Texas Supreme Court Ends Reliance on ABA Accreditation of Law Schools

The ABA said that the order did not change its role in the accreditation process.

The Texas Capitol building in Austin on July 21, 2025. Brandon Bell/Getty Images

The Supreme Court of Texas on Jan. 6 said it wouldn’t rely on the American Bar Association (ABA) to accredit law schools in the state.

In an order, the court defined an “approved law school” as one approved by the court rather than the ABA. It also said it would begin certifying law schools on its own, with graduates from Juris Doctor (JD) and certain Legum Magister (LLM) programs being eligible to take the bar exam and be licensed to practice law in the state.

It is the first instance of a whole state ending this type of role by the ABA, with the organization historically holding the power to accredit law schools and lay down model rules for the profession nationwide.

“[The Court] intends to provide stability, certainty, and flexibility to currently approved law schools by guaranteeing ongoing approval to schools that satisfy a set of simple, objective, and ideologically neutral criteria,” the court wrote in its order, which was signed by all nine of its justices.

The court noted that it “does not intend to impose additional accreditation, compliance, or administrative burdens on currently approved law schools, which need not take any additional action in order to remain approved law schools in Texas.”

The action follows ongoing criticism of the ABA by conservatives, who accuse it of supporting progressive politics and Democratic Party initiatives at the behest of a majority of its members and thus politicizing the legal profession.

“The American Bar Association’s (ABA) accreditation standards for law schools require unlawful race-based preferences,” the White House wrote in a fact sheet on April 23.

The ABA, historically, has established model rules for legal ethics adopted by nearly all states and has rated the judicial qualifications of U.S. presidential nominees to federal courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States.

In its order, the Supreme Court of Texas included a three-page list of law schools that would remain accredited under the new rule. The list includes all law schools that were previously accredited, representing most major law schools in the United States and correlated to rankings by U.S. News & World Report, which are widely used to assess their prestige.

The order did not include a set of new criteria for law schools to apply for certification, but stated that it “intends to develop, in consultation with the Texas Board of Law Examiners, a deliberative approach to requests from law schools not currently accredited by the ABA that wish to be added to Texas’s list.”

Conservative figures across the United States hailed the move, which was initially announced on Sept. 26, 2025, but was only certified by the court on Jan. 6.

“It is only the latest example of the decline of the ABA after abandoning ideological neutrality and alienating moderates and conservatives,” Jonathan Turley, the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at the George Washington University Law School, wrote on X. Turley is a prominent legal commentator on television news networks, particularly Fox News.

“Great job by the Texas Supreme Court to treat the ABA as the left-wing activist organization that it is,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, wrote on social media. “The ABA should not be given a preferential role in legal education or the profession of law.”

Other states and federal jurisdictions run by conservatives have announced plans to do the same as Texas. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier stated that he would recommend that the Supreme Court of Florida follow Texas.

Andrew Ferguson, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), supported the move as well, writing on X, “The ABA is a monopolist masquerading as a public servant.”

The ABA said that the order did not change its role in the accreditation process.

“For over 100 years, the [ABA] has assisted the state supreme courts and bar admitting authorities in their work. ... The Texas order does not alter that role, as it reinforces the authority that the Supreme Court of Texas has always had over the licensure of JD graduates,” wrote Jenn Rosato Perea, managing director of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admission to the Bar, in a statement to The Epoch Times.

“We will also continue to prove our value as an accreditor,” the ABA added.