Article
Zoning and the Bar Exam.
Journal of Land Use & Environmental Law
(2023)
Abstract
The National Conference of Bar Examiners (NCBE), which develops American bar examinations, plans to revise the bar exam over the next few years. As part of this process, NCBE has released a proposed outline of the subjects to be tested in future bar examinations. The NCBE outline failed to include zoning. Because zoning is a significant area of practice, this change seems difficult to justify at first glance.
This article both seeks to explain the NCBE's outline and to critique it. On the one hand, it could be argued that because zoning is primarily governed by local law rather than state law, there are no clear majority rules in zoning law, and thus that it is impossible to adequately test bar applicants about zoning. But this article responds to that argument, by setting forth a list of zoning-related rules that commentators have accepted as national majority rules. Because these rules are easily testable, the bar exam should continue to test students on zoning law.
Keywords
- zoning,
- bar exam,
- ncbe
Disciplines
Publication Date
Spring 2023
Citation Information
Michael Lewyn. "Zoning and the Bar Exam." Journal of Land Use & Environmental Law Vol. 38 Iss. 2 (2023) p. 187 Available at: http://works.bepress.com/lewyn/264/