The University of Manitoba first became involved in legal education in 1885 when it established a three-year course of studies leading to the LL.B. degree. This course did not include instruction, it simply prescribed a reading program with three annual examinations, which articled law students couId follow concurrently with the course prescribed by the Law Society. In the years 1911-1912, the Law Society was prompted by the Law Students Association to provide a short series of lectures. In 1913, H.A. Robson, then Manitoba's Public Utilities Commissioner and a former judge of the Court of King's Bench, organized a considerably improved course of lectures and began to lay the plans for the establishment in the following year of a permanent law school modeled after the Osgoode Hall Law School of the Law Society of Upper Canada.

The Manitoba Law School was jointly sponsored by The University of Manitoba and the Law Society of Manitoba. Both bodies took part in the planning from the beginning. In the summer of 1914, they entered into an agreement, subsequently endorsed by legislation, which provided for the creation of the School, offering a three-year course consisting of lectures and apprenticeship leading to both an LL.B. degree and a call to the Bar and admission to practice. Expenses of the School were shared equally by the two parent bodies, and its operations were supervised by a jointly appointed Board of Trustees. This arrangement between The University of Manitoba and the Law Society of Manitoba continued until 1966 when the Law School became the Faculty of Law of the University of Manitoba.

The Faculty of Law presently offers programs of study leading to two degrees, the LL.B. and the LL.M. The latter degree program was brought into existence in 1949 by the Manitoba Law School. It was substantially revamped by the Faculty of Law in 1968.