The Question That Killed Critical Legal Studies

Abstract

A short while ago, attended the 25th reunion of my eighth-grade graduation class. had been looking forward to getting together with the 70 or so folks with whom had experienced parochial school during the late 1950s and early 1960s for a host of reasons-not the least of which was that expected to see my first love, to whom had not spoken in well over 20 years. had long since blown that candle out, but was intrigued by reports from mutual friends and acquaintances suggesting that she and had followed remarkably parallel life paths. She, too, had gone to law school; she, too, had gone on to teaching after a stint in practice; she, too, had come to love the classroom and to enjoy scholarly life; and she, too, had evidently succumbed to the entreaties of her colleagues to undertake a multitude of thankless institutional-service tasks-the last a pattern of behavior that perhaps only unexpurgated Catholic guilt could explain. So was dying to know: Did she still go to church? The Church? To confession? Did she take communion during the Eastertide? Eat meat on Fridays? When the moment of truth at last arrived, she had a different agenda. So, she said after a warm hello, I hear you're a crit.1 My mind raced for a response. couldn't deny it-not, in any event, in this setting, where