Texas will become the first state to no longer use American Bar Association (ABA) for oversight of its law schools.
The Texas Supreme Court will take over that responsibility, according to an order its justices issued on Friday, Sept. 26. The ABA has set standards for law schools nationwide for decades.
Karen Sloan, who covers the legal business for Reuters, spoke to Texas Standard about the decision. Listen to the interview above or read the transcript below.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: Well, first, briefly explain why this accreditation process is so critical for law schools and their graduates.
Karen Sloan: So law school accreditation is important because it kind of paves the way for graduates to go on and practice as lawyers.
Most states require graduation from an ABA-approved law school in order to sit and take their bar exam. And of course you have to pass the bar exam in order go on to become a practicing lawyer.
So it's really kind of a key credential that you need in order pursue your legal career.
Well, what has the American Bar Association done in the view of the Texas Supreme Court to drive its justices to this decision?
That is a little bit unclear at this point.
When the Texas Supreme Court back in April said that it was gonna be reviewing the ABA requirement, it never said why. And then last week when it said the court is going to assume the responsibility of approving law schools instead of the ABA, it also didn't really provide a rationale for making the change – much to the chagrin of, I think, some legal educators in the state who wanted sort of an explanation of why the change was needed.
So we're left to read a little bit in between the lines as to what motivated the court to do this. But we do know that the Supreme Court of Florida, which a few weeks before Texas launched its review, said it was creating a work group to look at the ABA rule. Those justices came out and said, we're doing this because the ABA has a diversity requirement for law schools. And they're uncomfortable with some of the ABA's quote, "political engagement."
So in that case, they were pretty clear that there are some sort of political reasons that led to their review. We didn't get that from Texas. So we don't have as clear of a picture as to their motivation.
Well, you raise a good point. Texas is the first state to make this move, but could others follow?
Absolutely. We already know that the Supreme Court of Florida is looking at a similar review. In recent months, Ohio has also said it's looking at its ABA requirement. And just a couple of weeks ago, Tennessee said that it was as well.
So it's possible that Texas could be the first in a series of states that are backing away from their reliance on the ABA to accredit law schools.
Well, could this isolate Texas law schools and alumni, making it harder for them to find jobs outside the state?
It's possible, but we don't know very much about that yet.
When the court said it intended to sort of take over responsibility for approving law schools, it said, when it asked for further public comment on that, that it intends to retain the portability of Texas law school degrees into other states and the ability of lawyers who graduated from law schools elsewhere to come into Texas.
Now, the Texas Supreme Court gets to control how licensing happens in Texas, but they don't control how lawyer licensing happens outside of the state lines. A lot of states require graduation from an ABA law school. So it's unclear how this change could potentially impact law graduates in Texas who want to go into other states, but have not graduated from an ABA-accredited law school.
Well, has the Texas Supreme Court released any details about how it will assess law schools going forward?
Very little. In what the court put out last week, it has said that it does not want to impose any additional requirements on schools. So I believe that it's not gonna require anything from law schools above and beyond what the ABA currently requires from them.
It has said, in fact, that it wants to give schools stability and flexibility with a set of – and this is their words – "simple objective" and "ideologically neutral" criteria. So my expectation is it will not require any more of law schools than the ABA does.
Potentially, it could require less, but we just don't know yet because it has offered very little in the way of specifics.
Well, Karen, you cover this closely – the legal industry. What are you looking at going forward? What are keeping an eye on?
Well, there is another potential reason for taking a closer look at ABA accreditation and that is the, I think, valid criticism that the ABA imposes a lot of requirements on schools and some have said the ABA even micromanages law schools and that as a result, going to law school and becoming a lawyer is quite expensive.
So there is an argument that in order to serve the vast unmet legal needs of the American public, that we need more lawyers and we need lawyers who don't have to take extremely high paying jobs in order pay back their law school debt.
So one of the arguments for opening up accreditation beyond just ABA law schools is that we need to make becoming a lawyer more affordable because in order to expand the number of lawyers out there, we're just pricing people out. That there's not enough lawyers and to get more lawyers and to address what's known as the justice gap, we have to make it easier to become a lawyer and we have look at alternative pathways in order to meet those needs.
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