The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1872-08-15
UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI,
OXFORD,
IULY Isah, s1z9s
THE Law SCHOOL.

/ July Isah, s1z9s
rib Law sCHooL,
s.kss FAGUTrDs sac
JOHN n WADDEI. ID. ID! CsANCKIIoR.
/ THOMAS WALTON, IL. B. PROFESSOR.
Is June, 1872 theTrustees dispensed with the
IL necessity of two years attendance, in this
Law School and permitted the graduation of n
! student who attends one year provided he
| should pass satisfactory examination. The
degree, or diploma, thus obtained, IS made, by
statute, license to practice law in any court
in Mississippi The student may enter the
class at any time though he is advised to be
here at the beginning eff the session, about
the first of October.
Board and lodging, fuel, lights. washing
and servants attendance, can be had IN Ok
ford at prices varying from sixteen to twenty
hve dollars month--the cheapest being about
good as the eostlieSt. The tuition fee is fifty
| dollars in the Law School; in all other depart
ments of the University, tuition is free. There
were two hundred and sixty students in the
University last session. The Law School,
| though re-organized only jast as the Univer-
sity opened, had success surprising to its
most sanguine friends, and ii is already
known that next year it win have a still bet
ter attendance
The following the subjects of study pur-
sued in this School, and under each head
is set down list of those authors read from
time to time that particular topic
1. The Law of Real Estate.
Blackstone, Kent, Washburne, and Blackwell
on Tax Titles.
2. The Law of Personal Property, in
Guiding Contracts and Commercial Law.
Kent, Story, Smith ByIes, Redfeld. and Par
sons, and Benjamin on Sales and Williams
on Personal Property.
The Riohts' of Persons
Blackstone, Kent, Shoulders Domestic Rela-
tions, and Angel Ames on Corporations.
4. The Law of Torts.
Addison on Torts.
5. Criminal Law and Procedure
Blackstone and Bishop.
6. The Law of Practice, including
Pleading and Evidence.
Stephen on Pleading, Gritty on Pleading
Greenleaf on Evidence, Starkie's Evidence,
3 Blackstone, Conkling's United States
Courts, and Bump on Bankruptcy,
Moot Courts, also, have always been in use
in this School. Ittf
Z. Equity Jurisprudence, Pleading and
Practice.
Adams, Story and Daniel.
8. Constitutional Law.
Cooley, Kent and Story.
9. International Law, including Pri-
vate International Law or the Conflict of
Laws. I
Wharton's Conflict of Laws, Story, Kent and
Wheaton.
Textbooks are the chief means of instruc-
ton in this School and lectures are not read to
the class, for law Is too abstruse learning to
be taught after that fashion; but it has been
the practice to furnish the student written
lectures on Mississippi practice, for him to
read and copy.
One of the chief advantages of law school
and especially of one not over-erowded with
students-is that by rigorous course of ex-
animation repeated with every student every
day on his days reading, thorough accuracy
is guaranteed in his mastery of the subject.
In this school, every student is thus examined
every day about three hours a day being de-
voted to this exercise, and explanations being
given on those points which this rigorous ex-
animation may show that the student does net
sufficiently understand rs.
A practice has also been adopted here of re-
quiring the students, freq uently, to write down
in the recitation room synopsis of their latest
reading, in order to compel them to that accu-
racy which is essential to a lawyer and each
student is in turn required to stand up before
the class, and, in manner as decent and quiet
as possible, to deliver an oral statement OF the
contents of the chapter and sometlmesa synop-
sis of the book under perusal. This IS done to
train the young men to the art of forensic ora
tory; for they not allowed to deliver
memorized statement, and their exercise
amountsto the same thing as an oral argument
at the bar, and is perhaps the only practi-
cal mode of teaching the art ofpublic speaking.
Obviously, the fewer the students, the more
training of this kind each one can obtain.
No young man who has attempted without as
sociates in study, to master the voluminous
learning of the law, need be told of the dismal
and often overpowering dreariness of such an
undertaking. Blackstone, after quoting a
very great lawyer, Sir Henry Spelmans con-
fession, that such trial had made his soul sink
within him, condemns the effort to learn law
by "sequestering ones self from the world,
and by a tedious, lonely process, extract
ing the theory of the law from a mass of
undigested learning" He equally condemns
the effort to learn it by an assiduous atten-
dance on the courts, to pick up theory and
practice together" law school gives the
student immense relief from this painful
irksOmeness attending his first year or twos
plOddiHg in the endless volumes of the law.
Such relief is derived fro1A the emulation
and companionship of studying in classes,
and from the daily examinations The stu
dents constantly discussing their studies
not only with the professor but with each 9TH
err, and their interest is thus prevented from
tagging, and their daily work from becoming
repulsive
Besides, however, the advantages of pre-
cisiOn in his learning, and of much livelier,
and therefore, much more vigorous prosecu-
ton of his studies, to be derived by law stu
dent from the daily discussions of a law school,
there is another question, namely, whether
law office or law school be the better place
as every man must pursue to obtain success
and on this question, the attention of students
and of the profession is invited to the opin-
ion of Sir William Blackstone
Making due allowance says he, for one
or two shining exceptions, experience may
teach us to foretell, that o lawyer, ted TO
the bar in subservience to attorneys and So
licitors, will find he has begun at the wrong
end. If practice be the whole he is taught,
practice must also be the whole he will ever
know. He must never aspire to form, and sell
dom expect to comprehend, any arguments
drawn, priOri, from the spirit of the laws
and the natural foundations of Justice"
On the other hand, speaking of the law
school he says:
IF the student viii afford himself here a
year or two's further leisure to lay the foun-
dation of his future labors in solid and sci
entifc method without thirsting too early to
attend that practice which it is impossible he
should rightly comprehend, he will afterward
proceed with the greatest ease, and will unfold
the most intricate points with intuitiye ra-
pidity and clearness."
l Blackstone Commentaries, Introduction,
PIP. 31-34. july23w6m