ABA Journal Podcasts - Legal Talk Network

Justice David W. Ellis has served on the Illinois Appellate Court for the 1st District for nearly 10 years. But readers may know him better as author David Ellis, writer of more than a dozen legal thrillers. Ellis had enjoyed creative writing as a youth, he tells the ABA Journal’s Lee Rawles in this episode of The Modern Law Library. But during his college and law school years, he was focused sole...

The LSAT is facing competition from the JD-Next exam, and many states are reconsidering their licensing methods as the bar exam as we’ve known it sunsets in 2028. Kellye Testy, the executive director and CEO of the Association of American Law Schools, talks with the ABA Journal’s Julianne Hill about why those changes are happening now and what it means for law schools and students.

The goal of the bar exam is to be a gatekeeper for the legal profession and protect the public. But the current system, dominated by the Uniform Bar Examination, gets a failing grade from Joan Howarth, an academic, an attorney and the author of Shaping the Bar: The Future of Attorney Licensing.

There has been a lot of talk and concern about generative AI tools and how they are changing the legal industry. A major worry for many lawyers is that these tools could replace them or make them redundant. But what about the potential of generative AI to help lawyers generate business, market themselves more effectively, and make more money?  On this month's episode of the Legal Rebels Podcast, G...

Do you need some distractions during vacation travel or while lying directly under your A/C unit and sweating? It’s time for The Modern Law Library’s summer recommendations episode, in which host Lee Rawles shares her pop culture picks with you, plus a re-airing of one of our older episodes with current relevance. As states navigate a post-Dobbs world, a series of federal and state regulations kno...

Finances are a fraught area for many attorneys. Despite a high earning potential, new lawyers often start out with a financial disadvantage due to the opportunity cost of the years devoted to school and bar prep, coupled with high student loans. People who chose to get JDs instead of MBAs often find themselves having to operate as entrepreneurs to launch a small firm or solo practice. In The Lawye...

A commonly cited solution to helping bridge the access-to-justice canyon is for lawyers to provide more pro bono work. In that regard, have generative artificial intelligence tools made it easier for lawyers to provide pro bono services?

Originalism is the ascendant legal theory espoused by conservative legal thinkers, including the majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices. But far from being an objective framework for constitutional interpretation, says author and attorney Madiba Dennie, its true purpose is to achieve conservative political aims regardless of the historical record.  In The Originalism Trap: How Extremists Stole th...

Networking is something that comes naturally to some people. But if the idea of talking to strangers makes you break out into a cold sweat, there’s help and hope, says Deb Feder, author of the book After Hello: How to Build a Book of Business, One Conversation at a Time. “You have picked a profession that is never finished meeting people,” Feder writes of lawyers. A practicing lawyer for many year...

It seems like every time that there’s a major disruption or event that threatens to upend the legal industry, it spells doom for the billable hour. But that could be more out of hope than anything else. The billable hour survived the Great Recession and the COVID-19 pandemic, despite many people thinking—or maybe wishing—that it wouldn’t.

From COVID-19 response to the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the results of 50 states having individual approaches to public health, medical outcomes and healthcare access raise troubling questions. A husband-and-wife team of University of Utah professors dig into the ethics of the American healthcare system in States of Health: The Ethics and Consequences of Policy Variation in a Federal System. Les...

When the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the country's borders was announced, opposition from the public and the legal community was swift. The outcry and judicial decisions led to a reversal of the administration's stated policy. But detention and family separation have a long history in this country, history professor Ana Raquel Minian says. Minian, who immigrated from Me...

The lack of diversity when it comes to race, gender, sexuality, disability and social class within the legal profession is nothing new. However, the last decade has marked a gradual increase in diversity across all fields.

“Trespassing plus time equals adverse possession,” Paul Golden writes in his new book, Litigating Adverse Possession Cases: Pirates v. Zombies. When someone has occupied or used a piece of property as though they own it for long enough, a court could determine that they are the rightful owner—regardless of what the paperwork says. It’s a concept more popularly discussed as squatter’s rights. In th...

James Patterson has written bestsellers in many genres. But as he tells the ABA Journal's Lee Rawles in this episode of The Modern Law Library, he has always been fascinated by legal thrillers, courtroom dramas and crime novels. He even considered becoming a lawyer, before his literary career took off. In his newest release, The #1 Lawyer, James Patterson partnered with co-author Nancy Allen to te...

Transcription technology has existed for a while now, but its accuracy has never been that high. Now, artificial intelligence could make automated transcription even more accurate. As the tech becomes better and better, is it possible that it could eventually replace human court reporters?

Three high-profile cases of sexual assault in 2012 followed a basic pattern: A teenage girl was sexually assaulted at a house party by one or more teenage boys while she was incapacitated by alcohol. The attacks were recorded and the photos, videos and stories were shared on social media or via texts. The photos and videos were used to ridicule the victims among their peers. Those texts and posts...

Ray Brescia, a law professor at Albany Law School, has taken a hard look at the country’s legal system in his new book, Lawyer Nation: The Past, Present and Future of the American Legal Profession. In this episode of The Modern Law Library, Brescia tells the ABA Journal’s Lee Rawles about the efforts in the late 19th and early 20th century to exclude people from the legal profession who were not p...

In Police & the Empire City: Race & the Origins of Modern Policing, Matthew Guariglia looks at the New York City police from their founding in 1845 through the 1930s as “police transitioned from a more informal collection of pugilists clad in wool coats to what we can recognize today as a modern professionalized police department.” From the beginning, race and ethnicity had a major impact in the p...

What better way to spend Valentine’s Day than with your favorite lawyers, legal professionals, technologists and thought leaders who will be on hand to teach lucky conference goers about all the latest trends and developments in the field of legal technology?

After 50 years as a professor at Yale Law School, Owen Fiss says his students are still idealistic and passionate about the rights won in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965. As a young lawyer in the late 1960s, Fiss worked with the Department of Justice to implement those laws. A classroom discussion in the spring of 2020 prompted him to draw upon his legal expertise and de...

The impact for people clearing their criminal records can be life-changing, leading to long-term employment and financial security. And research shows that it also helps prevent recidivism. But the path to expungement is not always easy, requiring people with criminal records to navigate an unfamiliar, costly and drawn-out process. That’s where lawyer Noella Sudbury comes in.

In 2013, the ABA Journal named Renee Knake Jefferson a Legal Rebel for her work co-founding the Michigan State University’s ReInvent Law Laboratory and rethinking how legal services could be delivered to consumers. In 2024, she’s taking a look back at more than a decade of research and experimental programs aimed at improving access to justice–the successes and the failures. On this episode of the...

There are lawyers who love the practice of law so much, they’ll only leave it feet first, in a box. But for those who’d prefer to exit the bar before closing time, Kevin McGoff has advice on planning that next chapter. In his book, Finding Your Landing Zone: Life Beyond the Bar, McGoff describes his dawning realization that he was missing out on experiences while his life was dominated by his lega...

As 2023 draws to a close, the Legal Rebels Podcast looks at the top stories in legal technology for the year. Between the explosion in popularity of ChatGPT and other generative artificial intelligence tools, the continued use of virtual or hybrid working arrangements and the underwhelming mergers and acquisitions market, it was certainly an eventful year.