C|M|LAW Student Publication ‘The Gavel’

C|M|LAW’s student newspaper The Gavel was first published in April 1953 and is still produced today. PDFs of most issues are available in our institutional repository Engaged Scholarship through the link above.

In the inaugural issue, Dean Wilson G. Stapleton wrote:

Whatever the actuating influences, we welcome THE GAVEL and hope for its continued success. It can be a medium of good reporting, of editorial comment, and of student opinion, and should serve both student body and faculty well. The extent of its success will depend in large measure upon those busy people already taxing their waking hours with the added study of law. The same problem was present when the Law Review was started [in 1952], but the results there have overcome any latent doubts there may have been concerning the extra time that students would spend.

For a number of years I have told incoming students that we could offer them personal interest, excellent instruction, and adequate library facilities, but I regretted we had no ivy on the walls. The institution and growth of student activities like the Law Review, the Student Bar Association, and now THE GAVEL, may well be symbolic of this ivy. Such is our hope, and with it our best wishes to the editors in this new venture.