L&C Law Review is among Top 50 Law Journals in the Washington & Lee Rankings

The renowned Washington & Lee Law Journal Ranking Survey has listed Lewis & Clark Law Review (LCLR) as one of the top 50 law journals for 2023. LCLR has joined historic publications like Harvard Law Review, Stanford Law Review, and Yale Law Journal in this top 50 ranking. The ranking moved to #44 overall from last year’s position of #51.

LCLR is the law school’s general purpose law review, first founded in 1996 as the Journal of Small and Emerging Business Law. It is one of three law reviews at Lewis & Clark, alongside Environmental Law Review and Animal Law Review, which publish more specialized volumes. It has consistently been recognized as one of the top 15 percent of U.S.-published law journals since its first appearance on Lewis & Clark’s campus.

Talia Brumfield ’23, the 2022-2023 Editor in Chief of LCLR, attributes this success to the hard work of the LCLR team and the excellent scholars they have worked with. “We have been very fortunate at LCLR to work with incredible authors who have dedicated their careers to advancing the legal field for the better,” said Brumfield. “This past year has been full of exciting topics, like criminal justice reform, housing, victim rights, human rights, disaster policy, and more. Our outstanding members have put in long hours to publish the law review, and it certainly shows in the rising rankings. I’m excited to see the law review continue to grow in the ranks under the new board!”

To determine ranking order, Washington & Lee uses four criteria: impact factor, journal citations, currency factor, and case citations. Of these, LCLR ranked #35, #43, #44, and #83 respectively. According to Washington & Lee, these criteria are used to help calculate the prominence of law reviews and help prevent biases in favor of long-published journals.