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Law School Culture: A Visit to Rutland
joined in 1938 by a junior lecturer. This remained the situation
until 1948, when a period of steady expansion began: there were
four full-time staff in 1950, seven in 1960, twelve in 1970, twentysix
in 1980. In 1992-93 there were thirty-three, including five professors,
responsible for a total "student load" of about six hundred;
of these about half were registered for the three year LLB, sixty
were postgraduates and the remainder were reading for joint honours
degrees in Law or else taking one or two modular law
options. 6 The law school also offers a few short courses for solicitors
as part of their continuing legal education. Let us start our
tour with the physical facilities.
PLANT
Until recently the Rutland Law School fitted quite comfortably
into three converted terrace houses just off the edge of the campus.
With expansion the accommodation became increasingly
cramped. In 1985 a rather ugly purpose-built building was tacked
on to provide extra office and teaching accommodation. Almost
every American law school is built around the Law Library. This
is every law dean's dream and university librarian's nightmare. In
Rutland, as in most United Kingdom law schools, the central library
won on grounds of economy. There is no room for a proper law
library in Denning House, as the law school complex is called, so
the faculty is precluded from arguing with fervour that the library
is the lawyers' laboratory and can legitimately be separated from
the main collections since only lawyers consult law books. 7
Concern about parking is one of the unifying links of the world
academic community. The Law School is one of the few departments
at Rutland to have the privilege of its own parking spaces;
a small lot by the building can squeeze in up to five compact
vehicles. Since 1969, these have not been reserved for any particular
officers, but are used by faculty on a first-come-first-servedlast-in-first-out
basis, providing an on-the-spot case-study of dispute-prevention
and resolution for disinterested colleagues who
choose to use public transport. Parking studies have a special place
in law school legend. 8
One enters the Faculty by the extension. Denning House has
inscribed above its main entrance Coke's admonition to King
James—NON SUB HOMINE SED SUB DEO ET LEGE—an idea
cribbed from Harvard's Langdell Hall. 9 At the entrance, below the
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