Presidents, lawyers, and law schools

I ran into a dumb article about how Kamala Harris would be only the second president with a law degree from a non-elite (aka T-14) law school. Harris graduated from the University of California San Francisco, formerly known as Hastings. This is actually wrong: besides Joe Biden, who graduated from Syracuse, William Howard Taft graduated from Cincinnati. My research into this critically important issue also turned up the following:

64% — 29 of 45 — of America’s presidents have been lawyers.

However, only seven of these 29 actually received law degrees, which highlights how radically the formal requirements for being a lawyer have changed over the course of American history.

President-lawyers who never went to law school include: John and JQ Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Van Buren, Tyler, Polk, Fillmore, Buchanan, Lincoln, Garfield, Cleveland, Harrison, and Coolidge.

Presidents who went to law school and went on to practice law but never graduated include: Both Roosevelts, Pierce, McKinley, Arthur, and Wilson. (Wilson is the only president with a Ph.D. GW Bush is the only one with an MBA).

Presidents who went to law school, didn’t graduate, and never practiced law: Truman, LBJ.

Presidents with law degrees; Hayes, Taft, Nixon, Ford, Clinton, Obama, Biden.

Speaking of how the past isn’t even the past, I ran into this little nugget on the website of a North Carolina personal injury firm (and what is going on with this guy’s hair?), in a list of capsule bios of every president who has been a lawyer:

Lincoln was the president during the Civil War, and his administration was a time of success and failure. He was a former statesman, lawyer, journalist, soldier and president of the United States.

Well that’s a take as the kids say.