 |
Eleanor Swift, October 16, 1945 - September 20, 2023, was a professor at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. She was best known for her work on the theory of evidence, and additionally taught civil procedure, the legal profession, and periodic seminars.
Eleanor Swift graduated from the University of Chicago Laboratory High School. Upon graduating from Yale Law School, Eleanor Swift clerked for Judge M. Joseph Blumenfeld of the U.S. District Court in Hartford and for Chief Judge David L. Bazelon of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. She then practiced in Houston with the firm of Vinson & Elkins.
Swift joined the Boalt faculty in 1979. She served as associate dean at Boalt from 1998 to 2000. She was also chair of the Committee on Professional Development of the Association of American Law Schools and was a past chair of the Evidence Section. From 1992 to 1997, she chaired a special faculty-student committee appointed by Dean Herma Hill Kay to develop a proposal for improving and expanding the clinical curriculum at Boalt. In 1998 she received Boalt's Rutter Award for Teaching Distinction and in 2000 she received UC Berkeley's Distinguished Teaching Award.
The focus of her teaching and research was on the adversary system: the legal rules, practices, and procedures that govern civil and criminal trials. She taught courses in Civil Procedure, Evidence, and the Legal Profession.
Swift incorporated three perspectives in her classes: theoretical, professional, and ethical. "My aim," she said, "is to introduce students to the practice of law under a system of rules, to develop their ability to critique those rules, and to enable them to experience the ethical dilemmas of lawyers acting in role."
Students consistently pointed to the effect her teaching has had on their lives. A former student said, "It would be easy for me to say that I went to the Eleanor Swift School of Law. . . .The lasting imprint of her message makes me use my legal education to make the world a slightly better place. I could never thank her enough for her instruction."
Student course evaluations pointed to the demanding nature of the course: "Evidence is a conceptually difficult course, but her teaching brought out clear thinking," says one student. Says another, "I think this topic is pretty complex and difficult, which makes the instructor and class materials all the more impressive."
One of Professor Swift's most lasting contributions to the Law School's teaching mission was her leadership in the establishment of Boalt's Center for Clinical Education," which brought clients in need of legal advice to Boalt, where students, directed by a faculty member, provided counsel.
Swift was originally denied tenure at Boalt Hall in 1987. She initiated a suit against the University alleging sex discrimination in her tenure review process. The suit was settled with an agreement to leave the tenure decision to an outside independent review committee of distinguished academics. This committee unanimously recommended that she be promoted to tenure, which finally happened in the fall of 1989.
She wrote about this experience in Becoming a Plaintiff, 4 Berkeley Women's L.J. 245 (1990).
"The courses that I teach at the School of Law—Civil Procedure, Evidence, and Legal Profession—all focus on the adversary system. My goal is, of course, to develop students' knowledge of the legal rules, practices and procedures that govern civil and criminal trials. Equally important, however, is that students understand how these rules establish roles for the participants in the adversary system — the lawyers, their clients, the judge and the jury. I develop opportunities for students to learn how lawyers function in resolving individual and societal disputes, and to critique this function from theoretical, professional, and ethical perspectives.
"Taking a theoretical perspective on the rules of the adversary system requires examination of the core values—truth (or rectitude of decision), fairness, efficiency and finality—that underlie our procedural justice system. The rules are carefully examined and debated with regard to their efficacy in promoting these values. Since these core values are often in tension, alternatives are explored and compromises are evaluated.
"A professional perspective on legal rules integrates both theory and practice. Students are introduced to acting in the lawyers' and judge's roles through specific role-playing techniques that I have incorporated into all of my classes. These techniques permit discussion of ethical dilemmas in the lawyer's role to arise naturally in class.
"The ethical perspective emphasizes the importance of the lawyer's responsibility to the client within the adversary system. Law students tend to think of lawyers as "in charge" and it is important to expose them to the constraints on their autonomy created by a representational relationship. My aim is to introduce students to various other role dilemmas, to the incomplete answers provided by our codes of professional ethics, and hence to their own responsibility to develop their individual moral commitments both in and out of role. Finally, I also address the ethical obligation of the legal profession to provide access to our system of justice.
"The practice of law is challenging precisely because it is constantly working out the tension in the core values of the justice system. Legal education must train students to think competently and critically not only about the content of the law and legal rules, but also about the lawyer's role as a professional, with obligations to others, including the legal system in general, beyond self-interest. In law teaching, it is easy to focus almost exclusively on content, but to do so would be to fail in our own professional responsibility."
Swift's publications included "One Hundred Years of Evidence Law Reform: Thayer's Triumph" in the California Law Review (2000); "Rival Claims to 'Truth'" in Hastings Law Journal (1998); and Evidence: Text, Problems and Cases, 2nd ed. (with Allen and Kuhns, 1997). [1]
A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include arguing cases in courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, researching the law and giving legal opinions.
A lawyer is a person who practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly, across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, solicitor, legal executive, and public servant. — with each role having different functions and privileges. Working as a lawyer generally involves the practical application of abstract legal theories and knowledge to solve specific problems. Some lawyers also work primarily in advancing the interests of the law and legal profession.
