Verified answer

Actually, very little. 98% of being a lawyer is writing. And type of arguments you make in law are not the types you think they are. You will take one class in which you are trained in some trail practice, but other than that, no. Law school trains you to think like a lawyer. So its all about research and issue spotting and procedure.

Speech and Debate club will have no bearing on your law career one way or another, they have no relation to one another. Nothing you learn in there is really relevant to being a lawyer. It would be more important for you to take as many writing classes as you can.

Hey YO!,

It won't hinder you in any way, whatsoever. The practice of law is mainly research, a lot of writing, and very little open debate. While developing the skills early to form a coherent argument that is broken down into individual elements (a skill that debate will instill in you) is great, it's not that important to miss out on it at the high school level, especially if you're so busy with other things that you don't have time for it.

On a side note, law school will not train you to become a lawyer. It will get you used to reading legal opinions and thinking in a way that's helpful to lawyering, but you learn to be a lawyer on the job. That's why you get the menial tasks the first few years - they make you do the grunt work to get their money's worth out of you while they train you to do the big boy/girl things.

Good luck!

You'll only need to be able to speak and argue well if you want to be a trial lawyer (and I'm not sure there's much call for that in international law). Most law practice (even as a trial lawyer) involves a lot of reading, research, and lots and lots of writing.