The University of Colorado Law Review was founded in 1928 as the Rocky Mountain Law Review, the first quarterly law journal in the Rocky Mountain Region. Since then, it has remained an important contributor to the legal literature of the American West and the entire United States. The Law Review’s original editors began the journal with “the hope that it may be a pleasure to its readers, bring them into more constant and intimate contact with the trend of legal thought in this section of the country, and perhaps from time to time contribute to a solution of the problems confronting the bar.”

In 1962, the journal changed its name to the University of Colorado Law Review to clarify its affiliation with the University of Colorado Law School, because its nationwide audience was confused about its location. Readers were particularly confused “east of the Mississippi,” noted one contemporary editor, “where the Rocky Mountains are generally considered to be in Nevada.”