Thursday, June 24, 2004

Brian Leiter (Texas) today reprises his piece, Why Is it So Easy To Get Tenure in Law Schools? Here’s a sample:

[O]utside the ranks of the top 15 or so schools, most law schools tenure almost everyone they hire; and even within the top 15, a tenure review comparable to what one finds at Princeton or MIT is unheard of. One consequence: while the tenured ranks of the best philosophy departments are full of first-rate intellects (even if one might quibble about whether so-and-so’s work is really “that significant”), the tenured ranks of the best law schools (including Yale and Harvard) are uneven, including not only first-rate intellects but also intellectual lightweights.