HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE, LEGAL EDUCATION DIVERSITY EDITION: Jonathan Adler: What Is The Association of American Law Schools Afraid Of?

Most law school faculties lack meaningful viewpoint diversity, and this has consequences for legal education. Training lawyers requires teaching students how to understand and get inside the arguments of those with differing interests, outlooks and orientations. It requires developing the ability to understand and articulate points of view that one does not believe. Doing this effectively requires exposure to differing points of view, and this is more difficult to achieve when faculties are ideological monocultures and echo chambers. At many law schools, students rarely encounter the forceful articulation right-of-center views. Indeed, most major law schools have fewer conservatives or libertarians on their faculty than can be found on the U.S. Supreme Court.

While right-of-center views may be hard to find in much of legal academia, they are commonplace in the legal profession, in particular on the federal bench. The lack of meaningful exposure to alternative views leaves law students less well prepared to advocate for their clients. This is why some of us have urged the Association of American Law Schools to pay more attention to the causes and consequences of the lack of viewpoint diversity — a lack which is also evident in much of the AALS’s own programming.

The existence of ideological imbalance has been documented in numerous studies, including this analysis by Northwestern’s James Lindgren, in addition to studies of law school hiring, political contributions and legal scholarship that also find left-right disparities. While most law schools have a few token right-leaning professors, these scholars are often relegated to “private law” subjects (e.g., business, contracts, IP), and are less prevalent in “public law” subjects (e.g., constitutional law). . . .

One way to help resolve the dispute over whether there are meaningful ideological or partisan disparities in law school hiring would be to study the question, such as by analyzing data from the AALS Faculty Appointments Register (FAR). Analysis of such data in the past has produced interesting findings on racial disparities in law school hiring. An analysis of ideological factors in hiring might likewise be illuminating — whether or not it confirms the hypothesis that ideological hiring bias exits. Unfortunately, the AALS has denied researchers access to the FAR data for this purpose. While the AALS allowed other researchers to look at racial and other factors in hiring, for some reason it refuses to allow a similar inquiry into the role of ideology.

The AALS styles itself as a learned society. It’s stated mission is “to uphold and advance excellence in legal education.” Further, the AALS proclaims that “In support of this mission, AALS promotes the core values of excellence in teaching and scholarship, academic freedom, and diversity, including diversity of backgrounds and viewpoints, while seeking to improve the legal profession, to foster justice, and to serve our many communities–local, national, and international” (emphasis added). On what basis, then, does the AALS refuse to allow researchers access to FAR data to conduct legitimate academic research? The AALS cannot claim this data is inviolate for, as already noted, it has allowed researchers access to this data before. It is almost as if the AALS is afraid of what such research might find.

Ya think?