Focusing on 'people law,' state chief justices encourage 'innovative pathways' to law license, new report says
Changing the requirements for a law license and supporting financial help for public-interest lawyering are among the ways that state supreme courts can help address “staggering” unmet legal needs, according to a report by a group of state chief justices and court administrators released Wednesday.
The report also cites a need to address “a concerning gap in practice skills” affecting “critical competencies,” such as client communication, legal writing specific to practice tasks, negotiations and oral advocacy.
“The report details the urgent challenges we are facing in meeting the legal needs of the public and provides a roadmap for how state courts can lead in addressing those needs and advancing the profession,” says New Hampshire Supreme Court Chief Justice Gordon J. MacDonald, who commented in an emailed response to the ABA Journal’s questions.
MacDonald is chair of the Committee on Legal Education and Admissions Reform, the group established to conduct the study by the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators. Both groups endorsed the report at the end of their annual meeting Wednesday, according to a July 30 press release.
In focusing on the crisis in “people law,” the report broadens the definition of public-interest law to include private attorneys serving people of modest means and those who live in underserved areas, observes Deborah Jones Merritt, a professor at the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, who previously served on the ABA’s Commission on the Future of Legal Education. She is also a 2025 Journal Legal Rebel.
“This segment of the bar receives too little attention at many law schools and sometimes struggles for respect in the profession,” Merritt told the Journal in an email. “Yet these lawyers are essential to addressing the crises that face our profession and the clients we are supposed to serve.”
Public service attorneys can be supported by advocating for loan repayment assistance and tax-credit programs, according to the report. Rural practice can be encouraged by promoting distance education and encouraging law clerkships in rural communities.
And “innovative pathways” to a law license, such as supervised practice after law school, could help address access to justice, as well as practice readiness, the report says.
The skills gap was chronicled in a survey of more than 4,000 judges.
Deborah Jones Merritt is a professor at the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law. She previously served on the ABA’s Commission on the Future of Legal Education. (Photo by Maddie McGarvey)
New attorneys need more training before practicing in their courts, according to 54% of the surveyed judges. When new attorneys are unprepared, clients bear the worst consequences, according to 60% of the judges.
Ways to promote readiness include amending court rules to allow more students and recent graduates to appear under an attorney’s supervision and increasing opportunities for internships and externships, according to the report. Requirements for continuing legal education could also deal with skills gaps.
The report also included suggestions for legal education. Law school accreditors should be encouraged to promote innovation, experimentation and a cost-effective legal education. As for rankings by U.S. News & World Report, “all stakeholders” should reduce reliance on them. And experiential learning involving client responsibility should be encouraged.
Top state courts regulate the legal profession, setting bar admission requirements, conducting character and fitness reviews, and overseeing other requirements for practicing lawyers. But change is not a top-down process, MacDonald says.
“A theme of the study is that while state supreme courts have a leadership role and the regulatory authority, we are all in this together. Innovation, reform and meaningful change should come through collaboration,” he says.
MacDonald’s CLEAR committee, made up of nine current and retired state supreme court chief justices and three state court administrators, was tasked with examining legal education, licensure and entry into the profession.
The study produced nine broad recommendations, along with several more detailed ideas.
“The CLEAR initiative is about solutions, not just more talk,” says Joan Howarth, a professor emerita at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas William S. Boyd School of Law, who emailed her comments to the Journal. She is also a 2025 Journal Legal Rebel.
The report gave several examples of alternative paths that could be adopted to obtain a law license. Options include:
• The “diploma privilege” allowing bar admission for those who satisfy curricular requirements in law school and complete a character and fitness review. Wisconsin has a diploma privilege for its two ABA-accredited law schools.
• A program akin to New Hampshire’s Daniel Webster Scholar Honors Program. Students in the program at the University of New Hampshire Franklin Pierce School of Law complete experiential and doctrinal classes while accumulating portfolios of work that are reviewed by bar examiners. Those deemed to be minimally competent receive a law license without taking the traditional bar exam.
• Supervised practice after law school graduation. In Oregon, for example, participating law grads have to complete 675 hours of paid legal work under attorney supervision, submit legal writing samples that are deemed to be minimally competent, and submit documentation of two client encounters and two negotiations.
• A plan like that being developed by Nevada that relies on a law exam with multiple choice questions, completion of three performance tests, and supervised practice with client interaction.
• A plan like South Dakota’s that involves two years of supervised practice after graduation in an underserved rural community.
Merritt and Howarth praise the comprehensive work of the committee. Merritt calls the 200-plus page report “a remarkable piece of work” that draws on scholarly research, input from three working groups, surveys, listening sessions and stakeholder interviews.
“This is a report that everyone should take very seriously,” she says.
More work remains to be done.
“CLEAR was not just a ‘one-report-and-done’ effort,” MacDonald says.
The CLEAR committee will now be a standing committee of both groups that will facilitate implementation of its recommendations.
The report is titled Committee on Legal Education and Admissions Reform (CLEAR): Report and Recommendations.
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