Law Schools

Yale Law Community Fed Up With Unswerving Fixation On Social Climbing That Defines Yale Law

But if you take the prestige hustling out of Yale Law... what's left?

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Tons of Yale Law students and alumni have signed an open letter blasting the school for embracing the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh and leading the charge in numbing criticism of the jurist’s troubling substantive record.

It’s safe to say that when Trump tapped Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court, the only people happier than Kavanaugh’s family and his carpool buddies were the powers-that-be at Yale Law School. The perennial top-rated law school was so overjoyed to see another of their grads ascending to SCOTUS they could hardly contain their enthusiasm for furthering the school’s stranglehold on the nation’s judicial branch. Notoriously, Yale Law professor Akhil Reed Amar earned derision from far and wide for his vapid defense of Brett Kavanaugh based on his deep constitutional analysis of the fact that “he went to the school I currently work at.”

In addition to Profesor Amar’s op-ed, the school quickly issued a press release gushing about Kavanaugh’s nomination, filled with quotes from Dean Heather Gerken describing him as a friend, Professor William Eskridge describing him as “one of the most learned judges in America,” and Professor Abbe Gluck scolding any Kavanaugh critics by gravely noting that “politics have deeply harmed our Supreme Court nomination process.”

Is this an endorsement? No. But curating these quotes into a press release makes it very clear how the school feels about adding another grad to the Court. If the school wanted to put together a matter-of-fact, “we take no position” press release, they could consider following the model of Kirkland & Ellis, who acknowledged their former partner’s nomination with a statement that amounted to “as far as we can tell, he might have worked here.”

And more importantly, the Yale Law community — from current students to far-flung alumni — saw it as approaching an endorsement, and they are incensed at the school’s conduct and put together a letter that’s rapidly gathering signatures leveling harsh criticism against the school and asking a very poignant question:

We write today as Yale Law students, alumni, and educators ashamed of our alma mater. Within an hour of Donald Trump’s announcement that he would nominate Brett Kavanaugh, YLS ‘90, to the Supreme Court, the law school published a press release boasting of its alumnus’s accomplishment. The school’s post included quotes from Yale Law School professors about Judge Kavanaugh’s intellect, influence and mentorship of their students.

Yet the press release’s focus on the nominee’s professionalism, pedigree, and service to Yale Law School obscures the true stakes of his nomination and raises a disturbing question:

Is there nothing more important to Yale Law School than its proximity to power and prestige?

No.

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Sorry, but the answer is absolutely no. The signatories provide an incisive, eloquent, and downright devastating critique of Kavanaugh’s nomination and their school’s response, but ultimately they hit on the problem right off the top of the letter.

What is Yale Law without proximity to power and prestige? A three-year string of lectures on the “The Dormant Commerce Clause In The Works Of Emily Dickinson”? What makes the school one of the very few institutions of higher learning that you should absolutely attend if admitted no matter the cost is its track record of placing graduates in high-profile positions. It’s the same reason the school bemoans the idea of students daring to offend powerful speakers — it’s all about the prestige.

And… that’s understandable. That’s them doing their job as they see it. Ivory towers, especially ivory towers steeped in privilege and prestige like Yale Law School, develop an echo chamber. The school’s spent decades driving to and then staying atop the law school heap based on its standing as the law school of the elite and they do that by applauding and trumpeting their elite alums. It’s going to be hard to convince someone working in that system to upset that apple cart. “See how important our graduates are” is not a marketing pitch, it’s a lifestyle.

But just because it’s understandable doesn’t make it right. The open letter closes by stressing that:

Now is the time for moral courage — which for Yale Law School comes at so little cost.

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And that’s true. But can the school remove its blinders long enough to see it?

(The full open letter is reproduced on the next page. If you’re a Yale student or alum, you can add your name here.)

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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