these schools teach law by cases entirely. The purpose of the case system is to give instruction in law by means of judicial deci'ions as the basis of class room work. What are believed to be the most important cases upon a given subject, say contracts, insur ance, constitutional law, or whatever it may be, are collected and published in the form of a case book, which is given to the stu dent for study and preparation, so that he may be able to report upon and discuss in the class room the cases previously assigned to him for study. No syllabi or head notes are used or permitted in connection with the cases contained in the case book, and there is nothing to indicate the points of the de cision, unless it be the title given to the subject under which the case is grouped. Copious notes are often added, however, re ferring to other decisions in which the same or kindred questions are determined, either in accord with or contrary to the adjudica tion of the principal case or cases furnishing the topic for discussion. Xo one who has given this system of teaching law serious study can escape the conviction that it has become a potent factor in the world of legal education, and that it has greatly revolutionized the entire work of the law teacher. Formerly, written lec tures and recitations from treatises on given subjects constituted the principal means by which a knowledge of law was imparted to law school students. Where the text-book only was employed great emphasis was placed upon the necessity of following the ideas and conclusions of the author; and the contents of the texts were usually recited by rote. The lecture system, as then practised, gave the student but little to do beyond storing up the utterances of the professor for use on ex amination day. It is true that the lectures contained many and frequent citations of au thorities, but these were rarely ever reported on or even carefully examined by the stu dent, and never discussed at length in the
class room. All this has now changed. The oral discussion in class has displaced the verbatim "recitation" and the written lecture. Neither the dogmatic statement of the text nor that of the instructor is any longer blindly followed, and the spirit of freedom of discussion and independence of thought prevades every well-conducted class in the law school. And this is true whether the teach ing is purely by cases or not. That these reforms in the teaching of law are wholly the result of the case system, is, perhaps, too much to say for it; but that they are so in large part must, I think, be ad mitted by everyone at all familiar with the subject. Every case that comes before the class, ¡f carefully studied by the student be forehand, will, from the nature of its ratio decidendi, call forth either the approval or disapproval of the student of law, if he is sufficiently advanced to entertain a rational opinion on the question decided, or will, at least, raise a question of doubt in his mind, if his views as to the underlying principles of the case are not already firmly fixed. This will supply the motive for an investigation beyond the immediate scope of the decision itself. It tends to arouse the spirit of con; troversy which is so useful to the student, not only in the class room and in his inter course with the teacher, but also in the act ual practice of his profession afterward. If, then, the case system has done nothing more for the cause of legal education, its right to a permanent position in law school work seems to be firmly established. But its merit is not to be confined to the bene ficial influence it has exerted over the meth ods of teaching in a general way. Its greater utility lies in its own intrinsic fitness to ac complish the most satisfactory results in the teaching of law as a science, under proper conditions. This is not to say that it can be employed successfully with all classes of stu dents and in all circumstances. If the stu
