About the North Carolina Law Review
The North Carolina Law Review, a student-operated journal, serves judges, attorneys, scholars, and students by publishing outstanding legal scholarship and furthering the intellectual climate of the University of North Carolina School of Law. Through its collaboration with the legal community, the Review provides timely and thought-provoking commentary for people of North Carolina and the nation. To these ends, the staff and board of the Review also host an annual symposium and publish the online NCLR Forum that is devoted to current issues in North Carolina.
In addition, the Review trains its members in intensive legal research, analysis, and writing, thereby preparing them for the rigors of legal practice and public service. The North Carolina Law Review belongs to the entire Carolina Law community and accepts the responsibility of enhancing the school’s reputation and academic environment.
From the Editors
The North Carolina Law Review is a distinguished and cherished institution, of which its members are very proud. We hope all members of the legal community can benefit from our work. The Review has pursued this unchanging mission since 1922.
It is hoped that this Review may be of service to the law students, the law teachers, the members of the bar, and to the judges upon the bench, and, through them, to the people of the state. To the faculty of the School, the Review will be an added incentive to systematic research in the state law and a medium for the publication of the results achieved. To the members of the bar and the judges upon the bench, the Review will make available, in the form of leading articles, editorial notes and comments, discussions of important legal problems, statements of the significance of outstanding recent state and federal decisions, and historical accounts of the development of distinctive topics and doctrines of North Carolina law. In other words, the Review will carry to the active members of the legal profession, the work the School is doing in tracing the development of law in North Carolina and in the country at large.
As a supplement to the routine daily class work of the School, it will afford to the second and third year students, a means of intensive training in legal writing. To them, the independent experience . . . in the analysis, investigation and critical discussion of current problems in North Carolina law will be invaluable. As the Review goes into volumes year by year, it will constitute a collection of reference materials on the local law, of definite value as collateral readings in connection with class discussion.
Excerpt from Editorial Notes, 1 N.C. L. Rev. 31 (1922)
Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
The North Carolina Law Review is committed to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion in both its membership and scholarship. The Law Review sees diversity as a variety of lived experiences and personal values that arise from differences of culture and circumstance. These experiences and values include, but are not limited to, any of the following: race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, sex, sexual orientation, religion, abilities/disabilities, age, language, socioeconomic status, past and current geographic region, immigration status, family status, personal/family education level, and prior or current military service, and more. The Law Review strives to foster understanding across these differences such that members feel valued and are empowered to add value in an inclusive environment. Lastly, the Law Review aims to create conditions that provide all members an equitable opportunity to participate and succeed as a member of the Law Review.
Our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion is not only an important end in itself but also integral to our achievement of excellence as individual members and as a flagship journal. For example, our commitment helps us enable broader and more complex dialogue over publication decisions because we believe lived experiences and personal values inform how students think about issues, proposals, and priorities. In turn, our commitment will help us increase the variety and breadth of scholarship and perspectives within the legal academy. Because our differences in experience and perspectives can lead to personal growth for each member, this commitment also helps us strengthen our student development and mentorship opportunities, leading to a more meaningful legal education and journal experience for our members. Finally, because law review membership is a stepping-stone in the legal profession, our commitment helps us ensure the North Carolina Law Review—and by extension, other influential organizations—can remain more accessible to more people and does not replicate systemic social inequalities.