University of Iowa College of Law

University of Iowa College of Law
Established	1865
Type	Public
Dean	Gail B. Agrawal
Academic staff	50
Students	660
Location	Iowa City, Iowa, USA
Campus	Boyd Law Building
Colors	Black and Gold
Mascot	Hawkeyes
Website	www.law.uiowa.edu

The University of Iowa College of Law is one of the eleven professional graduate schools at the University of Iowa, located in Iowa City, Iowa. Founded in 1865, it is the oldest law school in continuous operation west of the Mississippi River. The law school is currently ranked as the 26th best law school in the United States according to the U.S. News and World Report Best Law School rankings. It is the 8th best public law school in the country, and 3rd most affordable among the top 30.

Overview

The law school offers a rich curriculum covering the full range of contemporary legal education, with an especially significant concentration of courses organized in 2 areas: (1) the International and Comparative Law Program (ICLP), and (2) the Innovation, Business & Law Program. The College has a strong program of clinical legal education, and it offers a small but well regarded LLM program in International and Comparative Law.

In conjunction with the change in deans in 2004, the law school has embraced the opportunity to engage in substantial curriculum reform, especially in the first year curriculum and LAWR instructors. The reform is intended to strengthen Iowa's historically strong commitment to the teaching of legal writing. The other principal change to the first year has been adoption of a one-course elective in the second semester.

Iowa surpasses the ABA minimum standards for student contact with faculty. The law school has a high course requirement for graduation (84 credit hours), a long semester (14 weeks), and a long classroom period (60 minutes). The law school traditionally required its full-time faculty to teach 12 credit hrs per year (usually 4 courses). The high course load for professors results in a large number of low-enrollment courses, and therefore more opportunities for faculty/student interaction in those classes. As a result, legal education at Iowa involves a high level of contact with faculty and considerably more than many of Iowa's peer schools.

The law school has a distinguished faculty with a strong tradition of substantial and significant scholarship and self-governance as well as strong commitments to teaching and service. Most faculty take faculty committee work quite seriously.

Iowa Law School is said to have graduate the first female law student in 1873 by the name of Mary Beth Hickey. The second woman to graduate Iowa law was Mary Humphrey Haddok in 1875, who later became the first woman admitted to practice before the U.S. District and Circuit Courts.

For the class entering in 2006, the law school enjoyed a rise of over 30 percent in its applicant pool, even though the national pool declined by almost 7%. With its long tradition of concern for diversity, school does vigorous recruitment to enhance diversity and uses a numbers plus admissions process as well, which does a careful read of all files, and does not rely merely on numerical indicators.

Iowa has the advantage of very low in-state tuition, making the average debt of a 2010 graduate $87,891. University policies enable out of state students to get in state tuition if they become a research assistant to a professor. The law school has been able to more than double the non-loan based financial aid it can make available to students and now offers that aid to about half of the class.

The law library has the second largest collection of volumes and volume equivalents and the second or third largest number of unique individual cataloged volume and volume equivalent titles among all law school libraries. It is technologically up to date, currently has the second largest number of different individually cataloged titles (third if only bound volumes are counted), and it has one of the most comprehensive collections of on-site legal materials in the country.

It contains over one million volumes and volume equivalents and is one of the largest and finest collections of print, microform, and electronic legal materials in the United States. The collections of the Law Library cover all aspects of Anglo-American law. In addition the library has a very strong collection of foreign, international, and comparative law materials. The library also is fully computerized, both in its internal operations and in its public services, and provides hardwired and wireless access for library patrons to access an extensive range of computer research sources and library information.

The law school has sponsored, for more than 30 yrs, “Bridging the Gap,” a minority pre-law conference held at the law school and participates in, and supports, CLEO and PLSI. The mission of the law school is to challenge students to set high standards for themselves and to strive for the best professional education they can obtain from the curriculum, the faculty, and the academic environment.

Facilities of special interest to law students include the $25 million law building that features state-of-the-art computer equipment, audiovisual technology, and 3 full scale courtrooms. All law school facilities are accessible to the physically disabled.

