The USC Gould School of Law located in Los Angeles, California, is the law school of the University of Southern California. The oldest law school in the Southwestern United States, USC Law traces its beginnings to 1896 and became affiliated with USC in 1900. It was named in honor of Judge James Gould in the mid-1960s.

The University of Southern California is a private research university in Los Angeles, California. Founded in 1880 by Robert Maclay Widney, it is the oldest private research university in California. The university is composed of one liberal arts school, the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, and 22 undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools, enrolling roughly 21,000 undergraduate and 28,500 post-graduate students from all fifty U.S. states and more than 115 countries. It is a member of the Association of American Universities, which it joined in 1969.