When the University of Adelaide established Australia's second law school in 1883, South Australia became one of the few places in the common-law world where all new lawyers studied at university. The new law school fought off an attack on legal education by a determined government, and it attracted three brilliant scholars as early professors.

Candid and engaging, Adelaide Law draws on the University's rich archives, highlighting the long-delayed entry of women and Indigenous students to the law course, the broader setting of legal education, the rise and fall of staff democracy, and the Law School's changing relationship with the profession it educated.