Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 01.pdf/77

 58

seemed to enjoy. His memory is most fit tingly honored by the large portrait of him which hangs in the lecture hall of the school. In 1872 the standard maintained by the law schools of the country was remarkably low. Even such an old school as that at Cambridge did not require any examination for admission, promotion, or graduation. Neither was there at that time any law school which had a three years' curriculum. At its inception the University School in sisted upon examinations, and particular im portance was attached to those for graduation. It also from the first had a three years' cur riculum, the third year of which was, until 1876, a post-graduate course; but in that year it was added to the undergraduate course, and a three years' course of study, with minor exceptions, was made a pre requisite to graduation. Other law schools have since adopted similar provisions in all the above matters; but the Boston Law School was the leader in the movement, and is entitled to the credit of placing legal academic education upon a higher plane than had before been maintained. In 1875 the number of students had so increased that more accommodations were demanded, and the large hall in the Wesleyan building on Bromfield Street was se cured for a lecture room. Subsequently the library and dean's office were removed to the same building, and other improvements made by the addition of recitation rooms and the fitting up of a large lecture hall which was capable of seating some one hundred and seventy-five persons. In 1884 the school was removed to its present loca tion in the fine law-school building on Ashburton Place, and adjoining Jacob Sleeper Hall, a building used by other departments of the University. The period during which the school was located in Bromfield Street was a most im portant one; it gave system and consistency to the school, and developed it into one of the best managed, equipped, and most thorough schools in the country.

Up to the time of the removal to Brom field Street, and indeed for a year or two after that, the instruction consisted almost entirely of lectures, with such incidental discussion as would naturally arise from an occasional interruption and question. Moot courts had been held with considerable regularity, and had been conducted by some mem ber of the faculty. But in the fall of 1877 the system of recitations was inaugurated. These recitations have become one of the greatest elements of strength in the school; and in this measure, as in others, the school has led all the other law schools in the country. It has given to this branch of instruction, as distinguished from instruc tion by lectures, a prominence nowhere else attained. It has been the practice of the faculty since this system was instituted to intrust this work to young men, and always to some one other than a lecturer. It is true that young men who have just finished their own school work do not know quite as much as their elders, but they are far better adapted to conduct recitations; they appre ciate more quickly and more fully the diffi culties and embarrassments of the pupil, and can therefore help him more. Two instruc tors were appointed in 1877, and their work was so satisfactory that in the fall of 1878 two more were added to the list; and from that time to the present the school has always had an able corps of such instruc tors. Time has but increased the satisfaction which attended the introduction of this sys tem; and it has become the settled policy of the school to leave the discussion of particu lar adjudications, their reasonings and plead ings, to the recitation room; and for the lecturer to lead the students along the great lines of principle which pervade his subject, giving them the broad foundation for his statements and citations to the great leading cases. It has of late years become quite common to study law in some of our schools without any such work in the lecture room, and to make it all the study of cases, from which