formerly prepared to enter the practice of the law by work and observation of the law in action in a law office. He still does most of his graduate work, if any, in that manner. Today the school has almost entirely supplanted the office as a preparatory institution, but it has made slight inroads on the office for work following graduation. After eighteen or nineteen years at school the student is ready for a change, and once he is in successful practice he is not likely to leave it to return to school. Thus far, completion of a graduate course does not bring more attractive offers to enter practice.
The immense increase in enrollment in law schools, however, has brought the need for many more lawyers fitted to become teachers of law, and for that purpose legal scholarship is very important. Success at the bar has proved no criterion of promise as a law teacher. Successful practice is financially so much more remunerative than teaching that active practitioners are rarely willing to change, and very successful practitioners have often proved ill suited to the teaching of law, particularly so if they enter upon teaching after many years of practice. More and more, law faculties are recruited from lawyers with short experience at the bar, often with none at all, but with scholarly instincts and achievement. For the training of these there is a limited but growing demand for superior graduate work in law.
The first enrollments for graduate work were in the days of the two-year law course. In 1889 the Regents approved a study of one year after graduation leading to the degree of master of laws (LL.M.). Between 1890 and 1897 (the year in which the course was increased to three years) there were from six to twenty-one enrolled in this graduate year. Since that time enrollments have been few. This shows that several years before it was offered there was a substantial demand for a three-year course. When three years of study were required for the bachelor of laws degree, the degree of master of laws almost disappeared. The course was little more than an added year of law study, though some specialization was required.
In 1924 a new fourth-year course (for the degree of master of laws or juris doctor, J.D.) was announced which was not merely an added year after graduation, but called for specialization and a different kind of work. For this, new courses were offered which were open only to fourth-year students. The next year this was modified so as to provide for two fourth-year curriculums (LL.M. and doctor of juridical science, S.J.D.). These two curriculums are still in force. To enter the former the student must have secured a law degree with high rank and must thereafter pursue a fourth-year program of study in this Law School approved by the committee on graduate law instruction. This program must provide for a substantial measure of specialization in some selected subject.
More worthy still of being dignified as graduate study is the course leading to the degree of doctor of juridical science (S.J.D.). The candidate must not only have the previous record required for the course leading to the degree of master of laws and pursue an approved program of graduate study for at least a year, but he must also demonstrate capacity for independent research in law by completing and preparing for publication an approved original study upon some selected subject. This study may be submitted at any time within five years after completion of the graduate year. This year must be devoted to pursuit of seminar courses open by special permission to a limited number of exceptionally qualified third-year and fourth-year students. This is graduate work calling for independent research which requires scholarly
