Understanding the Juris Doctor (JD) Degree in the United States

Are your thinking about attending law school in the United States, where you must earn

a Juris Doctor to become a lawyer?

Want to learn more about this prestigious degree?

Today I'll describe what it is and how you may obtain it.

If you stick along to the conclusion, I'll also go through the significance of the Magna Carta and how it earned its name.

Short History of the JD Degree

Hello lawlings, this is Professor Beau Baez.

The Juris Doctor or Juris Doctorate, often called by its initials JD, is a professional

The last academic prerequisite for becoming a lawyer in the US is a PhD.

In this essay, I'll cover seven characteristics of the JD: its brief history, the amount of years it takes to finish, the course material, the methods of instruction in law school, its difficulty,

how it compares to the LLB, and finally how it compares to the PhD.

Now let’s begin.

Number of Years to Complete the JD Program

The LLB was first offered as an undergraduate degree at the early American law schools.

as a two or three year program, but eventually standardizing as a three year program.

Some legal schools started awarding the JD degree to students who graduated in the early 20th century.

enrolled in law school despite having a non-legal undergraduate degree,

They took the same classes as their LLB undergraduate counterparts, albeit, in all other respects.

By the middle of the 20th century, there were no longer any undergraduate programmes offered by law schools.

moving legal education to the graduate level.

And in the 1960s, law schools began referring to the degree as an LLB and changed it to JD.

Number of Years.

Curriculum of the JD Degree

The JD is a three year full-time program, though some law schools have accelerated options

that, with summer school, allow students to finish it in two or two and a half years.

This alternative does away with summer employment in the legal field, thus I personally would not advocate it.

field, which is important in helping get some legal experience before graduation.

There are also part-time options, which require students to complete the JD over four years,

but can usually be extended by another year or two.

For further details on the benefits and drawbacks of a part-time JD programme,

I’ll leave a link to the video I made on this topic.

Curriculum

Curriculum.

All American law schools follow a largely uniform first-year curriculum, however the number

of credits for each course vary.

Common first-year courses include those on torts, contracts, property, and civil procedure.

Criminal Law, and Legal Writing.

Most law schools feature an optional system after the first year, albeit a course may be required.

in legal ethics is required at all law schools.

Some legal schools mandate that students take certain bar exam courses, such Wills,

Constitutional Law, Criminal Procedure, Evidence, or Business Associations.

After that, the variety of electives depends on the size of the law school.

I went to a big legal school where I studied three courses that I would describe as exotic: the Legal Imagination,

Law & Economics, and the Idea of Progress in the 19th Century.

However, since there are so many fundamental courses you should take during your last two years of law school, attending law schools with a wide range of electives isn't crucial.

Law schools provide a variety of practice-related choices in addition to the doctrinal courses.

in clinics, experiential courses, and externships.

For example, last semester I taught an experiential course in Estate Planning.

Instead of only lecturing students on estate planning, the students created a number of wills.

and trust agreements.

We started with simple wills, and then moved to a complex structure for a married wealthy

couple looking to leave money to their grandchildren and also avoid high estate taxes.

My strong recommendation is that you take advantage of these experiential opportunities,

as they will help prepare you for the practice of law.

Teaching Methods in Law School

The primary teaching method at American law schools is the Socratic Method, sometimes

called the case method.

You will be given an appeal ruling to read before class, and your lecturer will then ask for student participation in a discussion of the case or hypothetical issues based on the prescribed readings.

As I mentioned earlier, there are some experiential based courses, each with various methods for

assessing student competency.

The Difficulty of Law School

Most law students would call law school difficult.

There are different reasons for this.

One, the amount of time you need to dedicate to your studies is at least 60 hours a week.

Two, the tests you'll take in law school are very different from anything you've ever taken.

Three, professors calling on you in class.

Four, a rigid grading scale that guarantees that only 10 to 15 percent of pupils receive a passing grade

the highest grades.

Five, an admissions policy that ensures that similarly ranked students are admitted, which

means increased competition for you.

Sixth, due to the increasing academic demands, social isolation.

JD vs LLB: A Comparison

Practically speaking, the modern JD is the early 20th-century LLB.

The JD programme of legal education has remained largely unchanged, notwithstanding law schools' transformation of the LLB into a graduate programme.

JD vs PhD: Contrasting Professional and Research Doctorates

The JD is a professional doctorate, which is typically earned by taking a series of

courses over six semesters.

A PhD is a research doctorate, which may have a course or two that helps students learn how to conduct research.

But after that is exclusively a research and writing program resulting in a lengthy document called a dissertation.

I occasionally am asked if JD holders may use the title "Doctor."

There's no law prohibiting this, but it is viewed as bad form to do so.

This is so that only people who have earned a research doctorate are eligible to use the title "doctor."

Now, for today’s bonus law fact.

Bonus Law Fact

Magna Carta is a document that King John of England was forced to sign by his barons on

June 15, 1215 after the Battle of Runnymede.

Though there are 63 clauses in Magna Carta, only four still apply today.

This is due to the fact that several of the clauses dealt with feudal privileges that are no longer applicable, such as

Clause 50, for example, listed certain Frenchmen who were to be removed from the realm and identified them.

Then there is clause 54, which prohibits women from legally accusing a man of murder.

The two most significant provisions out of the four that are still in effect today are 39 and 40.

Clause 39 states that no free man may be taken, locked up, deprived of his property, declared an outlaw, banished, or otherwise persecuted without the legitimate consent of his peers.

and the law of the land.

Clause 40: We will not sell anyone, and we will not put someone's rights or justice in jeopardy.

You will find various versions of these two clauses throughout the English speaking world.

For example, the constitution from State of North Carolina in the United States has this provision:

No one may be arrested, imprisoned, stripped of their freehold, freedoms, or privileges, declared an outlaw, banished, or otherwise deprived of their life, liberty, or property unless in accordance with the law of the nation.

It is clear that clause 39 of the Magna Carta served as its foundation.

Magna Carta, however, is respected for two main reasons: first, it is thought to be the first legal document.

written constitution in Europe after the fall of Rome.

Additionally, it supports the astounding tenet that no one is above the law, not even the King or Queen.

You might now be wondering what these two Latin terms actually signify.

Great Charter or Great Charter of Freedoms are common translations of Magna Carta.

Due to what it stands for, the Magna Carta is currently understood in this way.

that is not how it would have been translated in 1215.

Magna Carta was really two independent documents when King John signed it.

The second one called the Articles of Barons.

The Articles of Barons was a schedule of terms that King John agreed to on June 10th,

five days before he signed Magna Carta.

To avoid confusion between the two documents, the second document was called Magna Carta

because it was written on a larger piece of parchment.

Magna Carta may therefore be better, albeit not as impressively, translated as Big Parchment or Big Paper Document.

In other words, the word magna was referring to the physical size of the document,

not to its perceived importance—its historical and legal significance developed hundreds of years later.