Notably, past issues of the Cornell Law Review have included articles by Supreme Court justices Robert H. Jackson, John Marshall Harlan II, William O. Douglas, Felix Frankfurter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Amy Coney Barrett.

In the first issue of Cornell Law Quarterly in November 1915, Cornell professor (and soon-to-be dean) Edwin Hamlin Woodruff defended the launch of this new journal from critics who decried the proliferation of legal periodicals at the time (one contemporary critic counted 20 journals total, including non-scholarly periodicals).

Woodruff argued that the Cornell Law Quarterly would "justify its existence if it can reach and be helpful to...lawyers who might otherwise give their attention exclusively to the routine of practice" and noted the "pedagogical value...within the college itself" for the students who worked on the journal.

Woodruff wrote that the journal "would not fail of its purpose, if it substantially enhances the spirit of mutual service between the College of Law and Cornell Lawyers; if it aides in some degree to foster any needed reform in the law, or to give help by intelligent discussion and investigation toward the solution of legal problems; and if it satisfies within the college itself among the students and faculty a desire to advance...the cause of legal education in a larger sense."

Today, the Review is edited exclusively by upper class students in Cornell Law School's Juris Doctor (J.D.)