Chief Justice Hastings' Requirements for the Founding of UC Hastings

By Julian Davis

Chief Justice Hastings' Requirements for the Founding of UC Hastings

A 2012 candidate for District 5 Supervisor in San Francisco, Julian Davis has directed the San Francisco Clean Energy Campaign, led the Booker T. Washington Community Service Center, and been a director of the San Francisco Housing Development Corporation. Julian Davis earned his law degree in 2011, graduating magna cum laude from the University of California Hastings College of the Law.

Chief Justice Hastings' Requirements for the Founding of UC Hastings

Located in the heart of San Francisco’s Civic Center, the UC Hastings College of the Law offers its students easy access to City Hall, State and Federal office buildings, and several state and federal courts. Established in 1878 with a large contribution by California’s first Chief Justice, Serranus Clinton Hastings, UC Hastings occupies a unique position in the University of California system. In making his grant, Justice Hastings imposed the requirement that the school not be governed by the Regents of the University of California. 

Chief Justice Hastings' Requirements for the Founding of UC Hastings

Another of Justice Hastings’ requirements is that the school remain in its place at the heart of political and legal centers of San Francisco. The effect of this is that UC Hastings’ law students have superior opportunities for internships and externships in the various courts and government offices within walking distance of the school. This, in turn, contributes to UC Hastings College of Law being viewed as a place where students learn to be lawyers, as opposed to other schools where the law is taught more as an academic discipline and students learn to be legal theorists.