On law review: a possibly snotty post

(I apologize in advance to 1) non-law readers and 2) law readers who could care less about law review; you will all find this post either boring or annoying. Feel free to ignore; this has just been gnawing at me for a bit!)

Okay, I'm not sure this is going to sound very sympathetic, but I want to hold forth briefly about law review.

In the last couple of months, I've run into people who didn't apply to be on law review (at my school, membership is determined almost entirely by a write-on essay - grades don't matter) because they didn't like the topic that was assigned for the competition. Or who think the law review should let people write about different topics for the write-on.

Now, let me acknowledge first that I am very invested in law review - NOT, mind you, that I think law review is the be-all and end-all of student achievements (it's not), or that it's some kind of indication that someone's going to be a great lawyer (it's not), or that someone NOT being on law review tells you anything about their skills or intelligence (it doesn't). I'm just invested in law review because I actually believe in the value of academic scholarship, and am a research-and-writing nerd who gets way too into all that stuff.

So, I may not be impartial here. BUT I would respectfully submit that people who don't do the write on because of the topic, or who think that they should be able to write on what they like, are entirely missing the point of law review.

Law review is not interested in whether you can write something brilliant on a topic of your own choosing, dear to your heart.

Law review wants to know if you can take a pile of crap and make something coherent and useful out of it. Completing the write-on is really a proxy for your willingness to slog through stuff that may be of very little interest to you, personally. It's about whether you can and will do what (usually) other people believe needs to be done.

Sure, you're going to write a note on something you're interested in (I hope), and you can show all your brilliance in that.

But an awful lot of law review is NOT about that. Law review is about getting done what needs to get done to put other people's work out there. Law review is about believing in the ultimate product, even when that involves matters you, personally, couldn't care less about. The irony is that one of the things that law school culture has deemed individually "prestigious" is actually not at ALL about individual glory or interests (unless maybe you publish your note). Not even if you're Editor-in-Chief (at least, if you're a good one).

And if we're thinking about law review in a utilitarian fashion, I'd bet you the employers who care about law review care not because they think it means an applicant is a brilliant writer, but because it means an applicant is willing to put in a lot of tedious work towards a broader goal. (After all, how often do beginning attorneys actually get to pick their cases?)

Now, I'm not going to argue that this is a good thing, that law review values are necessarily the best around. In fact, I'd submit that someone who chooses not to do law review because they're not interested in doing stuff they consider boring/crap/irrelevant just for the sake of a line on the resume/generating a lot of pages of writing that don't accomplish anything may well be a healthier, more balanced person who knows what they want out of life and isn't willing to sacrifice that. More power to such a person, I say.

But I don't think such a person can complain about the way in which law reviews (or at least, ones like mine that have write-on competitions) select their members. Because the point of law review isn't to do what you like. And maybe it isn't fair that you can't get the "prestige" of law review without having to do the crap you don't want to do - but that's the way it works.

(To try to make this rant a bit more constructive: if you're a law student considering whether you want to try for law review? Don't let disinterest in/dislike for the application process dissuade you - one of the best criteria for being on law review is simply being willing to put in the work to complete the application diligently and competently. Or conversely, if you're convinced the process is really so horrible that you can't imagine completing it, you are a wise person who knows yourself and what makes you happy, and law review will not do so. So just spend your time on other things and don't look back. Because law review is not that big a deal, and any "prestige" it bestows is not going to make up for hating what you have to do for it.)

Comments

[Andrew]

The prestige probably has something to do with the fact that, as you point out, willingness to do a lot of tedious work for a broader goal is a character trait / skill highly prized by law firms and indeed, employers in general. In fact, this probably explains a lot of the boring bits of schooling in general, from kindergarten on up. The point is not (merely) to learn facts or how to think critically; it's also to learn how to sit down and shut up, how to be self-disciplined and conscientious, how to do what you're told, and indeed, how to do a lot of tedious work in the service of a broader goal. Alternatively, you could say that rather than entraining these skills, school is really about signalling to employers whether you have these character traits or not.

[Rudbeckia Hirta]

Tangentially related anecdote from when I was a senior in high school: Of the two purple liberal arts colleges in western Massachusetts, I applied to only one of them because the other had icky essays on its application.

[undine]

I didn't know what the process was, but anything that proves the applicant can do "tedious work towards a broader goal" sounds like a good thing for employers as well as those on the law review.

[joy]

Their reasons sound to me like post facto rationalizations for not having the guts to do the writing competition. There are plenty of good reasons to not apply to law review, but "I wanted to pick my own topic" is not among them.

[Comrade PhysioProf]

And if we're thinking about law review in a utilitarian fashion, I'd bet you the employers who care about law review care not because they think it means an applicant is a brilliant writer, but because it means an applicant is willing to put in a lot of tedious work towards a broader goal.

Nah. Legal employers care about law review because being on it means that you outcompeted many of your classmates and thus it provides an objective metric they can use in addition to grades to rank job applicants.

[New Kid on the Hallway]

Sure, but you mostly outcompeted your classmates at being willing to put in tedious work toward a broader goal. It's not really a very objective metric of quality when you think about all the people who don't go out for law review. I know any number of people who're just as qualified as I am to be on law review who just weren't interested, and hence didn't do the write-on - so how is being on law review any kind of objective metric for judging between me and them? (I'd agree it's a filter for employers, and it's objective in the sense that it's a bright-line rule - you're either on law review or you're not. But I think it's a much better proxy for attitude than it is for ability.)

[Comrade PhysioProf]

I'd agree it's a filter for employers, and it's objective in the sense that it's a bright-line rule - you're either on law review or you're not.

Yeah, that's exactly what I meant.

But I think it's a much better proxy for attitude than it is for ability.

It probably is. Regardless, legal employers--other than, perhaps, judges looking for clerks--don't really care what it's a proxy for, and just use it as a filter.