In 1974 the William Mitchell Law Review had no past, and its future was in grave doubt. Recently founded Hamline Law School had no law review. Today’s Mitchell Hamline Law Review was beyond imagining.
I remember when the William Mitchell Law Review had a short past and a still uncertain future. I knew that publishing Volume 1, Number 1, as momentous as it felt, did not necessarily mean that William Mitchell had a law review.
I was not there for the founding of the Hamline Law Review, but I can imagine it well. I am sure there was pain at its birth and a time when its future was uncertain.
Today the William Mitchell Law Review has more than a forty- year history. The Hamline Law Review has more than a thirty-five year history. I still can hardly believe that I am writing these words.
I worried about the future of the William Mitchell Law Review for years. Gradually, almost imperceptibly, I came to realize that hundreds, then thousands, of students, under the incomparable mentorship of Mike Steenson, had turned once lonely little Volume 1, Number 1, into an enduring institution. Today, the William Mitchell Law Review sits within the top 100 in the Washington and Lee University rankings of student-edited flagship law reviews.
Now there is a threat to all law reviews, no matter how well established: a talent drain. Having peaked in 2011, college enrollments have been declining steadily and precipitously. People who have the talent for law review are instead starting careers out of high school or after technical training. Whatever the cause, and there is much debate about that, we cannot rely on this trend reversing itself.
Merger is the best, perhaps the only, strategy to address the talent drain. Cutting quality is not an option. As I know well, you need talented people to publish a high quality law review. My nightmare is that a dwindling talent pool would send the William Mitchell Law Review back to its origins: a handful of students working like dogs in a dingy little basement room behind the boiler.
I submit that the William Mitchell Law Review and the Hamline Law Review are perfect merger partners. They are members of a small and elite club in the law review world: flagship law reviews that started from scratch in relatively recent years and developed into enduring institutions.