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About

Founded in 1952, the Emory Law Journal was the first journal sponsored by Emory University School of Law. Originally titled the Journal of Public Law, the Journal specialized in public law fields. In 1974, the Editorial Board changed the name of the Journal to the Emory Law Journal and pledged to widen the editorial scope of the Journal to include matters of general law, while maintaining an emphasis on public law. In 1978, the Editorial Board decided to abandon an editorial policy emphasizing the publication of pieces that explored the political and sociological aspects of the law. Since then, the Journal has been restricted editorially only by the limits of legal scholarship and interest. Today, ELJ publishes six issues a year, featuring professional and student articles on a broad range of legal topics, and remains entirely student edited. Additionally, ELJ hosts the Randolph W. Thrower Symposium in the spring semester, which brings together legal scholars from across the country to discuss timely legal topics.

The goals of ELJ are three-fold:

1. to foster excellence in legal research, writing, analysis, and editing; to provide the legal community with reliable and thoughtful commentary on new developments and trends in the law;
2. to enhance the reputation of the Emory University School of Law;
3. to not only provide a valuable research tool to practitioners by illuminating the current state of the law, but also to serve as a forum for legal activism by demonstrating where the law should be.

The achievement of these goals rests on the ability and dedication of ELJ’s members, which consists of second- and third-year law students who have demonstrated superior ability in legal writing and analysis. Each year, up to forty-three second-year students are invited to join ELJ as candidates to the Editorial Board. Those students who successfully complete the candidacy requirements are elevated to the Editorial Board and become eligible for election to the Executive Board. ELJ board members and board candidates carry sole responsibility for the editorial content and the substantive and technical accuracy of each article published in ELJ. The writing and editing responsibilities provide everyone involved with the daily operations of the Journalan invaluable educational experience.

ELJ also publishes an online companion to the Journal, ELJ Online. Launched in 2014, ELJ Online is a bridge between the scholarship of the Emory Law Journal and the legal community, and provides an integral forum for pertinent, shorter scholarly pieces than traditional articles and essays.