When the American Bar Association first surveyed law students about ideology and freedom of
speech back in 1991, it was a bit damning. The results revealed that conservative students at some
schools were apprehensive about sharing their views in class.
“To express conservative political beliefs in my school would be to commit academic suicide,” one
student wrote. “One professor in particular has taken it upon himself to lower the grades of people
who disagree with him in or out of class.”
Now, some 30 years later, the apprehensiveness has turned to scorn.
Conservatives don’t just complain that law schools are too liberal. Today they go a step further and
label themselves “woke.” Studies show that 89% of all law schools fall on the liberal side of the divide.
Critics argue that this imbalance has created serious problems. Conservative law professors rarely
get hired and are often discouraged or even prevented from sharing their views, they say.
Meanwhile, some argue that conservative law schools get penalized in U.S. News & World Report’s
annual rankings. And others say the lack of balance is not good for conservative or liberal law
students.
But is legal education really that out of balance with a nation that polls 36% conservative, 25%
liberal and 35% moderate?
preLaw reviewed two studies and a survey to place law schools into one of five categories: very
conservative, conservative, moderate, liberal and very liberal.
The two studies — “The Political Ideologies of American Lawyers” and “The Legal Academy’s
Ideological Uniformity” — looked at the political ideologies of alumni (in 2016) and professors (in
2018), then ranked schools on an ideological continuum. The survey, by The Princeton Review,
asked students to rate their schools on a similar liberal-to-conservative continuum. We compiled the
results of these studies and, including anecdotal evidence as well, categorized the 193 schools for
which we felt we had enough data.
In the end, only four law schools were placed in the very conservative category.
Read the full story and see the list of the most conservative and most liberal law schools in the Back to School Issue of preLaw magazine.
