Orin S. Kerr | 2.1.2024 12:20 AM

From 1940 to 1990, about one third of Supreme Court law clerks became law professors. But in recent years, Brian Leiter and Jeff Gordon note, that percentage has dropped considerably. Sarah Lawsky has some numbers of clerks entering legal academia in the last decade or so that Brian recently posted:

Even if Sarah is missing some former clerks in her numbers, that's a noticeable drop. What explains the trend? Over in the comments to Brian's post, Professor Dan Epps has a suggestion that I think explains a lot: The increasing separateness of the law clerk and law professor track.

I realize this is a niche topic, but here's a little background to explain that increasing separateness for those who may be interested. It used to be, decades ago, that getting a top clerkship and getting a top professorship were the same track. If you were a law student and you wanted to be a law professor, you got the highest grades you could and tried to use your grades to get a clerkship with the most prestigious judge you could. The clerkship acted as a sort of graduate degree in law. If you hit........

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