The 'Plus One' Clinic: Adding (Political) Value to the Clinical Experience by Representing Landlords Alongside Tenants

Abstract:     
This article proposes a novel clinical methodology for teaching “political” values, which it defines as values that are not encompassed by the Rules of Professional Conduct, but extend beyond personal morality, and include the values that fall under the Carnegie Report’s “third apprenticeship” of professional education. Under the “plus one” approach, a clinic with an existing docket of eviction defense representation would add to that docket at least one case representing a landlord seeking to evict a tenant, and a clinic representing workers in wage or employment discrimination claims would add at least one case representing an employer defending one of those types of claims. Clinics are a potent venue for teaching “professional values,” the ethical rules that all lawyers at least purport to be bound by. This article argues that clinics also have a unique ability to teach “political” value lessons, regarding issues about which there is much disagreement within the profession and society. Law students are already taught the parameters of what they should and should not do once they have a client, but they are not comparably taught how they should decide which individuals or entities to represent, and to what ends. Students in a “plus one” clinic would be given the tools to make these types of decisions in the context of their eventual practice areas and individual ideologies.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 32

Accepted Paper Series