Mitchell Lecture reflects on the evolution of legal education

BUFFALO, N.Y. – One of the University at Buffalo School of Law’s oldest traditions will feature one of its most familiar — and most thought-provoking — voices.

This fall’s James McCormick Mitchell Lecture will be delivered by UB professor John Henry Schlegel, whose talk, “Reflections on Legal Education and the Post-War Middle Class,” promises a deeply personal and historically rich exploration of how American legal education has evolved alongside shifting social class dynamics.

Drawing on decades of scholarship and experience, Schlegel will revisit the foundational moments of legal pedagogy — from Langdell’s case method to the rise of Legal Realism — and offer a compelling argument for why class, often overlooked, must be part of the story.

The Mitchell Lecture Series was endowed in 1950 by a gift from Lavinia A. Mitchell in memory of her husband, James McCormick Mitchell, an 1897 graduate of the Buffalo Law School.

Mitchell Lecture programs have brought many distinguished speakers to UB, including Derrick Bell, Paul Freund, Lawrence Friedman, Carol Gilligan, Sheila Jasanoff, Duncan Kennedy, Karl Llewellyn, Stuart Macaulay, Catharine MacKinnon and Richard Posner.

When: Friday, Nov. 14, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m.

Where: The Charles B. Sears Law Library in O’Brian Hall on UB’s North Campus.

Who: John Henry Schlegel is a widely celebrated legal historian who joined the UB School of Law faculty in 1973. A UB Distinguished Professor and Floyd H. and Hilda L. Faculty Scholar, his scholarship and teaching have focused on American Legal Realism and economic legal history.

To register: The event is free and open to the public and will be followed by a reception celebrating Schlegel’s more than 50 years of distinguished scholarship and service. Required registration is available at law.buffalo.edu/mitchell.

“If Schlegel’s subjects have been the ambitions and frustrations of American legal scholars as they tussled with social reality, his work casts light, too, on the changing culture of American legal education and on our own ambitions and frustrations,” says Paul Linden-Retek, associate professor of law and chair of the Mitchell Lecture Committee.