Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 02.pdf/88

The Law School of Cumberland University. The Plan of Instruction. The virtue of any plan of instruction must consist of two things : (1) it must cause the student to work, or, in other words, to study diligently; (2) it must so guide and direct his work, that in the best way and in the shortest time he may be qualified to practise law. The plan here is to give the student a lesson every day, and examine him the next

day carefully and crit ically. He must an swer questions in the presence of the whole class. This will in sure the closest appli cation of which he is capable; for indolence is sure to sink him to a degraded position. This method is far superior to the plan of studying in the lawyer's office, or to the old law-school plan of teaching wholly by lectures. Neither of the latter has any thing in it to secure application. The stu dent is brought to no daily examination to test his proficiency. Indeed, all that is cal ANDREW B. culated to stimulate him to constant, la borious application is wanting. The student ought to have such a course assigned him, and be conducted through it in such a way, that he will understand, at the end of his pupilage, the greatest amount of pure, living American law, and will know best how to apply it in practice. We have made our course American. Important as it is to trace the history of the law from its original sources, through all its mutations, yet this is not the most important or appro priate work in preparing the young man for practice. The useful and the practical, the

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law of to-day and the mode of its application, are what the young man needs when he en ters on his professional career; and these the law school should give him. He will have abundant leisure, and, if his ambition be rightly stimulated, he will enter more largely into the origin and philosophy of the law in after years. In this Law School the object has been and is to direct the minds of students to what is most impor tant in the text-books, to teach them what is and what is not settled, to correct the errors into which they may fall, to dis pel the darkness that hangs upon many passages. This has been found necessary every day and at every step of their progress. Moot Courts. The art of the pro fession can only be learned by practice, and is as necessary a preparation as the learning of the science. MARTIN If the student learns the art at the bar, it is at the expense of his client; if he learns it in school, it is at his own expense. Moot courts have been kept up since the origin of the school, and consist not merely in de bating questions of law, but in cases an nounced in various forms to each student, on which he is to bring a suit and another is appointed to defend it. There is a regular clerk and sheriff, the students performing the duties of the officers. The plaintiff's attorney gives his prosecution bond, issues his writ, makes the proper returns on it in the name of the sheriff, and files his declara