James Ford ‘23
Interviewed by Nikolai Morse ‘24
How does it feel to have been nominated by Sai and JP for this week’s Hot Bench?
It’s about time! I’m one of the more eccentric people at the law school. I have an interesting background, views, and style.
Tell me about that interesting background?
I’m originally from Florida. I came from a pretty working-class family. Did poorly in high school and figured out that my best chance to get a good college education was in the UK, because they rely heavily on standardized tests. I went to the University of Dundee in Scotland, where I got a Bachelor of Laws. I was published, won Best Honours Dissertation, and graduated with First-Class Honours. My education there has given me a unique view on what the study of law is.
How is your view of legal education different?
Everywhere else in the world the law is considered an academic discipline. Similar to English, history, or philosophy. It is one of the humanities. So, the goal of your education is not to teach you a way of thinking, but rather to teach you what the law is in terms of its content and subject matter. The purpose is to be a legal scholar, rather than teach you common law reasoning, which I think is the goal of an American legal education.
What do you think accounts for those differences?
Two reasons. First, in Britain you’re expected to do an apprenticeship after law school, so the British legal academy expects you would get your practical training in that way. Second, you could probably trace the difference back to the emergence of legal realism in America and the idea that you can study law as a science by working through cases and deriving their rules.
Do you believe the realist method is uniquely American?
Interesting, because “Law AND”[1] is ascendant in the academy, but from a teaching perspective, we still follow the legal realist way. You aren’t told the point of the case ahead of time; you are asked to analyze it and derive the rule. The approach elsewhere is that the law is a distinct body of knowledge, and the way you learn it is by engaging with it.
How is the structure of assessment different in the U.K.?
You write more. Every class at my university had a paper which was 25% of your grade. And not a memo or case note, but a truly academic paper on a topic assigned by the professor. Sado-masochistic injury was historically illegal under the Offences Against the Person Act, and one of the papers I was asked to write asked whether it should still be illegal today—there’s an important normative inquiry. Your final is closed-book and handwritten. You’ll have some “problem” questions like we do here, but also questions on history and policy.
Why did you come back to the U.S. for your J.D.?
Originally, I thought I might want to be a legal academic, but I realized at a certain point that I did not enjoy writing legal academic papers and would want to be a practitioner. Since America’s legal market is substantially larger than Britain’s, and I am from here, it made sense.
What are you doing this summer?
I’m working for UVIMCO which manages UVA’s endowment. The endowment is huge—$21 billion—so they do lots of interesting things. My work seems like it will primarily be reading a lot of contracts the university makes with companies it invests in. It’s very transaction-focused.
I was told by some of my classmates to ask you about two (seemingly) unrelated topics: Communism and Tarot. Would you care to elaborate?
On communism: for me it comes down not to state control or centralization but unlocking human potential. Are people more free in a world where their lives are dictated by whether they are close to the imperial core or the imperial periphery, or would they be more free, creative, and capable of being more virtuous people if they didn’t have to live under that system? Currently in the U.S. there is an increasingly intricate system where upper-middle class families can send kids to the right prep school, the right universities, and to work for the right companies. The institutions of America have shown themselves to be incapable of dealing with this, because academics don’t want to talk about it and politicians are taking legal bribes from corporate interests.
Back to law school, the purpose of law school is not to teach you the law but to think like a lawyer. What is that, if not reproducing a certain kind of ruling class logic, to reproduce the method of thinking of those in power?
Would advancing Communism be a long-term goal for you?
It is actually federally unlawful to be a member of the communist party (though the law isn’t enforced), so it could be a problem if I joined a communist party before I pass the bar. The second problem is the financial aspect. My parents lost everything in ’08, so I have to earn some money. So, it’s important when you’re a leftist to think about how much you’re allowing your career to impact your values.
What about Tarot?
Some people at the law school know that I give tarot readings. My mom did this when I was growing up, which got me interested. I was in Dundee one summer and I started reading a lot of theology, a bit of occult history, and started meditating on tarot cards. Not sure if they have any kind of power, but they are rooted in a really interesting Christian theological system. When you understand this, and how specific the meanings of the cards are, when someone comes and speaks with you it gives you a structured way of jumping off into a broader conversation.
Alright, time for the lightning round!
Favorite food? Oysters.
Favorite class you’ve taken at UVA Law? Trusts and Estates, with Johnston.
Favorite place in Charlottesville? Clark Hall.
Favorite book? Moby Dick.
What is your spirit animal? Octopus.
If you could time travel, when and where would you go? The Holy Roman Empire, around the 12th century. I would be really interested in studying feudalism on the ground.
Favorite place you have traveled to? Sterling, Scotland.
If you could pick one person to win the lottery, who would it be? Myself.
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cpg9jy@virginia.edu
[1] E.g., “law and economics,” “law and sociology,” etc.