Breyer to teach Admin at HLS Forum

[Anonymous User]

Must be helpful for aspiring SCOTUS clerks at HLS.

[Anonymous User]

I'd be surprised if he ends up teaching full-on admin. Seems like a lot of work. But looks like he'll be teaching a seminar with Cass Sunstein?

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

[Anonymous User]

It might look nice to have Breyer's name on your transcript (IIRC, the HLS transcript shows the name of the professor that taught your course), but I feel like the experience taking the admin course would actually be bad. I doubt he's gonna really work on crafting a well-thought-out syllabus, a carefully curated list of reading assignments, effective case excerpts, etc.

He's an old guy that just retired, he's gonna tell them stories, drawing on his experience, and mostly mail it in. Might be fun, but doubt the students will learn the doctrines and subject matter as well as they would from an ordinary HLS admin professor.

And re rec letters, that won't nearly be enough to transport someone into SCOTUS-level clerkships. You'd still need stellar grades, and I bet he'll be drawn more to HLR types (given his own personal background) than just any student who takes his course.

[Anonymous User]

accidental duplicate

[Anonymous User]

Is he also going to sit by designation like Souter?

[Anonymous User]

It might look nice to have Breyer's name on your transcript (IIRC, the HLS transcript shows the name of the professor that taught your course), but I feel like the experience taking the admin course would actually be bad. I doubt he's gonna really work on crafting a well-thought-out syllabus, a carefully curated list of reading assignments, effective case excerpts, etc.

He's an old guy that just retired, he's gonna tell them stories, drawing on his experience, and mostly mail it in. Might be fun, but doubt the students will learn the doctrines and subject matter as well as they would from an ordinary HLS admin professor.

And re rec letters, that won't nearly be enough to transport someone into SCOTUS-level clerkships. You'd still need stellar grades, and I bet he'll be drawn more to HLR types (given his own personal background) than just any student who takes his course.

This sounds really sours-grapes-y. I don't think slackers end up on SCOTUS and I don't see why he wouldn't take seriously teaching one class properly.

Though I agree that taking one class from Breyer isn't going to give anyone much of an edge. A very eminent COA judge would periodically teach a class at my law school, and their classes were always over-subscribed because everyone envisioned getting an in with the prof, and it didn't really work that way. I'm sure there was the occasional student who made a good connection and was able to profit off that, but as you suggest, they were students who were well-positioned already.

[Anonymous User]

If this class is anything like the classes at my school that were taught by circuit judges the classmates will be insufferable.

[Anonymous User]

If this class is anything like the classes at my school that were taught by circuit judges the classmates will be insufferable.

Gunner city?

[Anonymous User]

It might look nice to have Breyer's name on your transcript (IIRC, the HLS transcript shows the name of the professor that taught your course), but I feel like the experience taking the admin course would actually be bad. I doubt he's gonna really work on crafting a well-thought-out syllabus, a carefully curated list of reading assignments, effective case excerpts, etc.

He's an old guy that just retired, he's gonna tell them stories, drawing on his experience, and mostly mail it in. Might be fun, but doubt the students will learn the doctrines and subject matter as well as they would from an ordinary HLS admin professor.

And re rec letters, that won't nearly be enough to transport someone into SCOTUS-level clerkships. You'd still need stellar grades, and I bet he'll be drawn more to HLR types (given his own personal background) than just any student who takes his course.

This sounds really sours-grapes-y. I don't think slackers end up on SCOTUS and I don't see why he wouldn't take seriously teaching one class properly.

Though I agree that taking one class from Breyer isn't going to give anyone much of an edge. A very eminent COA judge would periodically teach a class at my law school, and their classes were always over-subscribed because everyone envisioned getting an in with the prof, and it didn't really work that way. I'm sure there was the occasional student who made a good connection and was able to profit off that, but as you suggest, they were students who were well-positioned already.

