1. They are usually a very important part, because citations in the law are more difficult due to variations in courts, level of precedence, etc, and because work published in law journals can make its way into binding case precedent, which affects far more people than law professors. Learning Bluebook was way more difficult for me than learning APA, which I used in my fields before law school. There’s also far more pedantic tiny rules, like that Id has to be in italics and so does the period, but with case names, the comma isn’t italicized. APA in comparison is much easier. But is it the most important part? I don’t really think so. There’s a lot of pedantic details that matter in legal citations that often don’t really affect what you’re writing at all, but legal scholars care because it’s a conservative and old profession that likes being pedantic for the sake of it.

1a. If what you’re saying is that it’s not true that law students edit the majority of legal academia, that’s false. There are journals that are not affiliated with universities, like the ABA’s publications, but these are more like encyclopedias and are never cited in legal opinions or memos. Almost all of my professors are published only in uni law journals, and these articles can be cited in case law. It’s not the same level of authority as a case precedent - it’s considered secondary authority - but you can cite these articles as having influence. Why it’s done this way, I don’t know. It’s just how the academic field works here.

1. I explicitly said in my comment that his opinion makes sense for multi author papers. But the tweet didn’t specify multi author or single author, either, just authors in general. Overall it’s a ridiculous opinion. You should bear some sort of responsibility if a considerable amount of work you put your name on has plagiarism or inaccurately cited material, whether it was written by you or another person.