Americans for Limited Government has emailed a release that calls for the ending of American Bar Association accreditation of law schools. ALG characterizes ABA accreditation as crony capitalism. They write:
There is an inherent
conflict of interest when lawyers are allowed to regulate the entrance of
competitors into their field. Due, in part, to the ABA’s numerous requirements
of law schools and its restrictions on the practice of law, millions of
Americans are unable to afford legal services and are forced to represent
themselves in the bewildering legal system. While it is hard to argue that the
world needs more lawyers, the ABA accreditation system, by design, limits the
number of opportunities to attend law school with the result being the capping
new entrants into their field, a clear conflict of interest. As such, the
Department of Education should end the American Bar Association’s credentials to
provide law school accreditation.
As I have previously blogged, under Betsy DeVos the DOE has done too little to investigate left-wing influence on higher education. The ALG's point is a little different: licensure is a market impediment, and a professional guild should not be permitted to limit access to a market. It is difficult to argue that the standards that apply to law schools raise the quality of lawyers to some minimum, below which malpractice would be the norm. Rather, the ABA standards are meant to restrict the supply of lawyers.
The education system is not, on a number of levels, what it claims to be. Yet, the DOE has done little in the way of investigation and research, much less reform.