How is it at all "sours-grape-y"?? I think it's a reasonable prediction based on Breyer's age (pretty old), circumstances (just retired from SCOTUS, of all thing), and comparison class (highly-driven, professionally-trained law profs). I didn't say he wouldn't take it "seriously", but there are levels. I think he'll show up on time, and grade the papers and ask and answer questions; I don't think he's gonna be reading and writing and researching in the way or degree that typical law professors do. Do you think otherwise?!

I don't have any desire or resentment to take a class with him, it's just a neutral guess at what that experience will be like, from a student and pedagogical standpoint, relative to what it would be like to be taught admin law by a full-time, TT law professor.

All that said, still could be a great experience if you're a causal student interested in taking the class for kicks. But yeah, I don't have like a personal dog in the fight or anything, so kinda weird to say it's sour grapes...

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

Advanced Admin was not taught in Fall or Spring 2022. Despite its name, Kessler and Sabel's seminar is not an advanced admin law class.

Fed Courts is not admin law, and there is significantly more to administrative law than learning the basics of Chevron and Mead.

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

Advanced Admin was not taught in Fall or Spring 2022. Despite its name, Kessler and Sabel's seminar is not an advanced admin law class.

Fed Courts is not admin law, and there is significantly more to administrative law than learning the basics of Chevron and Mead.

Going to piggyback on this.

Anyone who thinks Kessler and Sabel's seminars are an adequate replacement for a BLL class on admin law should be automatically disqualified from giving their opinion on anything re: CLS's public law course offerings. These people simply have no idea what they're talking about.

Too, anyone who thinks Fed Courts—whether with Funk or with Metzger—is an adequate replacement for Admin Law is disqualified. If you believe spending extra time talking about Stern v. Marshall and Crowell v. Benson makes up for the lost opportunity to learn about administrative guidance, the nuances to Chevron and Skidmore, and the history of the APA, then... I don't think you really paid attention.

Leg Reg doesn't cut it. Every other T14 school has major admin law offerings that go beyond a surface-level analysis of reading legislation.

I get that some of you are big law, private law people, so the lack of public law offerings is of no consequence to you. And as a result of your lack of investment, you don't really know about the dearth of such offerings at CLS. That's all fine. But don't start saying things that are untrue.

[Anonymous User]

It might look nice to have Breyer's name on your transcript (IIRC, the HLS transcript shows the name of the professor that taught your course), but I feel like the experience taking the admin course would actually be bad. I doubt he's gonna really work on crafting a well-thought-out syllabus, a carefully curated list of reading assignments, effective case excerpts, etc.

He's an old guy that just retired, he's gonna tell them stories, drawing on his experience, and mostly mail it in. Might be fun, but doubt the students will learn the doctrines and subject matter as well as they would from an ordinary HLS admin professor.

And re rec letters, that won't nearly be enough to transport someone into SCOTUS-level clerkships. You'd still need stellar grades, and I bet he'll be drawn more to HLR types (given his own personal background) than just any student who takes his course.

This sounds really sours-grapes-y. I don't think slackers end up on SCOTUS and I don't see why he wouldn't take seriously teaching one class properly.

Though I agree that taking one class from Breyer isn't going to give anyone much of an edge. A very eminent COA judge would periodically teach a class at my law school, and their classes were always over-subscribed because everyone envisioned getting an in with the prof, and it didn't really work that way. I'm sure there was the occasional student who made a good connection and was able to profit off that, but as you suggest, they were students who were well-positioned already.

How is it at all "sours-grape-y"?? I think it's a reasonable prediction based on Breyer's age (pretty old), circumstances (just retired from SCOTUS, of all thing), and comparison class (highly-driven, professionally-trained law profs). I didn't say he wouldn't take it "seriously", but there are levels. I think he'll show up on time, and grade the papers and ask and answer questions; I don't think he's gonna be reading and writing and researching in the way or degree that typical law professors do. Do you think otherwise?!

I don't have any desire or resentment to take a class with him, it's just a neutral guess at what that experience will be like, from a student and pedagogical standpoint, relative to what it would be like to be taught admin law by a full-time, TT law professor.

All that said, still could be a great experience if you're a causal student interested in taking the class for kicks. But yeah, I don't have like a personal dog in the fight or anything, so kinda weird to say it's sour grapes...

