Duke University (Durham, N.C.) has used the late Tobaccoman James Buchanan ("Buck") Duke's millions to build one of the architectural, if not intellectual, wonders of U.S. higher education. It is hardly a place from which would be expected to come the theory that Gothic palaces do not a university make. Yet last week in Duke Forest, about five minutes' walk from the Gothic campus, 32 Duke Law School students celebrated their return to a simple life. Like Abraham Lincoln, they began to study law in log cabins.
The theorist responsible for this Duke retreat is the Law School dean, tanned, pipe-smoking Hugo...