12 Michaelmas Term 2005steady support of public order.” “These are commonplaces,”Justice <strong>Cooley</strong> finished, “but the strength of law lies in itscommonplace character; and it becomes feeble and untrustworthywhen it expresses something different from the commonthoughts of men.”Justice <strong>Cooley</strong> was admonishing Justice Oliver WendellHolmes, Dean Christopher Columbus Langdell, and the otherBoston Brahmins and legal giants in the Harvard crowd.Langdell, who was promoting his new casebook method,rejoined <strong>Cooley</strong> that law was not to be learned from practicaleducation, experience, and apprenticeship, or from anexperienced lawyer, as <strong>Cooley</strong> had learned it, but was a scienceand “that all the available materials of that science arecontained in printed books.” For his part, Holmes laterrejected <strong>Cooley</strong>’s steadying commonplaces and insteaddescribed law as a “field for the lightning of genius” hopingthat from it “may fly sparks that shall set free in some geniushis explosive message.” In his final writing, “The Path of the<strong>Law</strong>,” Holmes wished that “every word of moral significancecould be banished from the law altogether” in favor of anamoral social science enabling the eugenics he favored.The rest is history. One might say that Langdell, not <strong>Cooley</strong>,won. At least, Harvard became the model for legal education.<strong>Law</strong> school, which students had entered immediately afterhigh school, gradually became a graduate school with a fouryear undergraduate degree generally required for admission.The law school curriculum gradually extended to three years.<strong>Law</strong> school eventually became mandatory for the bar as stateseliminated qualification by apprenticeship. Entering the professionrequires seven years of education, whereas in Justice<strong>Cooley</strong>’s day it had required none—only apprenticeship, committedreading, and practical examination.In addition to the credentialing of the profession and theenormous increase in entry cost, there was also a change inthe way law itself was taught. Langdell’s Socratic casebookmethod became the standard in which students read longstrings of cases with little guidance and much intimidationfrom the professor. (Langdell was said to frustrate his studentsto the point of apoplexy over his unwillingness toanswer questions.) Gone were <strong>Thomas</strong> <strong>Cooley</strong>’s clear lecturesand equally clear treatises, as well as the inalienablerights and ethical bases for law. In their place was aprocess-oriented form of legal analysis producing graduateswhom some scholars today call “amoral technicians”—readyto employ a discussion-closing rhetoric to achieve any clientend without much regard for the greater consequences.But did Langdell win? Although law’s professionalization certainlyserved the industrializing nation well, some studiessuggest that in today’s post-industrial society law schoolenforces a process and produces a product with which neitherthe student nor the public is very satisfied. Studentsreport that the ethical component they expected to find inAuthor’s note: Those wishing to know more of the legal,BENCHMARKlaw school is disappointingly absent. The profession is notparticularly pleased with graduates’ practical incapacity. Thepublic seems not much more satisfied with either lawyerintegrity or service. And there are serious questions whethera profession which so highly values technical skills and credentialsadequately serves its fundamental and historicaccess to justice role.Yet fortunately, there are still law schools like <strong>Cooley</strong> thatarticulate a values-based mission centered on knowledge,skills, and ethics. By offering evening, weekend, and yearroundclasses, law schools help students complete their educationmore quickly and without foregoing other earnings.When tuition is reasonable and students graduate with lessdebt, those graduates have greater opportunity to undertakethose eleemosynary missions which may have brought themto law school—to serve rather than to accumulate, engagingin the kind of widespread, disinterested, moral advocacy onwhich a democratic republic depends. Moreover, when lawschools employ practitioner-scholars as professors, requirerigorous writing courses, and offer clinical courses andexternships, they help students develop skills immediatelyuseful in practice. When they maintain academic resourcecenters offering voluntary supplemental educational seminarsand services, they help fit the education to the student. Whenthey offer professional exploration programs and meritbasedadmissions to large numbers of students, they offeraccess and promote diversity. And again, when they placeethics at the center of the law school curriculum, they allowthe student to retain the heart, mind, and soul with which toserve clients, community, and country.Duke University Professor Paul Carrington believes thatJustice <strong>Cooley</strong>, whom he calls the “elder to the republic,”offers the profession a post-modern archetype—that thecharacter traits Justice <strong>Cooley</strong> exhibited and ethic he taughtmakes him