I said sour grapes because it was just a weird leap to "this guy is going to suck." I don't think he's going to research/write for publication the way that law profs do (though who knows), but most profs' personal research isn't relevant/transferable to an entire semester-long black-letter class either b/c it's much narrower. I also think that being on SCOTUS for almost 30 years has given him a better perspective on the development/current state of admin law than your average prof, and that preparing one class is a pretty significant step-down in terms of work level/time required from SCOTUS, so just because he's retired doesn't mean he can't/won't handle that workload. So I don't get at all why the assumption is that he'd show up, tell some stories, and mail it in.

As for comparison with the "professionally trained" profs already at Harvard (as if anyone actually professionally trains profs how to teach effectively), he was a prof at Harvard for 13 years before becoming a judge. The only thing that makes him different from any other adjunct is age, potentially, and if he stuck around on SCOTUS till 83, he's not exactly intellectually washed up/out to pasture yet.

I'm not at all saying you have to go the other way and assume his class will be the unparalled intellectual experience of a lifetime and you should sit adoringly waiting to catch the pearls of wisdom as they fall from his lips, just that the assumption he'd phone it in was weird. It's one class, he won't have any of the other competing obligations that law profs have, and certainly no one's making him do this - he's got the same salary now that he had when on SCOTUS so can't need the money. If he's retiring at 83 he's probably terrified of being bored.

(I could be completely wrong, of course, and you could be right, but I don't think you can assume one way or another.)

[Anonymous User]

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

Advanced Admin was not taught in Fall or Spring 2022. Despite its name, Kessler and Sabel's seminar is not an advanced admin law class.

Fed Courts is not admin law, and there is significantly more to administrative law than learning the basics of Chevron and Mead.

Going to piggyback on this.

Anyone who thinks Kessler and Sabel's seminars are an adequate replacement for a BLL class on admin law should be automatically disqualified from giving their opinion on anything re: CLS's public law course offerings. These people simply have no idea what they're talking about.

Too, anyone who thinks Fed Courts—whether with Funk or with Metzger—is an adequate replacement for Admin Law is disqualified. If you believe spending extra time talking about Stern v. Marshall and Crowell v. Benson makes up for the lost opportunity to learn about administrative guidance, the nuances to Chevron and Skidmore, and the history of the APA, then... I don't think you really paid attention.

Leg Reg doesn't cut it. Every other T14 school has major admin law offerings that go beyond a surface-level analysis of reading legislation.

I get that some of you are big law, private law people, so the lack of public law offerings is of no consequence to you. And as a result of your lack of investment, you don't really know about the dearth of such offerings at CLS. That's all fine. But don't start saying things that are untrue.

From an outside perspective, that's really surprising. Admin is very useful for any biglaw litigation practice where the government might even be tangentially involved in the case, so it seems like that's a giant omission. I can only offer my own experience at YLS as a comparison, where admin seems to be as close to a required class as it gets. While I was there, one (sometimes two!) sections got offered every semester, in addition to advanced admin (taught as a blackletter), legislation/statutory interpretation, and a bunch of public law seminars. Might be a function of fewer CLS folks wanting to go to DC lit, but it's crazy that they don't regularly offer the class that's essentially public law 101.

[Anonymous User]

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

Advanced Admin was not taught in Fall or Spring 2022. Despite its name, Kessler and Sabel's seminar is not an advanced admin law class.

Fed Courts is not admin law, and there is significantly more to administrative law than learning the basics of Chevron and Mead.

Going to piggyback on this.

Anyone who thinks Kessler and Sabel's seminars are an adequate replacement for a BLL class on admin law should be automatically disqualified from giving their opinion on anything re: CLS's public law course offerings. These people simply have no idea what they're talking about.

Too, anyone who thinks Fed Courts—whether with Funk or with Metzger—is an adequate replacement for Admin Law is disqualified. If you believe spending extra time talking about Stern v. Marshall and Crowell v. Benson makes up for the lost opportunity to learn about administrative guidance, the nuances to Chevron and Skidmore, and the history of the APA, then... I don't think you really paid attention.

