Legal education and research

Media

Part of Panorama

Title: Legal education and research
Creator: Sinco, Vicente G.
Language: English
Source: Volume XV (Issue No.7) July 1963
Year: 1963
Subject: Legal education; Legal research; Law schools; International law
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Abstract: The advancement of legal education depends upon the results of research of international law societies.
Fulltext: ■ The advancement of legal education depends upon the results of researches of internatiqhal law soaeties. LEGAL EDUCATION AND RESEARCH Vicente G. Sinco The promotion of world peace through law requires for its success the employ ment of education, in gen eral, and legal education, in particular. This condition is practically indispensable and should go hand in hand with other activities that make for peace. It is generally admit ted that the use of political and economic measures alone does not effectively abolish war. On the contrary, it makes war at times necessary and even profitable. But to confine ourselves to the subject of legal educat ion for world peace, it ap pears desirable that an un derstanding of law, particu larly international law and its institutions, should not only be acquired by mem bers of the legal profession but should also be widely spread among the educated inhabitants of every country. The problem of peace through law is not merely the concern of the individual; It is a problem that faces all nations and all men. Conse quently, a measure of legal education should be enjoyed by the general public in or der that it could serve as a pervasive and persistent so cial influence for the adopt ion of peaceful methods of adjusting international dif ferences. In the long run, it is the diffusion of an effective edu cation for peace through law that could create an intellec tual atmosphere adverse to war and other violent forms of remedial action. Hence, the development of a human environment of this nature should be the concern not on ly of the professional school teacher but also of the law yer and of every educated person. Of course, this is a long, tedious, and difficult process. But so far there 2 Panorama seems to be no method bet ter than this that could change and ultimately sup press war as an ancient prac tice or a deeply rooted habit which mankind has collect ively followed or has taken for granted since time imme morial. The pursuit of peace must of necessity be consider ed a priceless goal of the ad venture of legal education. It cannot be done, much less achieved, by political edicts, administrative decrees, or le gislation. To carry it out, it has to be started on the bas is of a. well-studied plan and a carefully conducted' imple mentation. No plan of mass education may thus be considered ade quate as an instrument for world peace unless it makes provision for some acquaint ance with the fact that there exists a system of laws which precisely lays down certain standards of conduct among the different nations of the world. A satisfactory prog gram of general education on the availability of rules should place sufficient stress on law and courts for the peaceful settlement of inter national conflicts. It should describe the horrible effects of another world war which may likely be fought with the present terrible means and methods of wholesale murder and devastation. In a word, basic education for the masses would be incom plete unless it could help arouse in them a strong cons ciousness of the rule of law as an instrument for world peace. Mass education of this na ture and with this goal as an essential objective should serve as the ground work, the foundation, for a system of legal education which could be an effective medium for the establishment of world peace. The vast multitude of the world population to day even if we should ex clude the ignorant and the illiterate, are not aware that there are legal and peaceful mthods which could be used in settling international dis putes. They only know that governments and political leaders have always resorted and may always resort to war to settle differences between nations as long as they have the weapons and the resour ces for such purpose. Relatively vast sums are being set aside today for mass July 3 education. Even small coun tries devote a large propor tion of their national bud gets for so-called fundamen tal education. But for legal education there is nothing but niggardly amounts. For the advancement of the inter national law aspect of legal education not much has been done .Colleges and univer sities do not generally give enough attention to the sub ject except in their graduate courses. Oftentimes, it is merely made a minor part of the course in political science and is discussed in only one or two chapters of textbooks in international relations. The small value assigned to it in this manner has the ef fect of belittling the import ance and purpose of inter national law in the mind of the average student in a col lege or in a law school. • As a subject for graduate or post graduate work, inter national law is studied by on ly a limited number of stu dents, persons who take it for purposes of specialization. To give more impetus to its study by all students in our law schools and thereby develop greater interest in its rolex as an instrument for would peace should be a se rious responsibility which the legal profession should con sider and conscientiously as sume. It should be realized, of course, that funds are in dispensable for qualified pro fessors, materials, and facili ties. They should be made amply available by ’ govern ments or private foundations. For no other object of expen diture andi human effort is as important as that of esta blishing and preserving world peace through law if human life and the maintenance of civilization are worth saving from the threat of total an nihilation. The program of legal edu cation should not be carried out only in schools and col leges. Its benefits may be widely dispersed when taken up in discussion groups or se minars among lawyers, pulic officials, and businessmen. These may be conducted either by special committees or by existing law or civic associations in various coun