The best law schools in the America are dominated by U.S. institutions such as Yale University, Harvard University, Stanford University and Columbia University. Graduates from these law schools include eight Supreme Court justices serving as of March 2010 as well as Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. There are also a number of Canadian law schools--including the University of Toronto, McGill University and the University of Montreal--that are consistently ranked among the best in the Americas and the world.
In Europe, law is split between the Roman-based civil law of mainland Europe and the judge-created common law of Great Britain. The best civil law institutions are exclusively found among continental Europe's best universities, including law schools from the University of Heidelberg (Germany), University Pantheon-Sorbonne (France), Leiden University (Netherlands) and the University of Bologna (Italy). Not surprisingly, the best common law institutions are all based in England, including the law schools at Cambridge University, Oxford University and the London School of Economics.
The British influence on law is not limited to Europe. The best law schools in Asia have been and continue to be common law institutions, including law schools at the National University of Singapore, University of Sidney (Australia), National Law University (India) and the University of Hong Kong. However, rankings show the rise of several civil law institutions among Asia's best, including law schools at Peking University (China), Tsinghua University (China), the University of Tokyo and Waseda University (Japan).