Students have access to federal, state, county, city and local agencies, courts, law firms, and legal aid organizations in the Iowa City area.

The Boyd Law Building has a central campus location on a bluff overlooking the Iowa River.

Degrees and areas of specialization

The College offers a JD program, the LLM in International and Comparative Law, as well as a Joint Degree program between the College of Law and other graduate and professional colleges.

Currently, the most popular joint degree objectives include JD/MA (Management), JD/MPH (Public Health), JD/MHA (Health Management & Policy), JD/MA or MS (Urban & Regional Planning), JD/MA (Journalism), and JD/PhD (Communication Studies).

Other graduate departments/colleges in which current law students are enrolled include Accounting, Biology, Chemistry, Economics, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Higher Education, History, Medicine, Philosophy, Political Science, Preventative Medicine and Environmental Health, Social Work, and Sociology.

Law Journals

The Law School also features four academic journals, including the Iowa Law Review. The Iowa Law Review was founded in 1915 as the Iowa Law Bulletin, and has served as a scholarly legal journal, noting and analyzing developments in the law and suggesting future paths for the law to follow. The Iowa Law Review ranks high among the top "high impact" legal periodicals in the country, and its subscribers include legal practitioners and law libraries throughout the world.

• Iowa Law Review
  • Ranked 17th overall law review in Washington and Lee University School of Law's index of legal journals.
• Journal of Corporation Law
  • Ranked 2nd corporate law journal
• Transnational Law & Contemporary Problems
  • Ranked 49th international law journal
• Journal of Gender, Race & Justice
  • Ranked 7th minority, race, and ethnic issues law journal
  • Ranked 15th gender, women, and sexuality law journal

Alumni

• James H. Andreasen (1958), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1987–1998)
• John J. Bouma (1960), Managing Partner, Snell & Wilmer in Phoenix, Arizona
• Bruce Braley (1983), U.S. Representative (D-IA)
• James H. Carter (1960), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1982–2006)
• Alexander Clark (1884), U.S. Ambassador to Liberia, and successfully litigated Iowa state desegregation case nearly ninety years before Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
• Alexander Clark, Jr. (1879), first African American to graduate from Iowa Law School, and possibly the first African American in the country to earn a law degree
• Norm Coleman (1976), former U.S. Senator (R-MN)
• Lester J. Dickinson (1899), U.S. Representative (1919–1931), and U.S. Senator (1931–1937)
• James D. Erickson (1962), former CEO of Northwestern Mutual
• Phyllis Propp Fowle (1933), First female JAG officer in U.S. Army, and helped launch the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps in World War II
• Rita B. Garman (1968), Justice of the Illinois Supreme Court
• Theodore G. Garfield (1917), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1941–1969), Chief Justice (1961–1969)
• K. David Harris (1951), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1972–1999)
• Mary Humphrey Haddock (1875), first woman in the country admitted to practice in the U.S. District and Circuit Courts
• John Hammill (1897), served three terms as the 24th Governor of Iowa from 1925 to 1931
• Virgil M. Hancher (1924), 13th President of the University of Iowa (1940–1964)
• Robert B. Hanson (1981), Iowa district court judge, and trial judge presiding over the landmark same-sex marriage case Varnum v. Brien (Iowa, 2009)
• William Cook Hanson (1935), Senior federal district judge (1962–1995)
• Paul P. Harris, founder of Rotary International, the world's largest service organization
• Bourke B. Hickenlooper (1922), former Iowa governor (1943–1945), and U.S. Senator (1945–1969)
• Leo A. Hoegh (1932), former Iowa governor (1955–1957), Director of the Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization, and member of National Security Council
• Brian H. Hook (1999), former Special Assistant to President George W. Bush, and senior advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 2006–08
• William S. Kenyon (1890), U.S. Senator (1911–1922), and circuit judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (1922–1933)
• Nile Kinnick (1940, attended), 1939 Heisman Trophy winner, 1939 Maxwell Award winner, consensus All-American, WWII veteran, inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, and 1939 AP Male Athlete of the Year. Left school to serve in WWII, and was killed in a training flight.
• Jerry L. Larson (1960), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1978–2008)
• Donald P. Lay (1951), circuit judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (1966–2007), Chief Justice (1980–1992)
• Richard S. Levitt (1954), chairman and CEO of Dial Corporation, and Vice President of the Board of Directors for Wells Fargo & Company
• Ronald E. Longstaff (1965), Senior federal district court judge (1991–present)
• Carol Havemann Lynch (1972), General Upstream Tax Counsel for ExxonMobil
• Patrick Madigan (1998), Assistant Iowa Attorney General, and played a key role in the nationwide mortgage settlement of 2012
• Thomas E. Martin (1927), U.S. Representative (1939–1955), and U.S. Senator (1955–1961)
• Arthur McGiverin (1956), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1978–2000), Chief Justice (1987–2000)
• Edward J. McManus (1942), Senior federal district court judge (1962–present)
• Michael J. Melloy (1974), Federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
• Ronald Moon (1965), Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Hawaii (1993–2010)
• Carroll J. Reasoner (1976), first woman and youngest president of the Iowa State Bar Association
• W. Ward Reynoldson (1948), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1971–1987), Chief Justice (1978–1987)
• Tom Riley (1952), Iowa politician and successful trial attorney
• Coleen Rowley (1980), Retired FBI Special Agent and Time Magazine 2002 Woman of the Year
• Frederick "Duke" Slater (1928), All-American College Football Player, and second African-American municipal judge in Chicago, IL
• Bruce M. Snell, Jr. (1956), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1987–2001)
• Daniel F. Steck (1906), U.S. Senator (1926–1931)
• Roy L. Stephenson (1940), Chief federal district court judge, Southern District of Iowa (1960–1971), and circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (1971–1982)
• William C. Stuart (1942), Senior federal district court judge (1971–2010)
• Philip W. Tone (1948), Federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
• Harold Vietor (1958), Senior federal district court judge (1979–present)
• Thomas D. Waterman (1984), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (2011–present)
• Mary B. Hickey Wilkinson (1873), first woman to graduate from Iowa Law School, and possibly the first woman in the country to earn a law degree
• George A. Wilson (1907), Governor of Iowa (1939–42), and U.S. Senator (1943–1949)
• Charles R. Wolle (1961), Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1983–1987) and senior federal district judge (1987–present)

