Law School Visiting Committee To Release Section of Report

Part of the report of the Board of Overseers's Visiting Committee on the Law School will be released to students in the near future, Albert M. Sacks, dean of the Law School, said yesterday.

The executive committee of the Board of Overseers approved Monday a request by Edward T. Gignoux, chairman of the visiting committee, to release the section of the report that deals with student concerns at the Law School.

Gignoux said last night the section that will be released is "just a digest of the views which were expressed by the students before the committee," and that it is unlikely to contain observations about the Law School that will surprise students there.

No Big Thing

He declined to give details about the committee's findings, but said "It's not anything like the Pentagon papers, I assure you."

The Law Students Guild, a student group, asked Sacks to release the report early last fall, but he asked them to wait until he could prepare a report on steps the Law School had taken in response to criticisms the visiting committee had made.

Sacks yesterday declined to say whether his response would be issued with the committee's report, but Gignoux said he believes the dean's comments will be distributed with the report, but Gignoux said he believes the dean's comments will be distributed with the report, but Gignoux said he feels that the Law School administration has taken steps to correct the problems that the visiting committee found most serious.

Gignoux said the rest of the visiting committee's report is not likely to be released to the Law School community.

Jeffrey Reiman, a third-year law student and president of the Law School's student government who asked Gignoux to publish the report, said yesterday he feels students have a right to know the findings of the visiting committee's Subcommittee on Student Concerns, since the report is based on student opinions expressed at a hearing last spring.

Ira A. Burnam, a third-year law student and a member of the steering committee of the Law Students Guild, said yesterday his group had asked Gignoux to release the whole report, including sections on faculty research and on the teaching of professional responsibilities at the Law School.

The 'Issue'

"The issue is not really one that depends on the substance of the report," Burnam said. "The issue is whether students can participate in the evaluation of the Law School."

Mark O'Donoghue '73, another third-year law student and member of the Guild, yesterday said this fall's controversy between Sacks and the students who wished to see the report is "a tempest in a teapot," that "only came to the boiling point because we kept the heat on."