Imagine Yourself with a Juris Doctor

The Juris Doctor degree was the first graduate and professional degree in law. The first Juris Doctorate was bestowed by Harvard University in the late nineteenth century. The Juris Doctorate degree was intended to replicate the old European doctor of law degree. The Juris Doctor developed from a movement instigated at Harvard for a more scientific study of law. The Juris Doctorate or J.D. was designed to standardize law degrees in the same way the M.D. degrees, D.O. degrees, and D.D.S degrees had in medicine.

The definition of Jurus Doctor is taken from the Latin. When translated, the definition of Juris Doctor is revealed to be "Doctor of Laws."

Christopher Columbus Langdell was the dean of the Harvard Law School from 1870 to 1895. Dean Langdell dedicated his life to reforming the education of legal professional in the United States of America. Langdell’s goal was to bestow university education on the legal profession. His larger goal was to standardize the practice of law be establishing a three year post baccalaureate Juris Doctorate degree.

The Juris Doctor program developed by Christopher Langdell sought an approach to the legal education that would combine the case method and Socratic method of education. The case method of education to earn a Juris Doctorate involves studying legal precedents established in earlier cases, while the Socratic Method of legal education involves seeking to develop an understanding in the students about the reasoning behind the decision, in order to make sure that the decision were not simply memorized, but instead were understood.

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