Leg Reg doesn't cut it. Every other T14 school has major admin law offerings that go beyond a surface-level analysis of reading legislation.

I get that some of you are big law, private law people, so the lack of public law offerings is of no consequence to you. And as a result of your lack of investment, you don't really know about the dearth of such offerings at CLS. That's all fine. But don't start saying things that are untrue.

From an outside perspective, that's really surprising. Admin is very useful for any biglaw litigation practice where the government might even be tangentially involved in the case, so it seems like that's a giant omission. I can only offer my own experience at YLS as a comparison, where admin seems to be as close to a required class as it gets. While I was there, one (sometimes two!) sections got offered every semester, in addition to advanced admin (taught as a blackletter), legislation/statutory interpretation, and a bunch of public law seminars. Might be a function of fewer CLS folks wanting to go to DC lit, but it's crazy that they don't regularly offer the class that's essentially public law 101.

I'll also add that the last time Advanced Admin was offered was in the Spring of 2021, and the professor for the class was changed a week before the semester started. That professor was and is notoriously bad at teaching Advanced Admin, and many who nonetheless ended up taking it said they regretted the experience. So, in reality, the last time Advanced Admin was properly offered as a course with its intended professor—no ifs and buts—was Spring 2020.

CLS just has other priorities than public law or clerkships. Lester's vision is for the school to be a hub for business lawyers, with an emphasis on the international. She's certainly done a good job of steering the school in that direction, but it means that we're shorthanded relative to some of our peer schools.

Still grateful for the opportunity to have attended.

[Anonymous User]

Don't worry CLS, here at NYU we also don't have advanced admin law except for a 50-person, once every two years class that is only 2 credits.

[Anonymous User]

To be clear, reading the body of the article, it seems like Justice Breyer will be teaching reading groups and seminars, not Admin as a black-letter law class.

[Joachim2017]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

In addition to the other reasons people have already pointed out, the bolded is an incredibly dumb take because the whole "you could have easily taken it...." line of thinking is premised on the assumption that its students' fault that they expected Admin to be available more often. For the amount of money paid at CLS, for a course like that, to not be offered that often...just wow.

You realize, right, that there are courses which may have been offered in spring 2022 that *aren't* reasonably expected to be available more often?

Also, just LOL at the "(and there’s still fed courts too)" throwaway.

[Anonymous User]

Great. HLS gets Breyer to teach admin, and CLS can't find a single professor to teach it.

huh? we have Metzger (wrote the book), JBP, Johnson, and Kessler who are all great

We have plenty of professors who are able to teach it (and teach it well). Yet, we didn't have admin offered either semester last year, and I believe it is not on the course list this upcoming year as well.

1) LegReg is basically admin, 2) We had advanced admin the past two years (though not this coming year I guess), 3) Fed Courts with Metzger is kinda another advanced admin

I get that there are ways to kind of replace admin. But the fact that we pay $100,000 a year to have the class of 2023 have no opportunity to take admin is just bad. Are there any other top schools that have a two-year gap in an important class like that?

Advanced Admin was taught this past spring (2022) so you could’ve easily taken it if you didn’t think legreg was sufficient (which I think it is for the vast majority of us) (and there’s still fed courts too)

In addition to the other reasons people have already pointed out, the bolded is an incredibly dumb take because the whole "you could have easily taken it...." line of thinking is premised on the assumption that its students' fault that they expected Admin to be available more often. For the amount of money paid at CLS, for a course like that, to not be offered that often...just wow.

You realize, right, that there are courses which may have been offered in spring 2022 that *aren't* reasonably expected to be available more often?

Also, just LOL at the "(and there’s still fed courts too)" throwaway.

Someone else already mentioned this, but I think it bears repeating. This seminar was not a real advanced admin course in the way other schools (or professors) teach it. This was a seminar on agency guidance that the professors agreed to rename. I took the class. I enjoyed it. It was not advanced admin in the way Metzger, Strauss, and others would teach it.

[Anonymous User]

Why has a post about Breyer teaching at Harvard become about other classes at an entirely different school