Law Schools

Another Terrible Law School Has Sued The ABA For Pointing Out That It's Terrible

The terrifying prospect is that the ABA may just not have the ability to fight these suits.

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Charlotte Law may not have been good at “serving the student community,” or “alumni relations,” or “actually teaching law,” but they really had a knack for seizing upon any and every opportunity to keep their enterprise rolling. They managed to lean on Betsy DeVos’s ideological hobby horse to get forgiveness for their for-profit failures.

So when the zombie remains of the closed law school realized that Florida Coastal was suing the ABA, it was only a matter of time before they jumped on board.

For the unfamiliar, the ABA played itself a while back when a lawsuit forced the body to reverse its tough stance on Thomas Cooley Law’s accreditation problems. That was all the opening Florida Coastal needed to see the answer to its own troubles with the ABA’s accreditation people was a quick lawsuit to ask why Cooley got preferential treatment. Now Florida Coastal’s InfiLaw sibling Charlotte is asking the same question in a suit filed yesterday.

This is why you don’t negotiate with terrorists.

The presence of a conservative legal luminary like Paul Clement, who also represents Florida Coastal, on a case like this is no accident. This is torn right out of the right-wing playbook to go right after a regulator for having the audacity to “regulate.” And, yes, the ABA is not the Department of Education, but as long as the ABA is setting the standards, it’s the only body in the regulatory process that matters. And, unfortunately, the only one that has to defend its actions with money out of its own pocket.

For years, observers complained that the ABA was not doing enough to halt the decline in academic standards at the nation’s law schools. As I used to say of the Chicago-based ABA “if yo law school is busted, 312 will not regulate” on more than one occasion. But then the ABA really got down to business and started laying down the tough pronouncements and harsh penalties the legal academy needed for years. Yet once it gets serious about its responsibilities, this is all it earns — a flurry of lawsuits.

While the basis of the lawsuit is that the ABA’s accreditation actions are arbitrary and capricious, the most chilling possibility is that the ABA’s moves are entirely deliberate. The ABA is in the midst of a steady decline in dues-paying members and has an almost bottomless task list of important work. Just as the ABA’s crackdown exposed the “law school empire wore no clothes,” perhaps Cooley’s suit exposed that the ABA lacks the wherewithal to go to the mat over this. If the ABA backed off of Cooley out of necessity, then it would no doubt have to relent with the full firepower of Kirkland & Ellis taking aim.

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If it comes to that, then the ABA’s role in setting academic standards would be… well, entirely academic.

(The full complaint is available on the next page…)

Earlier: Law School Sues ABA For ‘Attacking Diversity’ And, Like, Doing Its Job
Charlotte School Of Law Is Closing ‘Effective Immediately’
Charlotte Law School Excels At Making Enemies Everywhere
Charlotte Administration Pens Lame Response To Alumni Demands

HeadshotJoe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

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