Supreme Court
TEXAS SUPREME COURT advisory
Contact: Osler McCarthy
512.463.1441 or email
October 8, 2018
COURT APPROVES UNIFORM BAR EXAMINATION
FOR TEXAS AND SEEKS COMMENTS BEFORE ADOPTING
The Texas Supreme Court has adopted a task force’s recommendation to replace the Texas bar examination with the Uniform Bar Examination, which will allow new lawyers who pass the exam a score that can be applied for bar admission in more than 30 other states and territories.
In its order the Court notes the change to the Uniform Bar Examination should begin with the February 2021 exam and necessary rules amendments will be adopted before then.
In a May 14, 2018, report the Court-appointed Task Force on the Texas Bar Examination recommended adopting the Uniform Bar Examination for Texas candidates seeking bar admission in the state. The task force’s recommendation resulted from a two-year study of bar examinations, prompted by several years’ declining bar-exam scores in Texas and across the nation.
With the Uniform Bar Examination, successful bar applicants will have a “portable” score to use for admission in other states and U.S. territories that employ the same test.
The so-called UBE consists of three of four components tested on the Texas Bar Examination (the multistate bar examination, the multistate performance test and essay questions). But the UBE does not test on Texas procedure and evidence or include Texas essay subjects as the Texas exam does now. In adopting the Uniform Bar Examination for Texas, the Court also approves the task force’s recommendation that a Texas law course and examination be developed to assure Texas bar applicants have Texas law, ethics and procedure.
Texas Board of Law Examiners will assist the Court in developing both the Texas law course and the Texas law examination.
Public comment on this order will be open through December 8, 2018. Written comments may be submitted to rulescomments@txcourts.gov.