The "Yale Approach," so-called, stresses the relation of law to economics, politics, and sociology. This philosophy has two strands. One is the older doctrine of legal realism, which emphasized the actual problems of legal practice and judicial decision rather than more legal theory. According to this way of thinking students should be trained to understand law as a human creation dealing with human problems.

Policy Science

The second and more controversial stand of the "Yale Approach" is the newer and less-accepted policy science theory propounded by professors Myres McDougal and Harold Lasswell of Yale. These men view law as a pragmatic tool which can be used to shape policy for the public good. They feel that the student, as a potential policy maker--lawyer, judge public administrator--should be trained to think in these terms. Lasswell and McDougal also believe that other areas of knowledge--semantics, psychology, sociology for instances--should be brought to bear on law.

The Yale school does not wholly subscribe to the theories of Legal Realism or of Policy Science, although it draws on them both. Thus to teach the "realistic" actualities of law practice, there is the required moot court work and courses in case presentation and in case studies. An entire term is spent on the study of one actual case under direction of one of the original counsels. In line with the Policy Science, emphasis on allied fields. Yale has two non-lawyers on the teaching staff, F.S.C. Northrop and Lasswell.

Almost Entirely Elective

Except for the fall term of the first term, the Yale curriculum is almost entirely elective.. This freedom puts the burden of planning on the student, but it leaves him free to specialize as he will and allows him wide choice.

Besides the regular courses, there are about 30 half-year seminars, ranging from "Air Transportation" and "Legal Aspects of Diplomacy" to "Law and the Arts." One seminar, "Law and Public Opinion," was held at Mory's until 1949, when enrollment of a girl made a change of meeting-place necessary.

These courses are what students call "the fringe;" most men, wary of bar examinations, choose the more orthodox fare, the "bread and butter" courses.

Yale's free elective system is in direct contrast with Harvard, where the first, two years work is, with little exception, required. Harvard's position, in Dean Griswold's words, is that "there is a hard core of law which every educated and qualified lawyer should be exposed to." In other ways, however, Harvard's recent curriculum revision seems to have moved it closer to the Yale method.

For instance, in the fall term 1949, the Harvard faculty introduced five "perspective courses" for second-year men. These were designed, according to Professor Hart, to be "relatively small classes for the discussion of basic issues "about law. The subjects included "Comparison of Soviet and American Law," and "American Legal History."

The creation of the perspective courses was part of a general revision of first and second-year curriculum to provide what Professor Long Fuller calls a "general education in law. "The idea behind this change was to cram as much basic work as possible into the first two years, leaving the third year for more specialized work.

The teaching, at Harvard and at Yale, is based of the case system. Rather than memorize their way through a textbook, students have to think their way through actual court decisions, and the glean the points from them. At both schools many of the lecturers use the "Socratic method." In their classes, questioning student after student about a case until an answer is obtained.

'Bread and Butter' Course

As for the size of classes, Harvard's are large all the way through--around 130 for the first two years. A student will be called upon two or three times a term. At Yale entering men go into classes of about 75; from then on meetings average 40 members, though some of the "bread and butter" courses draw upwards of a hundred.

Besides joining in use of the case method, both Harvard and Yale have set up a research and writing requirement. Legal research must be through and exhaustive and the writing is a though but "necessary discipline." Both Administrations have found that work on the Law Journal (Yale) or the Harvard Law Review, with just this sort of experience, has proved to be the most valuable training law students can get. Of course, unfortunately it is restricted to the top men in the class.