A Tennessee law school’s lawsuit against the American Bar Association has sparked considerable discussion in legal-education circles about the ABA’s gatekeeper role in approving new schools.
Lincoln Memorial University’s Duncan School of Law filed its complaint against the ABA in federal court on December 22, just days after learning that the association’s accrediting arm had denied its bid for provisional accreditation.
Duncan, which opened in 2009 with the goal of helping students and potential clients in Appalachia, contends that the ABA is unfairly limiting competition by excluding new schools that want to offer a relatively affordable option for underrepresented students.
But others, including some Congressional critics, say the ABA hasn’t been tough enough in enforcing its standards, allowing too many new schools to open at a time when students’ job prospects are shrinking.
In its decision last month, the ABA’s Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar cited the academic credentials of Duncan’s incoming students, whose average score on the Law School Admission Test was 147 out of a possible 180. The average grade point average was 2.99, according to school officials.
The law school’s dean, Sydney A. Beckman, said the ABA had accredited eight law schools with lower average scores. “We are in compliance with the ABA standards, and we believe we did not obtain a fair review,” he said.
The lawsuit alleges that Duncan “has been the victim of a group boycott orchestrated by defendant ABA in concert with these interested accredited law schools, to the detriment of [Duncan], its students, and the public at large.” It adds that the accreditor’s actions “constitute an intentional misuse of its dominant market power as the gatekeeper for accreditation of law schools.”
A spokeswoman for the ABA said no one from the association could comment on the suit.
Duncan, which has 187 students, was featured prominently in a recent New York Times article about how the association’s accreditation standards contribute to the high cost of a legal education by requiring schools to pay high faculty salaries and maintain robust libraries.
Stephen Gillers, a professor of law at New York University who writes about regulation of the legal profession, said that the ABA has a responsibility to maintain high standards, and that “it’s in the very nature of standards that they impose costs.”
In 2010 graduates of ABA-accredited law schools passed state bar exams at three times the rate of those graduating from unaccredited schools, he said. “The claim that the ABA has a secret agenda will go nowhere,” he added.
Duncan’s main benefactor, O.V. (Pete) DeBusk, vowed in an interview to keep fighting. “We’re not going to lie down. We’ll stand up and be accounted for,” he said.
Some Duncan students’ test scores are lower than those in other areas of the country, he said, “but that doesn’t mean their performance will be lower.”
Mr. DeBusk, who owns a medical-supply company, said Duncan serves an important niche. “I was raised in these mountains. My folks were coal miners, and we can be very successful if given a chance.”