tries under the auspices of the Center for World Peace Through Law. Papers pre pared and presented at this meeting should be given the widest distribution possible 4 Panorama in each country. Syllabi, textbooks, casebooks and re ports of judicial and arbitral tribuanls, and similar edu cational materials need to be supplied to different civic centers, public libraries, col leges, universities. The services of' individual lawyers and law associations need to be solicited for these activities. Courts and com mittees or commissions in charge of bar examinations should be appealed to for the inclusion of international law among the subjects re quired in the examiniations of applicants for admission to the bar. It should be giv en considerable weight in the preparation of bar tests and in the assessment of the re sults. Because the movement for world peace through law need to be known and felt by public officials, it would not be out of place to sug gest that an acquaintance with international law be made a qualifying require ment for persons chosen for the higher civil servic of every government. The consensus in the dif ferent continental conferences have favored the organiz ation of a World Rule of Law Center.. This obviously is a wise step to take. It is to be a clearing house for the lawyers to exchange inform ation and views on a global scale. The establishment of such Center assures the vi ability and progress of what ever plans and projects need to be undertaken for the suc cess of the enterprise the lawyears of the world are now determined to accomplish. It is a needed mechanism through which the programs now considered for World Peace Through Law may be implemented. The activities necessary to carry out legal education on a global scale as well as the work of inten sifying researches in inter national law or coordinat ing the researches of the different existing in stitutions need a permanent body which could follow up and encourage them. The Center could serve as an agency to obtain available re sources and technical assist ance from different legal, financial, and educational organizations. It could act in mobilizing them for the ful lest possible development of a worldwide consciousness of law as an instrument for inter July 5 national peace. To enhance its effectiveness, it would seem advisable that there be organized active correspond ents and committees in all countries to promote the ideas and objectives of the conference and to recruit participants and supporters of this movement. Without this Center, the conference on World Peace Through Law might turn out to be another beautiful but im practical concoction of dream ers as described by self-styled h a r d-b oiled or so-called down-to-earth leaders and politicians. That there are at present existing international and national institutions actively engaged in promoting world peace through law is too well known by many to be over looked. The United Nations is the most important of them. Practically all the states of the world are its members. But it is primarily and largely a political body. Its record so far shows that it generally avoids solutions for the problems brought be fore it. It shows extreme re luctance to develop interna tional law or to encourage the use of its own legal in stitutions, such as the Wold Court, to determine what are obviously legal questions. Nevertheless, the United Nations, with all its defects, promises to grow as the foun dation for the future struct ure of a true international community. But this will require a long period of in ternational education to which this conference now plans and hopes to give greater attention that has yet been given thus far. Just as important as the promotion of international law education is the develop ment of new research projects and the coordination of re search projects and the coor dination of .research work al ready being undertaken by es tablished institutions. The advancement of legal educat ion depends upon the results of well-planned and carefully accomplished researches of international law societies and institutes, regional cen ters, universities, and other public and private institut ions. It should be recognized that there is actually a dearth of research in international law. Science is way ahead in research activity. There are established centers for inter 6 Panorama national studies which give but slight attention to inter national law in their pro gram of activity. These places should induced to pro mote on some phase of the subject. The development of a com prehensive system of interna tional bill of rights for the protection of every indivi dual regardless of race, na tionality, creed, sex, resid ence, and social station should be adopted. It is as indispensable to a world le gal system as the bill of rights is to a democratic na tional constitution, and made part thereof by mere refer ence, needs a clear definition of its scope. There should be a restatemnt or codifica tion of the specific rules which fall within these gen eral principles. The working papers for this Conference makes men tion of other subjects for stu dy and research in order that a more comprehensive system of law applicable to states and individuals may be uti lized in determining inter national standards of ton duct and in adjusting clashes ofjnterests before authorized international tribunals. The acceptability of a system of this nature and scope obvious ly depends upon the freedom of its provisions from obscur ity, ambiguity, and parLaltiy. The chances of its implemen tation by big powers and small nations under such terms and conditions are like ly to be enhanced. The researches of existing lgeal organizations as well as decisions on questions of in ternational law are largely known only by experts and some officials of certain in ternational organ izations. The products of research are of little practical value to so ciety until after they are widely known and undersood by the educated public. Hence publication should be an inseparable part of re search programs. Translat ion into principal languages should form part of this un dertaking. By so doing the progress of international law studies could be known not only