Brian Leiter reports on fields of expertise "ranked from highest to lowest citations based on the sum of the cites for the scholar ranked first, fifth and tenth in each area (those totals follow in parentheses)" in the period 2016-2020.
Constitutional law is ranked #1 (4,880 citations). Tax is 24th (880) and evidence is last (26th; 630 citations). I get that most legal academics think constitutional law is sexy. But is it really 5 times as important as taxation? Is it really 8 times as important as evidence?
I think it speaks to the skewed values of the legal academy. The bread and butter of legal practice, which affects more people's lives, get short shrift.
