between the Law School and Philosophy Department. Such courses of study are most valuable for those thinking about a career in legal academia, where it is now very common for law professors to have graduate training in another discipline. Most important for a career in legal academia, though, are qualifications like: an excellent law-school record; service on the law review; and prestigious judicial clerkships. Students with academic ambitions and philosophical interests that lend themselves to legal study may want to consider legal academia: compared to philosophy academia, salaries are much higher, tenure-tracks shorter and less daunting, research support better, and teaching loads more reasonable (two courses per term is the norm; three courses per year is also not too uncommon). (For more on getting in to law teaching, see http://www.utexas.edu/law/faculty/bleiter/GUIDE.HTM)
Keep in mind that Oxford University continues to be the world leader in legal philosophy, and by a wide margin: no school anywhere else in the English-speaking world has either Oxford’s depth or breadth of strength in legal philosophy. Thus, one possibility also worth exploring is earning the DPhil at Oxford and earning a law degree from a top U.S. school. Students, however, who want to earn the JD/PhD at the same institution should certainly be looking at the following schools; in all cases, it would behoove students to investigate how accessible the faculty are:
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