Bipartisan Legislation Introduced To Increase Job Opportunities For Law School Grads

If this legislation ever does get passed, it will be a interesting opportunity for the lucky few.

Congress is making a move to broaden the opportunities for law school graduates. Last week, Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), John Hoeven (R-ND), and Ted Cruz (R-TX) co-sponsored bipartisan legislation to create congressional clerkships — analogous to judicial clerkships — for law school graduates.

The Daniel Webster Congressional Clerkship Act is intended to “improve the business of Congress and increase the public’s understanding of its work,” according to a press release on the bill. The senators sponsoring the bill also hope to hook young lawyers on the allure of legislative work and eschew the judiciary focus that J.D.’s traditionally have:

“A clerkship can provide invaluable experience to a young lawyer at the start of his or her career,” Sen. Leahy said. “The federal judiciary has long had a clerkship program that teaches recent law school graduates the workings of the judicial branch. Yet there has never been a formal clerkship program in Congress. Creating a pathway for more young lawyers to gain an understanding of how Congress works and the value of public service will lead to a greater embrace of public service. I am proud to be introducing once again bipartisan legislation to encourage more young lawyers to work in the Congress.”

Working to make congressional opportunities elite ones that attract the best and brightest has been a challenge, and what the Steering Committee of the Congressional Clerkship Coalition hopes this legislation will address:

“The problem is not that Congress does not have enough lawyers,” the Steering Committee [comprised of Larry Kramer, former Dean of Stanford Law School; Robin West, law professor at Georgetown University Law Center; Bill Treanor, Dean of Georgetown University Law Center; Abbe Gluck, law professor at Yale Law School; and Dakota Rudesill, law professor at Ohio State] noted. “Rather, the problem is that Congress is not competitive for the opportunity to apprentice lawyers on the fast track to the legal profession’s most influential ranks. Congress is missing the opportunity to shape the constitutional perspective of the law’s future leaders. That is because unlike the federal courts, federal agencies, law firms, and law schools, Congress lacks a regularized apprenticeship program that is readily accessible to any top new law graduate, on the basis of objective qualifications,” the Coalition’s Steering Committee emphasized.

If this legislation ever does get passed, it will be a interesting opportunity for the lucky few.


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