Student Practice in Colorado
| Publication year | 1981 |
| Pages | 1600 |
| Citation | Vol. 10 No. 7 Pg. 1600 |
1981, July, Pg. 1600. Student Practice in Colorado
Both the University of Denver College of Law and the University of Colorado Law School have active student law clinics. Law students in these clinics receive academic credit for representing indigent clients under the supervision of a faculty member or staff attorney.(fn1)
Students in the two clinics are permitted to practice in the Colorado courts pursuant to one of the nation's most liberal student practice rules. C.R.S. 1973, § 12-5-116 provides:
Students of any law school which has been continuously in existence for at least ten years prior to April 23, 1909, and which maintains a legal-aid dispensary where poor persons receive legal advice and services shall, where representing said dispensary and its clients and then only, be authorized to appear in court as if licensed to practice law.(fn2)
Rule 226 of the Colorado Rules of Civil Procedure further provides that students in a clinic maintained by an accredited Colorado law school are authorized to appear in district, county and municipal courts of the state as if licensed to practice, "provided such representation shall be with the approval of the lawyers in charge of the said legal aid clinic and the judge of the court in which the student appears."
The Colorado rule differs from the ABA Model Rule on student practice and the student practice rules of many other states in that it does not specifically require in-court supervision by a licensed attorney or certification of a student by a law school dean.(fn3)
Despite the statutory and rule authority for student representation, however, there is sometimes disagreement on the part of judges, city and district attorneys, and private practitioners who may find themselves working with students on a case as to the legal status of the student practitioner. This is to be expected in light of the breadth of the student rules and the lack of specific guidelines contained in them.
Moreover, many of the problems in student practice go beyond the rules themselves. Important constitutional questions concerning the legal status of student practice, particularly in criminal cases, have been raised in other jurisdictions.(fn4) The manner in which these questions are resolved may have an important impact on student practice in Colorado and affect the procedures for student practice followed in the Colorado courts. Failure on the part of judges, city attorneys and supervising attorneys to follow those procedures may result in constitutional and other challenges to student representation similar to those made in other states.(fn5)
The law school clinic is the law school's answer to such critics of legal education as Chief Justice Burger, who has observed:
andThe shortcomings of today's law graduate lies not in any deficient knowledge of law but that he has little, if any training in dealing with facts or people---the stuff on which the cases are really made,(fn6)
Indeed, there has been a call for practical training in the law schools ever since Jerome Frank in 1933 observed that "the trouble with much law school teaching is that, confining its attention to a study of upper court opinions, it is hopelessly oversimplified . . . (T)he law schools should get in intimate contact with what clients need and what courts and lawyers actually do. "(fn8) The purpose of the modern law school clinic is to do just thatLaw students can deal with a corporate spin-off, or a vertical merger, but they don't know enough to save a client from a fast talking encyclopedia salesman.(fn7)
The University of Denver College of Law student law clinic, established in 1904, was the nation's first.(fn9) Although it was another forty years before other states began to follow Colorado's lead, by 1978 forty-four states had adopted some sort of student practice rule.(fn10)
An important boost to student practice came in the right to counsel case of Argersinger v. Hamlin, in which Justice Brennan, joined by Justices Douglas and Stewart, stated: "I think it plain that law students can be expected to make a significant contribution, quantitatively and qualitatively, to the representation of the poor in many areas including cases reached by today's...
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