GROUP 1 - ALONTE, AMORILLO, BEECH
Why Study Legal Technique and
Logic?
A. Oliver Wendell Holmes “The Path of the
Law” (1897)
➢ Law as prediction states that law is a
prediction on how the courts will
decide. Theoretically, it is a mindset
that what is good is what will win the
lawyer his/her case.
➢ Holmes developed the Bad Man
Theory which states that a bad
person’s view of law represents the
best test of what exactly the law is
because that person will carefully and
precisely calculate what the rules
allow and operate up to the limits.
➢ Law and Morality do not necessarily
intertwine and what is legal is not
always moral and what is moral is not
always legal.
B. Myres S. McDougal, “Legal Education
and Public Policy: Professional Training in
the Public Interest” (1943).
→ Problems of Legal Education and Public
Profession
➢ Configurative and policy-science
approach to the study of law that
conceives of law not as a body of rules,
but as a process of decision.
➢ In their view, the challenge was to
re-develop traditional methods of
teaching and learning law with the
goal of achieving a public order
respect for human dignity.
➢ The reform of legal education must
“revolutionize” in a world of
cumulative crisis and increasing
violence
➢ Law has been an almost monopoly of
intellectual elite, professional teachers
of law
→ POLICY SCIENCE APPROACH IN LEGAL
EDUCATION
❖ Approach is oriented towards
implementation of social
values
❖ Application of law must
proceed in a manner to
promote, preserve democracy
→ Effective policy making:
❖ Clarification of values
❖ Trend thinking
❖ Scientific Thinking
● BUT: Traditional skills and knowledge
of a lawyer should not be disregarded
● GOAL: “The creation of a world
community conceived in mutual
respect, understanding and rectitude,
where the different representative
social values or desirable objects of
human desires are widely and
equitably shared”
● Curriculum Towards Policy: The
subjects and the way of teaching must
be related to the larger institutional
contexts, the factual settings, that give
them operational significance.
● Classes can be geared towards the
formation of new policy-makers, the
development of social values, and the
practice of skills – both technical and
managerial.
● Mixing in methods of learning beyond
the classroom is highly desirable.
Some suggestions are moot courts and
seminars on ideology (democracy),
 diplomacy, economy, and strategy (use
of armies).
C. Duncan Kennedy (1983), Legal
Education as Training for Hierarchy
➢ Law schools are intensely political
places although the common notion is
the contrary because of how barren
the social life is therein.
➢ Students take law for advocacy or own
interest, and it affects their view on the
machinations of law.
➢ As early as first-year, students develop
deference towards authorities which
prepare them for hierarchies in the
practice of law. Professors who are
authoritarian tend to impart more
material than those considered as
softies.
➢ The common classroom setup is a
combination of hot cases (exciting
ones) and cold cases (long and boring
ones). Students learn to not be swayed
by their emotions through reading
cases that are anchored in reality.
➢ Problem is students are expected to
just get the knack of being a lawyer –
there is almost no feedback on
individual performance, and the focus
is on school performance in the bar
examinations.
D. W. Michael Reisman, “Theory
About Law: Jurisprudence for a Free
Society” (1999)
→ Critiqued McDougal’s New Haven /
Policy Oriented Approach in Legal
Education
→ Jurisprudence is “a jurisprudence
of suspicion.” It is a jurisprudence
aimed at demystifying our
commonplace understanding of the
phenomenon of legality and making it
more truthful.
→ Reisman defines law as a
combination of power and authority,
but he sees power as lying at the root
of authority, and authority as both
concealing and legitimating power.
Reisman’s jurisprudence is aimed at
exposing the many layers of legality
that exist underneath the “official,”
formal layer of state law.
E. Manuel F. Bonifacio and Merlin M.
Magallona “A Study on the Legal
Profession: A Perspective” (1980)
➢ The study tells us that the legal
profession is one of the most critical in
our society because it is imbued with
public interest and it is concerned with
the problems of rights and justice in
society and its restructuring.
➢ Legal professionals are the protectors
of social control. It is not necessarily
police power but it is the
determination of what is legal or not.
Legal professionals influence social
control through their interpretation
and application of the law.
➢ With the greater good in mind, legal
professionals are responsible for the
effective distribution of justice which
requires the rights and privileges of
people to be protected.