LAW REVIEW AND LAW PRACTICE
ESQUIRE POINT OF VIEW
By John Ritter
LAW REVIEW AND LAW PRACTICE
"The smartest law students are those on the law review," boasted the young law firm associate fresh from a law review editorship.
"If you're so smart then why aren't you rich," thought his secretary.
An old partner thought to himself about the law firm's motto: "The practice of law is getting clients and getting them to pay. All that other stuff in between you can hire young lawyers to do."
Why do they hire young law review lawyers like that smart aleck associate to do all that "in between" work? Just what is law review and why is it so important? It is both a mark of distinction and a training ground - - an elite boot camp; if you survive you will know more than the average law student and you will bear a mark of distinction for it.
But is it really worth it? Real lawyers do not sit around law libraries and double check citations for accuracy, something taught by law review. Very few practicing lawyers perform tedious research in depth and write legal memos all day. In fact, the lawyer who does is condemned to small back room offices and modest salaries for his whole career. The lawyers who make the big salaries and big corner offices are the ones who can get clients and survive law firm politics; thus, the most valuable law review experience is probably the competition for editorships. This is a combination of law, academics, and politics and the winner must be adept at all- - both to become a law review editor and partner.
One old law partner summed it up when he said, “1/3 of law practice is law school, 1/3 is business and social skills, the other 1/3 is common sense”. So law review helps to increase the law school third of law practice but does nothing to increase common sense or business-social skills. If a law student has business and common sense going into law school, he or she has it coming out. It is not something one learns in law school, making law review of dubious long term value to the practice of law.
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