The call to the bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received "call to the bar". "The bar" is now used as a collective noun for barristers, but literally referred to the wooden barrier in old courtrooms, which separated the often crowded public area at the rear from the space near the judges reserved for those having business with the court. Barristers would sit or stand immediately behind it, facing the judge, and could use it as a table for their briefs.
A Bachelor of Laws is an undergraduate law degree offered in most common law countries as the primary law degree and serves as the first professional qualification for legal practitioners. This degree requires the study of core legal subjects and jurisprudence to provide a comprehensive understanding of the legal system and its function. The LLB curriculum is designed to impart a thorough knowledge of legal principles, legal research skills, and a sound understanding of the roles and responsibilities of lawyers within society. This degree is often a prerequisite for taking bar exams or qualifying as a practicing lawyer, depending on the jurisdiction. Additionally, the LLB program also serves as a foundation for further legal education, such as a Master of Laws (LLM) or other postgraduate studies in law.
Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in many European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excellence in research, teaching, and further education, which usually includes a dissertation. The degree, sometimes abbreviated Dr. habil., PD, or D.Sc., is often a qualification for full professorship in those countries. The degree conferral is usually accompanied by a public oral defence event with one or more opponents. Habilitation is usually awarded 5–15 years after a PhD degree or its equivalent. Although in some countries Doctor of Sciences degree correlates with a position of Docent, it is closer in practice to the position of a full professor in the US.
Legal ethics are principles of conduct that members of the legal profession are expected to observe in their practice. They are an outgrowth of the development of the legal profession itself.
A bar examination is an examination administered by the bar association of a jurisdiction that a lawyer must pass in order to be admitted to the bar of that jurisdiction.
Professional ethics encompass the personal and corporate standards of behavior expected of professionals.
Professional responsibility is a set of duties within the concept of professional ethics for those who exercise a unique set of knowledge and skill as professionals.
Legal education in the United States generally refers to a graduate degree, the completion of which makes a graduate eligible to sit for an examination for a license to practice as a Lawyer. Around 60 percent of those who complete a law degree typically practice law, with the remainder primarily working in business or government or policy roles, where their degrees also confer advantages.
An admission to practice law is acquired when a lawyer receives a license to practice law. In jurisdictions with two types of lawyer, as with barristers and solicitors, barristers must gain admission to the bar whereas for solicitors there are distinct practising certificates.
Geoffrey Cornell Hazard Jr. was Trustee Professor of Law Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he taught from 1994 to 2005, and the Thomas E. Miller Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus at the University of California's Hastings College of the Law. He was also Sterling Professor Emeritus of Law at Yale Law School.
The Law Society of British Columbia is the regulatory body for lawyers in British Columbia, Canada.
Accounting ethics is primarily a field of applied ethics and is part of business ethics and human ethics, the study of moral values and judgments as they apply to accountancy. It is an example of professional ethics. Accounting was introduced by Luca Pacioli, and later expanded by government groups, professional organizations, and independent companies. Ethics are taught in accounting courses at higher education institutions as well as by companies training accountants and auditors.
Daniel D. Blinka is a practicing trial lawyer and law professor at Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. As a scholar, Blinka focuses primarily on evidence law, criminal procedure, and American history. He teaches evidence, trial advocacy, criminal law, constitutional criminal procedure, ethics, and American history. Blinka holds a Ph.D. in American history and a JD from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he has also taught history courses.
The University of California, Berkeley, School of Law is the law school of the University of California, Berkeley. The school was commonly referred to as "Boalt Hall" for many years, although it was never the official name. This came from its initial building, the Boalt Memorial Hall of Law, named for John Henry Boalt. This name was transferred to an entirely new law school building in 1951 but was removed in 2020.
A Doctor of Law is a doctorate in legal studies.
Maynard E. Pirsig, LLD, was an American legal scholar. He was a professor, and dean, of the University of Minnesota Law School; a Minnesota Supreme Court justice; director of the Minnesota Legal Aid Society, and an advisor for the Indonesian, Puerto Rican, and El Salvadoran legal systems. He defined Legal Ethics in the 1974 Encyclopedia Britannica. His law books were widely used in schools across the country, including his casebook Judicial Administration--which Pirsig used for the United States' first law reform course, early 1930s. He was mentored by Everett Fraser, Roscoe Pound, and Felix Frankfurter.
Unbundled legal services, also known as limited scope representation and discrete task representation, is a method of legal representation in which an attorney and client agree to limit the scope of the attorney’s involvement in a lawsuit or other legal action, leaving responsibility for those other aspects of the case to the client in order to save the client money and give them more control. Unbundled legal services, limited scope retainers or discrete task representation are available in multiple jurisdictions, including the United States, as well as the Canadian provinces of British Columbia and Ontario. One common use of unbundled legal services is family law, as a case is often too complex for a pro se litigant to handle alone but the cost of full-service legal representation is often prohibitive.
Susan Poser is the current and first female president of Hofstra University, having succeeded retiring president Stuart Rabinowitz on August 1, 2021. Before being named to the Hofstra post, she was chief operating officer, provost, and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Other | |