The College has approximately 10,000 alumni. While 40 percent of the alumni practice in the state of Iowa, other top states for the alumni include: Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, Texas, Wisconsin, and Virginia.

The alumni have an international presence with almost 200 alumni located outside the United States in the following countries: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Hungary, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, and Vietnam.

Notable Faculty

• Austin Adams (1875–1890), lecturer and Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court from 1876-1887.
• David Baldus (1969–2011), notable academic in the field of Capital Punishment whose research was a key component in Furman v. Georgia (1972)
• Willard L. Boyd (1954–Present), President Emeritus of the University of Iowa and the Field Museum of Natural History
• La Vega George Kinne, served six terms as Iowa Supreme Court judge, the last year as Chief Justice
• Eugene A. Gilmore (1929–1935) dean of the University of Iowa Law School, and President of the University of Iowa from 1934–1940
• Herbert F. Goodrich (1914–1922), co-founder of the Iowa Law Review, and circuit judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit (1940–1947)
• N. William Hines (1962–Present), Dean Emeritus of the University of Iowa Law School, served from 1976–2004
• Herbert Hovenkamp (1986–Present), expert in Antitrust law
• Mason Ladd (1929–1966), dean of the University of Iowa Law School from 1939–1966, and founding dean of Florida State University Law School
• Emlin McClain (1881–1901), dean of the University of Iowa Law School from 1890–1901 and 1914–1915, co-founder of the Iowa Law Review, and Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court (1901–1914)
• Margaret Raymond (1995–2011), dean of the University of Wisconsin Law School (2011–Present)
• Wiley B. Rutledge (1935–1939), dean of the University of Iowa Law School, and Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (1943–1949)
• Allan D. Vestal (1949–1983), expert in Civil Procedure
• Eugene Wambaugh (1889–1892), introduced the Langdell case method to the University of Iowa Law School, and published the first Iowa casebook