The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1872-09-05

JOHN N W ADDEL- ID ID, CHANCELLOR
THOMAS WALTON, Ii. B. PROFESSOR
Us June, 1872 the Trustees dispensed with til,
Il necessity of TWO years attendance, in thii
/ Law School and permitted the graduation of
/ student who attends year provided h,
/ should pass satisfactory examination Th'
degree, or diploma, thus obtained, Is made, 10y
| statute, license 10 practice law in any cour
| in Mississippi The student may enter the
class at any time though he is advised 10 b,
| here at the beginning cf the session, about
the first of October.
Board and lodging, fuel. lights. shine
and servants attendance, can be had Ia Ok
ford at prices varying from sixteen TO rs cnty-
five dollars a month-the cheapest being about
! as good as the eostliest. The tuition fee i 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 jdst as the Univer-
| sity opened, had success surprising to its
/ most sanguine friends, and il is already
known that next year il will have a still bet
ter attendance.
The following are the subjects of study pur-
| sued in this School, and under each head
! is set down a list of those authors read from
time to time on that particular topic.
1. The Law of Real Estate.
Blackstone, Kent, washburne, and Blackwell
Tax Titles.
2 The Law of Personal Property, in
Guiding Contracts and Commercial Law
Kent Story, Smith, Byles, Redfeld, and Par
sons, and Benjamin on Sales and Williams
on Personal Property.
3. The Rights of Persons.
tions and Angel Ames on Corporations.
4. The Law of Torts.
Addison Torts.
~ I I
Blackstone and Bishop.
6. The Law of Practice, including
Pleading and Evidence.
Stephen on Pleading, Gritty on Pleading
Greenleaf on Evidence, Starkie ; Evidence,
3 Blackstone, Conklings United States
Courts, and Bump on Bankruptcy.
Moot Courts, also have always been in use
in this School.
Z. Equity Jurisprudence, Pleading and
Practice.
Adams, Story and Daniel.
s. Constitutional Law.
Cooley, Kent and Story.
9. International Law, including Pri-
vate International Law or the Conflict of
Laws.
Whartons 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 n learning to
be taught after that fashion; but 1t has been
the practice to furnish the student written
lectures Mississippi practice, for him to
read and copy.
One of the chief advantages of a law school
and especially Of one not over-crowded 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 day being de-
voted to this exercise, and explanations being
given those points which this rigorous ex-
animation may show that the student does not
sufficiently understand.
4 practice has also been adopted here of re
quiring the students, frequently, to write down
in the recitation room Il synopsis of their latest
reading in order 10 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
possib 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
tory; for they not allowed to deliver n
memorized statement, and their exercise
amountstO the same thing as an oral argument
at the bar and IS perhaps the only practl-
cal mode ofteaching the art ofpublc speaking.
Obviously. the fewer the students, the more
training of this kind each one can obtain.
NO young man VINO mas attempted WITHOUT as
sociates in study, to master the voluminOus
learning of the law, need be told of the dismal
and often empowering dreariness of such an
undertaking. Blackstone, after quoting
very great lawyer, Sir Henry Spelman's con-
fessiOn, that such a trial had made his soul sink
within him, condemns the effort to learn law
by 'sequestering ones self from the world,
and by tedious, lonely process, extract
ing the theory of the law from 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, A law school gives the
student immense relief from this painful
irksomeness attending his first year or twos
plodding in the endless volumes Of the law.
Suchfrelief is derived from the emulation
and companiOnship of studying i'll 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 a much Lvefer,
and therefore, much more vigorous prosecu-
tion of his studies to be derived by law stu
dent from the daily discussions of n law school,
there is another question, namely, whether
law office or law school be the better place
for learning law in scientific method, such
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 n lawyer, educated to
the bar in subservience 10 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, priort, 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 will afford himself here a
dation of his future labors in solid and sci
entiic method, without thirstng too early to
attend that practice which it is impossible he
should rightly comprehend, he will afterward
proceed with the greatest ease, and viii unfold
the most intricate points with an intuitive ra-
pidity and clearness."
] Blackstone Commentaries, Introduction,