by specialists but by the members of the legal profes sion and by the public. There are, of course, some technical periodicals today publishing articles on inter national law, but these are circulated almost exclusively July 7 among members of the org anizations which take charge of their editing and- public ations. But the importance and necessity of international law as an instrument for the regulation and control of the relations and conduct of the states may only be widely appreciated when the lay public is in some way made aware of its growth and of the constant <nd serious at tention, time, and thought devoted to its development by competent scholars and responsible national leaders. Hence, it is not sufficient that the publication of re searches in international law be confined to technical jour nals for distribution among a small group of specialists. They should appear in news papers and other general publications, and they should be written in language and and style which the average law student, the public of ficial, and the educated lay reader could understand and appreciate. International law articles and decisions of international tribunals have an intrinsic appeal to many people. Such materials could be of direct interest to the average edu cated man because of their relation to problems o£ hu man security and survival. It would not be astonishing if much of the literature on the subject presented in a clear and readable style ra ther than in the obscure or technical jargon of the spe cialist would arouse the in terest of the layman in the objectives of the rule of law as an instrument for global peace. It might be opportune to recall at this juncture what one English scholar, once a Stowell Fellow of Oxford University, Thomas Baty, stated on how the Law of the Nations should be pre sented. He said that it is necessary that it be exhibit ed as “a body of rules based on clear, simple, intelligible, and sensible principles, com manding by its intrinsic me rit the occurrence and alle giance of the world.” But unfortunately, he added that not even the League of Na tions “saw the necessity of bringing the Law of Nations home to the common man.” And so in a volume he wrote on The Canons of Inter national Law, he suggested that international law be 8 Panorama simple, objective, and elastic. And the reasons he gave are: “Simple, because the com mon consent of the thought of so heterogenous a com posite as is afforded by the varied peoples of the world must obviously be limited to clear and plain propos itions. Certain, — (that is, protected by its exponents from rash and officious ques tioning) — because if a rule is made the passive subject of a vigorous and sustained sciolist attack, it is difficult to maintain that it enjoys general acceptance. Object ive, because only clear ob jective tests can be applied, when it is the opinion of the multifarious peoples of the globe which is to be based upon them. Elastic, because conditions change, and opin ions alter: a rigid rule which allows no room for corres ponding modifications is no rule at all. Every year since then, with the progressive replacement of principle by interest, the law has become less simple, less certain, less objective and to a fatal degree increasingly too elastic. We are slipping into the same state of anarchic practice as that which in an earlier cen tury aroused the indignation of Grotius.” Thus it is not only for the layman that clearer and more intelligible materials on inter national law should be made available. It is even also needed by many lawyers themselves. The average lawyer in my country and, I suppose, in some of the other countries, as well, does not often involve himself in questions of public interna tional law. As we all know, the cases which constantly engage his attention in his professional work seldom, if at all, call for the use and application of treaty provi sions or principles of inter national law. As a matter of fact, it is a rare occasion when problems of interna tional law are ever discussed in gatherings of lawyers he attends. It is almost certain that the last time he parti cipated in a discussion affectting international law was when he was a student in the law school. No wonder then that his attitude towards in ternational law and matters affecting international' legal organizations is one of indif ference. He considers them as pertaining to a field quite July 9 foreign to his professional business and to his personal life. He is almost convinced that they are better left to a law professor in a univer sity or to the two or three men working in the legal di vision of the foreign office of his government. This professional indiffer ence to international law and related matters has disturbed the minds of some respons ible leaders of the profession. Thus the late Justice Arthur T. Vanderbilt, one of the outstanding American jurists, in his lectures on Men and Measures in the Law raised these questions: “In these days of complicated interna tional relations, with a lin gering hope for One World and a brooding fear of Two Worlds, is not a deep under standing of public law, in cluding international law more important for lawyers than ever before in the his tory of mankind? Should the profession or the public generally be willing to leave these matters exclusively either to political scientists or to ” public officeholders?’’ The nature of the legal profession, the tasks that the members of the profession are called upon to perform, their significance to the per sonal and business affairs of the individual, their relevance to the social order, all of these and more justify the importance of the position and role of the lawyer in his community. Hence, a compet ent scholar was not without reason in bestowing upon the lawyer the title of officer of civilization. For the concepts of law, liberty, and order have ever been his concern, and without them as basic in gredients modern civilization would not have been pos sible. There can be no eco nomic and other forms of materials enterprises which generate the substance and content of civilized life in an atmosphere of chaos and law lessness.. The lawyer, however, has limited his field of action to -his community or his nation. But the size of the world has contracted; nations have become closely interdepend ent on one another; and their orderly relations are now the concern of all. Whatever the lawyer does within and for his country is no longer adequate to secure peace even in his very country it 10 Panorama self. He need expand the area of his service into the outside world and into its problems in the quest for peace. Hence the lawyer to day has to develop a new conception of his profession al duty. Professor Dennis W. Brogan, who is not a law yer himself, has expressed the opinion that because of the versatility and quick adaptability of the lawyer to the changing social context, his role in educating the public “for tolerable social living in this dangerous age is extremely important.” In the international society his preparation, we must con fess, could be much improv ed. In matters affecting for eign relations, his qualifica tions are in some instances so deficient that he is found unequal to his duties. Not very long ago some news papers published reports about a judge who acted in complete ignorance of a wellknown rule of international law and practice affecting diplomatic immunities. Mr. Philip C. Jessup, now a judge of the International Court, commented on that incident in these words: “Recently a judge of the City Court of New Rochelle, New York, was called upon to rule upon the immunities of the chauf feur of the Secretary-General of the United Nations. Pend ing Senate approval of a United Nations treaty 'defin ing such immunities, the sub ject is covered by general lan guage in the Charter, and in an act of Congress. The Charter itself is, of course, a treaty and under the Consti tution (meaning the Ameri can Constitution) is part of thee supreme law of the land. But the Charter is a consti tutional document which lays down broad principles rather than detailed rules. The judge in denying im munity from arrest in this case was obviously unfami liar with two centuries of law and practice relative to the comparable problem of immunities for the diploma tic representatives of foreign states and could see no rea son why the immunities for the United Nations staff should differ from those ac corded m e m b e rs of state and federal legislatures. Without going into more de tail, the case is cited as evi dence of the need in this en lightened country for more July 11 understanding of the nature of international organizations and the responsibilities of the United States as the host country.” This may not be a typical case, but it reveals eithef an inadequacy of legal education in the field of in ternational law or the exist ence of utter indifference to commonly known rules of in ternational law even among legal officers. It certainly seems to strengthen the need for more education in the general rules and principles of international law on the part of lawyers and public officials. I should like to conclude this paper by quoting a state ment of the Honorable Elihu Root which says: “The increase of popular control over national con duct, which marks the poli tical development of our time, makes it constantly more important that the great body of the people in each country should have just conception of their inter national rights and duties. “Government do not make war nowadays unless assured of general and hearty sup port among their people; and it sometimes happens that governments are driven into war against their will by the pressure of strong popular feeling. It is not un common to see two govern ments striving in the most conciliatory and patient way to settle some matter of dif ference peaceably, while a large part of the people in both countries maintain an uncompromising and bellige rent attitude insisting upon the, extreme and uttermost view of their own rights in a way which, if it were to con trol national action, would render peaceful settlement impossible . . . “■Of course it cannot be ex pected that the whole body of any people will study in ternational law. But a suf ficient number can readily become sufficiently familiar with it to lead and form pu blic opinion in every com munity in our country upon all important international questions as they arise.” These thoughts were ex pressed by that great Ameri can statesman in the early part of this century. He gave them as his salute to the founding of the American Journal of International Law. They are still applicable to 12 Panorama. the conditions of the world to day. I am convinced that they could serve as an inspiration and a guide in our present en deavor to promote world peace through the rule of law. Writers and historians have characterized different histo rical periods by the outstand ing events occurring in each. There were, for example, the age of faith, the age of feud alism, the period of geogra phical discoveries, the revi val of learning, the indus trial revolution, the age of global wars, the atomic age, and the age of outer space exploration. May the last quarter of the present cen tury go down in history as the age of international law and may this conference mark the real beginning of that age. For this event, there is no better site than Athens the place of origin of those intellectual ideas and aesthe tic sentiments which have made possible the flowering of modern civilization. (Speech delivered at a panel discussion of the Interna tional Conference for World Peace Through Law in Athens, Greece.) POOR APEI The most famous of debates over a theory of modern science took place in 1860 when Bishop Wil berforce shared a platform with Thomas Henry Hux ley. The Bishop concluded his attack on evolution by asking Huxley whether his descent from the ape was on his father’s or his mother’s side. Huxley’s crushing reply, from his own account in a recently discovered letter, was: “If then, said I, the question is put to me would I rather have a miserable ape for a grandfather or a man highly endowed by nature and possessing great means and influence and yet who employs those faculties and that influence for the mere pur pose of introducing ridicule into a grave scientific discussion — I unhesitatingly affirm my preference for the ape.’ July 13