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Abstract

Attacks on poor people's access to justice and on the academic freedom of students and teachers are not new. Perhaps it is only inevitable that as "real-client" law school clinical programs proliferate, these programs will sometimes become the target of politicians and others who disagree with the clinics' work. Many of us who teach in clinical programs have received inquiries from people outside of the law school community, such as alumni, legislators, or trustees, who ask why "the law school" is involved in a particular case. Most of these inquiries are benign, and alumni, legislators, and trustees are satisfied once they understand what law school clinics do and what they teach. Occasionally, however, the inquiries turn into full-fledged and serious attacks on the clinics and their universities. This introduction to the "Friends of the Court Submissions" before the Louisiana Supreme Court deals with a grave threat to clinical legal education in the State of Louisiana as well as to the program at Tulane University. In an effort to impede the work of Tulane's Environmental Law Clinic, business groups requested the Louisiana Supreme Court to change the state student practice rule to severely limit clinical students' ability to advocate for their clients. In response to these complaints, the Court is examining the state's student practice rule and the role of law school clinics in legal education. The Clinical Law Review is publishing edited versions of the submissions by the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) and the Clinical Legal Education Association (CLEA) to the Louisiana Supreme Court. These submissions will be of interest to clinicians and others since the submissions describe the development of law school clinical programs and address issues of access to justice, academic freedom, and professional responsibility in the clinical setting. It is also our hope that these submissions may serve as useful references for clinicians responding to inquiries about the clients they represent from forces outside of their law school communities.

Publication Title

Clinical Law Review

Volume

4

Issue

2

First Page

531

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