The organization tasked with accrediting the nation’s law schools will appear before a federal advisory panel later this month to defend its government-recognized status as an accreditor. This status gives the Council of the American Bar Association Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar the power to determine which schools have access to federal student aid and, in most states, whether graduates may sit for the bar. In short, federal recognition gives the council extraordinary power over entry into the legal profession.
Last month, the Department of Education identified numerous compliance failures by the council and recommended ending that recognition. Among the Department’s findings was that the council is not sufficiently “separate and independent” from the ABA—a charge that is far from surprising.
The council is not separately incorporated from the ABA. Nor do the two organizations possess a distinct employer identification number, or file separate tax returns. Moreover, the ABA has the authority to amend the council’s bylaws, giving the profession’s principle membership organization authority over the accreditor’s governing framework. The council does have procedures in place to insulate individual accreditation decisions from ABA politics. But these internal checks are unlikely to be effective if the two entities are one in the same.
The problem extends far beyond the legal profession. In a forthcoming study in the European Economic Review, I examined whether there was similarly structural entanglement between all 25 federally recognized professional accreditors and their corresponding professional or membership associations. I found that 22 share an employer identification number, consolidated tax filing, or single legal identity.
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