1. Law school courses generally focus on legal rules. But facts are just as important both for successful law practice and for an understanding of the actual workings of the law.
2. There are now some law courses that call on students to do fact investigation. For example, in litigation clinics students must often gather evidence and assemble it in preparation for trial. But fact investigation involves more than intuition and hunch. Fact investigation involves mental discipline; it involves and requires orderly thinking.
3. No method known to humankind can guarantee that a litigator (or some other sort of lawyer) will do fact investigation successfully. But some methods commonly involved in fact investigation can be identified – and they can be taught. See the course in fact investigation at Cardozo School of Law.
