Lawyers the Legal System

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

The seminar will provide a general introduction to the organization of the American legal system. We will spend the first five weeks discussing the distinctive features of our legal system: the federal structure of the court system, the difference between statutory and court-made law, different substantive areas of the law, and the broad contours of the process by which courts decide legal disputes. We will examine what scholars refer to as the sociology of the legal profession. We will compare the institutional settings in which lawyers practice law, and we will study the complexities that are introduced into the practice of law by two external factors: the lawyer's ethical obligations, and the economics of practicing law. We will read one book (A Civil Action) that provides a panoramic view of a real lawsuit and the decisions--tactical, ethical, and practical--lawyers must make during the litigation process. Lastly, we will spend the last several weeks of the seminar investigating and developing the skills lawyers must possess to be well-skilled in their calling. You will attend a portion of a trial to observe the way lawyers function in the courtroom and assess whether the "lawyering" you saw was effective. You will receive lessons in legal research and legal writing, and we'll apply those lessons to the mock-litigation of an actual case. We'll examine the education and training future lawyers receive in law school. We'll discuss contemporary criticisms of the legal profession and its role in society. And finally, we'll take a look at how mainstream society obtains much of its information about lawyers through the writings of popular fiction. [American Government]