question about law degrees

[mickeym]

How long is school, for a law degree? 4yrs of college (majoring in pre-law, yeah?) and then four more years of law school? Has it always been that way? I'm kind of looking for anyone who has any historical knowledge of this -- say the person in question is going into college, starting college, fall of 1945. What would be their expected/anticipated graduation-with-law-degree?

Comments

[without-me.livejournal.com]

I have no idea about historical differences, but today in the U.S., all you need for a JD is a bachelor's (in whatever--could be pure math or electrical engineering if that's what you're interested in, though poli sci or literature or something else word-oriented is probably more common) and then law school is (generally) a 3-year program.

[titti]

Undergraduate - 4 years
Juris Doctor - 3 years.
LLM - 1 year (this is a master on top of the JD, but you don't need it to practice).

However this wasn't always the case. I don't know in 45 but I'll do some searches.

[azephirin.livejournal.com]

Up until the 1960s and 1970s, there were law schools—typically smaller regional ones—that would take students right out of high school, so you *didn't* need a bachelor's degree. I'm pretty sure that the more prestigious law schools have always required a bachelor's, but until 30–40 years ago, it was possible to go to law school right out of HS. Three years of law school, pass the bar exam, and you could be a lawyer at 20/21. (Scary.)

I've never actually heard of pre-law as a major. Unlike with med school, there's not really a specific skill set that you need to go in with, other than logical reasoning and masochism, which can be developed no matter what you study. I was actually just talking to a law student a couple of weeks ago who was a math major undergrad. The "classic" law-student-to-be major is history (I was a history and women's studies double), but I'm not sure why.

[titti]

A few school actually offer prelaw. I know St. John's used to, although they've changed all the names in the past 20 years.

[titti]

All right did some research. Harvard started the modern classes back at the turn of the century (1900). In 1921, the ABA adopted the Harvard model. There were schools that took them out of high school, but they were NON accredited schools, which means their graduates could or could not practice depending on the state and level of the court.

From the little I could dig up, the Harvard model is very much alike what we cover in law school now.

[azephirin.livejournal.com]

Interesting! I did not know that. I had really never seen it as a major.

[titti]

Yeah, I mean the only reason I know it's because I debated if I should go pre-law or political science and I chose the second one.

[kaiz.livejournal.com]

Oh, interesting! I had no idea. All the folks I knew (20+ years ago) who were "pre law" were actually in political science/international relations/philosophy. I had no idea there was an actual pre-law major at some point!

[titti]

Yeah, I'm not sure how many schools offer it. As I said, I decided to go into political science in the end, because I wasn't sure if I'd go to law school. Of course, I've been out of school for a long while.

[phaballa.livejournal.com]

My University had a concentration (we didn't have majors) called Law Letters and Society, which was basically pre-law, but 99% of people who concentrated in LLS were also doing polisci or history or economics because if you end up not going to law school? A degree in LLS isn't going to make much sense to anyone outside the University :P

[kaiz.livejournal.com]

Of course, I've been out of school for a long while.

You and me, both! *feels really ancient online sometimes :-)*

[liz-w.livejournal.com]

There used to be a practice known as "reading the law", where an aspiring lawyer would work side-by-side with a member of the bar (a lawyer or a judge) acting as a mentor for several years (4 to 5, probably?), with the student learning about being a lawyer directly. Then, if he took the bar exam and passed, he would become a lawyer without ever going to law school.

So you might want to google search around on that and see what you can come up with, if that helps your story.

[titti]

My kids asked me if in the 'old days' we had TV. Way to make me feel young, right? *G*

[jinxiegirl.livejournal.com]

When I was studying to be a paralegal, it was 7 years total. 4 of pre-law and 3 years of law school. So it would be Spring of 1953 for graduation. I don't know if it's different now with all the new ways of attending school. Of course, that 7 years was average. Not meaning someone with double course load, or taking half course load. Hope this helps.

[without-me.livejournal.com]

The "classic" law-student-to-be major is history . . . but I'm not sure why.

Because the only other use for a B.A. in history is "Would you like fries with that?" ;)

(ETA: I kid because I love! My B.A. is in literature--equally useless without an advanced degree--and TWBE™ was a history major.)