Below is the text of Judge Reed’s advertisement for the opening of his Law School, as it appears in the book he kept regarding Law School matters. The advertisement first ran on January 9, 1834.
A law department has been established in connection with Dickinson College at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and it has been placed under the sole direction of the subscriber.
The design of the institution is two fold. I. To prepare students of law thoroughly for the practice of this profession. II. To afford to others the means of such general instruction in the science as is deemed indispensable to every finished scholar, and eminently useful to every American citizen. The two objects, as far as expedient, will be separately attended to.
The first will embrace a minute inquiry into the science of the law and the technical details involved in the practice of it. In accomplishing these objects, the severer studies, will be occasionally relieved, by an attention to history and such other branches of general literature, as are intimately connected with the study of the law, and are deemed indispensable, in forming a professional character.
I. The means of instruction will consist, first, in a methodical course of study of the best books, properly arranged. Secondly, in frequent examinations accompanied with familiar conversations, adapted to the progress and comprehension of each particular law student, and thirdly, in a regular series of lectures.
II. The practice will be taught first by the examination of approved precedents, and books of practice. Secondly, by presenting fictitious cases, and training the students through all the forms and distinctions of actions, pleas, pleadings, trials, judgements: thus familiarizing them with all the modes of procedure from the inception of a suit to its consummation by final execution.
III. The application of theory and practice will further be made familiar, by frequent exercises in conducting proceedings in a moot court to be organized for the purpose. Actions will be instituted and regularly prosecuted through all the windings which the skill and ingenuity of the students can suggest and in these prosecutions, regular discussions will be had on debatable points, both orally and in writing.
IV. A course of collegiate lectures will be prepared for such students of the college and others as may choose to attend them, less in detail, but embracing the general principles of the law as a science, in which the constitutions of the United States and of the several states, our political institutions and the laws derived from, or modified by, their peculiar constitutions, will claim special attention.
Upon the course being satisfactorily finished by law students, and a final examination passed, the degree of “Bachelor of Laws” will be conferred by the Faculty of Dickinson College.
The length of time required to complete the course, will depend in some measure, upon the age and previous amount of preparation of the respective students. Two years will be generally sufficient for graduates of any respectable college, and others properly prepared.
The College library, with the advantages of the literary societies connected with the College, and their extensive libraries, will be accessible to the law students, the latter at the option of the societies and according to the forms of the respective institutions. An extensive private law library will be appropriated exclusively to the use of the law school. The aid of competent assistants will always be secured, where occasion requires it.
Terms
The price of tuition to law students embracing all charges will be seventy five dollars per annum. (This is for two terms of 5 mos each.) For collegiate lectures, fifteen dollars a lesson. For membership in moot court, $15 per annum. The school will be open on the first day of April 1834 for the reception of students.