Scholarly Restraints? ABA Accreditation and Legal Education

Authors

George B. Shepherd, Emory University School of Law
William G. Shepherd, University of Massachusetts at Amherst

Abstract

This Article provides an economic and legal analysis of the American Bar Association's system for accrediting law schools. For decades, the ABA has administered the system as, in economic effect, a cartel of law school faculty members. The ABA has exerted monopoly power not only over the market for legal training, but also over three related markets: the market for the hiring of law faculty, the market for legal services, and each university's internal market for funding. Despite the selfless service of many in the system, the system has created large harms, but few benefits. Existing law faculty have gained at the expense of their students, of their universities, and of other potential faculty members. By suppressing new schools that would offer cheaper, more-efficient legal education, the system has excluded many from the legal profession, particularly the poor and minorities. The system has both raised the cost of legal services and denied legal services to whole segments of our society. The system is illegal under the antitrust laws. The Article enlarges the literature in five specific ways. It shows that many law schools are organized, in effect, as partnerships of professors. It explores the system's impacts on four related markets, rather than just one. It appraises the ABA system's main harms and possible benefits. It shows extensively the antitrust violation. And it suggests important policy choices, including abolishing the accreditation controls and markedly changing the role of the bar examination.

Disciplines

Education Law | Intellectual Property Law | Law | Legal Education | Securities Law

Recommended Citation

George B. Shepherd & William G. Shepherd, Scholarly Restraints? ABA Accreditation and Legal Education, 19 Cardozo L. Rev. 2091 (1998).
Available at: https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/clr/vol19/iss6/7