ABA Real Property, Trust and Estate Law Journal

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Submissions

We accept submissions on a rolling basis throughout the year.

General

The ABA Real Property, Trust and Estate Law Journal publishes scholarly articles on subjects of practical interest and importance to lawyers practicing in the fields of real property, estate planning, probate, and trust law. Each issue reaches the hands or screens of 15,000+ subscribers, which include ABA Real Property, Trust and Estate Law Section members, major law firms, and law libraries. Therefore, the Journal is a natural home for authors who wish to influence the practice of law through their scholarly work.

Submissions to the Journal are reviewed by practicing lawyers and law professors with extensive knowledge and experience of the Journal’s publication topics. We strive to provide timely publication decisions. Additionally, the editorial process includes peer review, with assistance from a student editorial board located at the University of South Carolina School of Law.

The Journal publishes three issues a year, and each issue is available in print and digital formats.

Topics and Topic Treatment

We consider for publication articles that address topics of national interest related to real property, estate planning, probate, and trust law, as well as related fields, including environmental law, ERISA, insurance, and bankruptcy. Within those topics, we will consider the following types of articles for publication:

  1. analytical articles on discrete topics of current interest or recent developments in the law,
  2. survey or primer articles discussing the development of the law to date in a particular subject area that provide useful analysis of various factors and policy concerns that have shaped development of the law,
  3. articles discussing proposals for legal reform,
  4. special reports or other material of unusual value to real property, trust, and estate attorneys, and
  5. book reviews that analyze and comment on books of interest to the Journal’s subscribers.

Law Students

Rather than submitting your article for publication, consider submitting it to the ABA Real Property, Trust & Estate Section’s Law Student Writing Competition. The winning submission is considered for publication in the Journal, in addition to receiving a cash prize, a full-tuition scholarship to the University of Miami School of Law’s Heckerling Graduate Program in Estate Planning OR Robert Traurig-Greenberg Traurig Graduate Program in Real Property Development, and free round-trip airfare and hotel accommodations to attend the spring RPTE Section meeting. More information, including the contest rules and entry form, can be found at https://www.americanbar.org/groups/real_property_trust_estate/fellowships-and-awards/law-student-writing-competition/.