and experience in conversation-classes on cases, under the present system, leads one to the conclusion that the better men would welcome such a departure and would greatly profit by it. The extensive use of this inductive case-method would, I believe, do much toward the rooting out of mere cramming for examinations; for this method necessarily involves careful preparation and the development of the student's own reasoning capacities.

The critic asserts, in the fourth place, that too many students carry on their studies and their practical work in chambers or in offices throughout one and the same period of time; this system resulting in serious detriment to the theoretical education of the student, his time for study being interrupted at every step by the necessities of his practical work. I assume that our critic is of the opinion that the student's education in the history and principles of law should precede in time his education in the practice of the law, our critic's idea being that the student, with greater time for study and the consequent advantage to his theoretical training as a whole, will be better enabled to grasp and to solve the problems that await him in his practical work. There is undoubtedly a good deal to be said in favor of carrying on studies and practical work during the whole period of a student's education in law, the theoretical and the practical aiding and supplementing one the other. But it would seem desirable, on the whole, that at least a very considerable portion of his course of study should not be interrupted, as it is at present in a good many cases. Law students at certain of the universities, more especially Oxford and Cambridge do, of course, spend considerable time in uninterrupted study before they become immersed in practical work; and certainly, from the point of view of the highest possible training of students generally, the number of such men should be greater in the future than at the present time.

I feel sure that the distinguished legal educators who are to take part in the discussion of my paper will materially assist the critic and all of us to a way out of the difficulties. I wish merely to say in conclusion, that the organization of the new society of public teachers of law in England and Wales, with

Professor Goudy, of Oxford, as president, is an earnest of the future; for the labors of this new society will be somewhat the same as those of the Association of American Law Schools, and I feel sure that teachers of law on the other side of the Atlantic will undertake the solution of their problems with the same earnestness and high purpose that you have manifested here.

The present is indeed a time of hope. There are now about two thousand law students and about one hundred public teachers of law in the various English law schools, and these numbers are constantly augmenting. More interest is being shown both by teachers and by students. The curriculum is gradually expanding; the system of electives is being further developed; and more and more work in advanced and special subjects is being undertaken.

These are happy auguries for the future. From age to age schools of law in England have adapted their courses of study and their methods of instruction to meet the needs and the desires of English society. From the days of the early Edwards down to the present time there has been gradual progress in harmony with the structure and the spirit of institutions peculiarly English in their origin and in their development. Students still attend the courts and take notes, somewhat as they did in the time of the early year books; but the medieval and modern centuries that stretch between Edward the First and Edward the Seventh have gradually and almost unconsciously developed those university and professional law schools with which we have been concerned tonight. We may have every expectation that the future has still further developments in store, and that the system of legal education at these schools will be improved from reign to reign as best befits the social requirements of the home of English law and the homes of other legal systems administered by British courts in all parts of the Empire.

A STATISTICAL COMPARISON OF COLLEGE AND HIGH SCHOOL EDUCATION AS A PREPARA

TION FOR LEGAL SCHOLARSHIP.

BY

JOHN H. WIGMORE AND FREDERIC B. CROSSLEY.

Of the reasons hitherto offered for making compulsory a college education prior to entering a law school, the chief are reducible to three:

1st. A college education is highly important for all intelligent citizenship; therefore, college attendance should be fostered indirectly, and not merely directly; therefore, a college education should be required for entrance to a law school. With this argument we are not here concerned. We leave it, with the remark that we agree with the premise, but do not see the logic of the conclusion.

2d. A college education is highly important for the knowledge and intellectual strength required by the legal profession in its professional administration of justice and in its legislative leadership; therefore, a college education should be required for entrance to a law school. With this argument, also, we are not here concerned. We leave it, with the comment that we believe in the premise, but we also believe that the only logical conclusion is to apply the requirement to admission to the Bar, not merely to a law school.

3d. A college education is essential to that scholarship which is needed for the scientific study and mastery of the law; therefore, a college education should be required before entering on study in a law school. It is with this argument alone that we are here concerned.

The logic of its conclusion can hardly be avoided. The question is as to the correctness of the premise. Hitherto its correctness has been assumed. Apparently the assumption has been treated as a fact that would be universally conceded.

Our present research attempts to investigate this supposed fact empirically. If it is a fact, the grades of scholarship awarded for school work will show it. Those grades or marks are universally made the basis of the university's diploma or certificate of legal scholarship attained. Any circumstance which by rule is correctly made a condition precedent, with a view to attaining good results, must show those results. If the results are not shown, the circumstance is not correctly made a condition precedent for that purpose.

This test of results is, of course, in the present instance, a comparative one; i. c., the proposed requirement of a college education is put forward in contrast to a high school education, hence, the test of results signifies in each instance a comparison of results for the college-educated and the high-school educated, and an essential difference in favor of the former. Do the records show such difference?

This inquiry should be made on a large scale, for all the schools in this Association at least. Nevertheless, for lack as yet of such statistics, the records of a single school may have the compensating advantage of representing a more uniform set of conditions, and therefore of eliminating other possible explanations.

The ensuing tables, as scientific data, need two kinds of preliminary explanations; first, as to the conditions affecting these particular records; secondly, as to the methods of analyzing and testing the results.

First, the conditions affecting these records. They are probably as uniform as could be, in respect to the nature of the work assigned, and also as varied as need be, in respect to the personal element involved. As to work, the number of years of work required was three; the classes taken were 10 (entering 1895

It was the writers' expectation to be able to arrange for a general symposium of such statistics for several schools. But the rapid spread of the college-requirement movement exceeded their estimate, and they were obliged to begin the present inquiry with their own school alone, hoping that others would then think it worth while to carry it out on the larger scale.

1905). The instructors were trained in modern methods (except a small percentage for a minor period). The methods of instruction were the same (except for a minor period in a minor part of the work). The requirements for graduation were substantially the same; i. e., reckoning one lecture a week for half a year as the unit (or "term hour "), the requirements were 60 units during the first half of the period covered, and 66 units during the second half of the period. The grades of marking were the same during the entire period; i. e., four grades, A, excellent; B, good; C, poor, and D, failure; C did not count for graduation, except to the amount of one-sixth of the total required, i. e., 10 units, in the first half of the period; 11 units, in the second half. As to personality, the instructors were some 40 different persons, all told; for the greater part of the work, some 20. The students came from 26 states and foreign countries; somewhat over three-quarters came from Illinois; over one-half came from Chicago. The high school graduates came from all kinds of schools (until 1907 the four-year high school course was not essential). The college graduates came from 54 different colleges; the colleges leading in numbers were: Northwestern, 31; Chicago, 26; Yale, 18; Harvard, 14; Princeton, 7; Wisconsin, 5; Williams, 4.

The records selected were of those persons alone who had been subjected uniformly to these conditions; i. e., all were omitted (1) who did not pursue the course into the third year; (2) who pursued any appreciable part of their course at another school; (3) who did not take the full work of a regular student. This left a total of 349 persons; these were distributed into classes by years as shown in Table Z. Of these, the high-school educated were 51.8 per cent; the college-educated, 48.1 per cent; almost equal proportions.

Secondly, the methods of analyzing the results. For comparing the high school education with the college education in the rough, all persons finishing a high school were classed as H; all persons finishing one or more years of college were classed as C. The latter were further subdivided as C2, representing one or two years of college, and C, representing three or four years of