A number of
well -
written articles chronicle at least some of the history of
legal writing in the law school curriculum.1 However, those articles were
written with a different purpose in mind: the authors sought to employ history to show the pedigree of
legal writing and argue for an equal place in the curriculum with doctrinal courses and an equal position for its teachers with other «case - book» faculty.2 Because of this purpose, they understandably focused a large part of their historical narrative on
legal writing in the «modern law - school,» an entity that has existed only since the late 1800s.3 The articles paid considerably less attention to the era that preceded it, beyond brief
mentions of the Inns of Court in England, apprenticeship in America, and the private law schools and early attempts at law teaching that preceded Langdell's introduction of the case method.4