International Legal Studies

Moot Courts

Since 1820 HLS students have been honing their advocacy skills in moot courts. Today J.D. and LL.M. students compete around the country and the world, in a range of moot courts that include such subject matter areas as public international law, European law, and international arbitration.

The Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court began at Harvard in 1960, as a match between two LL.M. and two J.D. students. As of 2005, Harvard teams had won the Jessup regional competition for seven years running, advancing from among over 500 teams to the final international rounds.

In 2005, LL.M. students from Belgium, Slovenia, Spain and the U.K. — the first Harvard team ever to compete — won the European Law Moot Court competition.

And every year HLS sends a team of students to Vienna to compete in the Willem C. Vis international commercial arbitration competition.

Real court cases also find their way to Harvard. Practitioners have been invited to "moot their cases" before panels of Harvard Law professors, prior to actually arguing before the U.S. Supreme Court. Lawyers involved in the Alien Tort Claims Act case first mooted it at HLS. And 2006 will see a return visit of the Navajo Supreme Court to hear a case before the student body, continuing a relationship begun in 1999 with this court of a sovereign nation.

Site Map