Tapping Reeve - Litchfield Law School

Litchfield Law School

Throughout the early years of his legal practice, Reeve continued to take students. Initially, Reeve continued the clerking or apprenticeship system of having the young men work for him while they studied his law books. He would also occasionally present talks on the principles of law. By 1784, as the number of young men in his office increased, due in part to the notority Reeve gained as a result of the highly publicized Mum Bett case, he built a small building on the south side of his property and created a formal 14 month long curriculum of legal studies. Lectures covered all areas of legal practice, noting developing changes in the new nation's adaptation of British Common Law. Students took rough notes during the lectures, copying them carefully after checking citations, which were put in the margins. Many students had their notes carefully bound into leather volumes, which became important reference works for them in their future practice.

In 1798, Reeve became a Judge of Connecticut's Superior Court. He then hired James Gould, a former student, to assist in running the school. Reeve served for 16 years on the state supreme court and in 1814 was named Chief Justice. He retired in 1815 and a year later published The Law of Baron and Femme a legal analysis of domestic relations that went into four editions and was the pre-eminent American treatise on family law for much of the 19th century.

In response to the continued popularity of the school and increased enrollment, Gould built his own lecture room next to his home on North Street. The law school students would walk back and forth between the two buildings to hear lectures from each teacher. Reeve formerly retired in 1820 and Gould continued to operate the law school until 1833, with the assistance of fellow Law School graduate Jabez Huntington, when increased competition from Harvard, Yale, Columbia and the University of Virginia resulted in decreased admission to the Litchfield Law School.