Reading Comprehension

PT131 · S4 · P2 · Q9 Statutory Law

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A proficiency in understanding, applying, and even formulating statutes—the actual texts of laws enacted by legislative bodies—is a vital aspect of the practice of law, but statutory law is often given too little attention by law schools.

Topic

Statutory law and why law schools should emphasize it more in legal education.

Framework

Challenge Position (the author pushes back against the way most law schools under-emphasize statutory law)

Main Point

Law schools focus too much on judicial decisions and case analysis, often neglecting statutory law, but developing skills related to statutes is essential for legal practice, making statutory law a crucial part of legal education even if statutes differ regionally. (The Most Valuable Sentence for the main point appears at the end of the first paragraph and is fleshed out in the final sentence of the passage.)

P1: Law School’s Emphasis on Judicial Decisions

Many law schools tend to focus their teaching on analyzing past court cases, which can give students the wrong impression that legal practice is mostly about interpreting case law rather than directly using or understanding statutes (laws written by legislatures).

P2: The Importance of Statutes in Legal Practice

In real legal work, lawyers often need to consult statutes directly to answer clients’ questions, and while sometimes using statutes is straightforward, accurately interpreting them when things aren’t clear is a vital legal skill.

P3: Teaching Statutory Law Develops Synthesis Skills

Teaching statutory law helps students become better at seeing how different laws fit together as a whole, rather than just analyzing one case at a time—a valuable ability, especially since most law students eventually specialize.

Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?

In spite of the reservations
Out of Scope: standard curriculum
The main clause of this answer is "law schools [should] implement a standard national curriculum in statutory law". We love that its main emphasis is "let's do statutory law!", but the specifics are off. The author never called for a standard national curriculum. In the final paragraph, the author is explaining that even if a statutory law curriculum at a regional law school is only dealing with local laws (thus, non-standardized across the country), that's still worthwhile education. The author thinks that law students can transfer the skills they learned while studying the laws of the state where they attend law school to the statutory law in whatever state where they end up practicing law.
8% picked this
Since the skills promoted by
Too Strong
Too Strong: reverse emphasis Unsupported: more important This is also close to the correct sentiment, because it's saying that law schools should place more emphasis on statutory law than they currently do. But it gets a little too loaded and specific with its language. Did the author say that the skills of statutory law are more important than those of case law? No, she says that the skills of statutory law are "a vital aspect" of the practice of law, but she doesn't directly compare them in importance to the skills of case law. Also, she says that law schools "often give too little attention" to statutory law. She believes that law schools "should give more attention to statutory law than they currently do", but she never says that "law schools should give more attention to statutory law than they give to case law".
2% picked this
Correct
Although statutes typically vary from
Why this is right
The main clause is that "law schools should provide training in statutory law", which is definitely in line with what we want. Can we sign off on the rest of the details? The answer begins with "although statutes typically vary from region to region". Is that true? Yes, the beginning of the final paragraph talks about that. And it's brought up as a possible objection, which the author then counters. So it makes sense that in this answer choice, the possible objection is prefaced by although, and then countered by the main clause. Did the author think that a big reason to teach statutory law is that it improves a student's "ability to synthesize legal information and interpret individual statutes"? Yes, the 2nd paragraph is all about need to interpret, and the 3rd paragraph is about the skill of synthesis.
Skill tested: Main Point · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.
81% picked this
In the theoretical world of
Opposite
The main clause of this answer is that "a proficiency in case law is often one of the most important assets that students can have". The author is not worried about encouraging people to study case law. That's taken care of. The author's worried about encouraging people to study statutory law.
0% picked this
Law schools generally are deficient
Too Strong: generally
This has the right main sentiment: "Law schools should teach statutory law more". But the terms are a little overbaked. Did the author says that most law schools are deficient in their attention to statutory law? (generally / typically / usually / tends to = most of the time) No, the first sentence just says that "statutory law is often given too little attention by law schools". "Often" does not mean "more than half the time". You might live in an area like Pittsburgh where you often have snow on Christmas, but you don't have snow on most Christmases. Does the author say that this results a "failure to impart the skills necessary for the analysis of legal information"? Not quite. This language is too black and white. The author definitely thinks that many law schools could do a better job at imparting useful skills lawyers need in the real world. But it's different to say that "law schools generally fail to impart skills necessary to analyze legal information".
8% picked this

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