the model American professional for the 21stCentury. Whether that is true or not, Justice <strong>Cooley</strong>’s life continuesto inform and invigorate his namesake law schooland, we hope, enrich and guide its graduates.political, and spiritual culture that formed and continuouslyinformed Justice <strong>Cooley</strong>, and of how that culture still influenceslaw school, may consider reading: Paul D. Carrington,“The Common Thoughts of Men: The <strong>Law</strong>-Teaching andJudging of <strong>Thomas</strong> McIntyre <strong>Cooley</strong>,” 49 Stanford L. Rev.495 (1997); Paul D. Carrington, Stewards of Democracy:<strong>Law</strong> as a Public Profession (Westview Press 1999); <strong>Thomas</strong>M. <strong>Cooley</strong>, “Suggestions for the Study of <strong>Law</strong>” in <strong>Cooley</strong>’sBlackstone (4th ed., Callaghan and Co. 1899); <strong>Thomas</strong> M. <strong>Cooley</strong>, ARecord of the Commemoration on the 250th Anniversary of the Founding ofHarvard College 92-96 (John Wilson & Son 1887); Charles G. Finney,Lectures on Systematic Theology (4th ed. 1878 (reprinted Bethany 1994));Philip C. Kissam, The Discipline of <strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong>: The Making of Modern<strong>Law</strong>yers (Carolina Academic Press 2003); Francis Lieber, Legal and PoliticalHermeneutics (1838, reprinted Wm. S. Hein & Co. 1970); Robert Stevens,<strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong>: Legal Education in America from the 1850s to the 1980s (Univ.of North Carolina Press 1983).]
<strong>Cooley</strong> Brings Exhibit From the Nations’sOnly Central Repository For AfricanAmerican Legal History to LansingAs part of its mission to promote diversity, <strong>Cooley</strong> <strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong>unveiled at the State Capitol on Sept. 27, “Saluting a Giant,” thesecond touring exhibit from the Damon J. Keith Collection ofAfrican American Legal History. The exhibit, which was on displayat the Capitol until Oct. 11, was hosted by the MichiganLegislative Black Caucus and the Lansing Sister CitiesCommission, and was sponsored by <strong>Cooley</strong>.Based on the career of the Hon. Damon J. Keith, senior judge ofthe U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit (Michigan), theexhibit follows the well-received national tour of the collection’sfirst exhibit, Marching Toward Justice, that chronicled the historyand importance of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.Saluting a Giant was the first in a series of exhibits entitled“Fighters for Justice” that will showcase the contributions ofnotable African American lawyers and judges, including JudgeKeith and Justice Thurgood Marshall. The Damon J. KeithCollection of African American Legal History is the first and onlycollection in the country that is working to document the historiccontributions of African American lawyers and judges.“Bringing this exhibit to Lansing is a great honor for the <strong>Thomas</strong>M. <strong>Cooley</strong> <strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong>,” <strong>Cooley</strong> President and Dean Don LeDucsaid. “As the law school with the nation’s highest minority population,we believe it is very important to recognize the significantcontributions made by African American lawyers and judges toour society and our legal system. This collection represents amajor effort to document those contributions, and the JudgeKeith Collection illustrates these contributions perfectly.”Judge Damon J. Keith was appointed by President Lyndon B.Johnson to the U.S. District Court in 1967. Nationally, he is bestknown for his decision prohibiting the warrantless wiretappingof individuals, a decision that was affirmed by the U.S. SupremeCourt. But he is also well-known for his important rulings incases dealing with civil rights, civil liberties, school desegregation,and housing discrimination.Judge Keith was awarded the Spingarn Award, the highesthonor that the NAACP bestows, and the Edward J. DevittAward, given annually to the outstanding federal judge in thecountry. In 1987, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist of the U.S.Supreme Court appointed Judge Keith the national chair of theJudicial Conference Committee of the Bicentennial of the U.S.Constitution.Keith has served as a United States Court of Appeals Judge forthe Sixth Circuit since 1977. Previously, he served as ChiefJudge of the United States District Court for the Eastern Districtof Michigan. Judge Keith is a graduate of West Virginia StateCollege (B.A. 1943), Howard <strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong> (J.D. 1949), where hewas elected Chief Justice of the Court of Peers, and Wayne StateUniversity <strong>Law</strong> <strong>School</strong> (LL.M. 1956).NewEnrollmentRecordThe single largest classever to enter law schoolstarted classes at the<strong>Thomas</strong> M. <strong>Cooley</strong> <strong>Law</strong><strong>School</strong> Tuesday, Sept. 6,2005. Over 1,000 peoplefrom throughout the UnitedStates and several foreigncountries make up therecord-breaking class.
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