The subjects I teach are largely common law subjects, that is, subjects in which the law is made by courts rather than by legislators. My philosophy of teaching law is rooted in my philosophy of the common law.

My philosophy of the common law is that it should be, and largely is, rooted in social morality, social policy, and human experience. Therefore, the best legal rule to govern any issue is the rule that best reflects these three elements, with appropriate balancing and adjustment when they do not point in exactly the same direction. Although not every common law rule is the best rule at any given moment, over time legal rules tend toward becoming the best.

My philosophy of teaching law is that because determining the best legal rule depends on social morality, social policy, and human experience, and because we all have a pretty good understanding of these elements, students have the ability to determine, from their own knowledge, what the best legal rule in any given case would be. To implement this philosophy, I use the Socratic method. Although this method is often conceived to center on questioning by the teacher that is meant to tear down what the student has said, that is a misconception. As Socrates used the method in Plato's dialogues, it depended on the philosophical theory that we all have truth within us, and therefore can be led to the truth by questions designed to bring out our own knowledge—albeit in a way that we did not completely apprehend before the questioning. Similarly, I use the Socratic method to prompt students to determine the best legal rule themselves—to critically examine the existing legal rule, to determine how far it varies from the best legal rule, and to see how the existing rule can become the best. This critical examination of the law is important not only in itself, but because it is a foundation for understanding what the law is, and how it is likely to develop.

While one of the objectives of my teaching is to give students a solid grasp of the subject, my dominant objective is to teach students how to critically analyze the law. I try to teach students to give serious consideration to what the courts say, but nevertheless to penetrate beyond what the courts say to what they do, and what they should be doing. That is, I try to teach students to penetrate beyond the specific rules to the general principles that should serve as the foundations for those specific rules. My objective is to teach the students to make me unnecessary: to bring students to a point at which they can read a case and ask themselves the questions that I would ask them.