Back to the Future: ABA Law School Accreditation in the 21st Century and America's First Law School's Battle to Survive in the 1970s
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LAW LIBRARY JOURNAL Vol. 111:4 [2019-18]
Back to the Future: ABA Law School Accreditation
in the 21st Century and America's First Law
School's Battle to Survive in the 1970s*
James S. Heller** and Simon F. Zagata***
In the mid-i 970s, the ABA threatened to pull accreditation from the College of Wil-
liam & Mary's law school. The ABAs motives were questioned as it had never taken
this step before. Would a more aggressive 21st century ABA have stripped accredita-
tion from well-established schools like William & Mary? The reader can be the judge.
Introduction ........................ ................................509
The William & Mary Law School Accreditation Crisis ..................... 518
T he Q uestion ....................... ................................549
C onclusion ......................... ................................550
Introduction
11 The American Bar Association, which determines whether graduating law
students can sit for bar exams in most states, began accrediting U.S. law schools in
1923. In all the years that the ABA has been in the law school accreditation busi-
ness, it had never revoked accreditation from a fully accredited school-until the
spring of 2018.1 At the May 10-12, 2018, meeting of the Council of the Section of
Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar-the ABAs accreditation arm-
approval was withdrawn from Arizona Summit Law School, which had been
@ James S. Heller and Simon E Zagata, 2019.
Professor of Law, Emeritus (Director of the Law Library, College of William & Mary, 1988-
2019).
** J.D. 2018, William & Mary Law School; Staff Attorney, Michigan Protection & Advocacy
Service, Inc.
1. Email from Barry Currier, Managing Dir., ABA Section of Legal Educ. & Admissions to the
Bar, to author (Nov. 16, 2017 9:12 EST); email from Mary McNulty, Senior Pub., Mktg. & Tech. Spe-
cialist, ABA Section of Legal Educ. & Admissions to the Bar, to author (Nov. 20, 2017 5:28 EST); email
from James P. White, former ABA Consultant on Legal Educ., to author (Nov. 27, 2017 2:19 EST).
509](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/llj111&div=29&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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