The Harvard Corporation will probably approve a Law School tuition increase of $450 for the 1978-79 academic year, raising the tuition to $4000, Thomas O'Brien, financial vice president of the Corporation, said last night.

Albert M. Sacks, dean of the Law School, notified the Law School faculty and law students of the proposed tuition increase in a memorandum earlier this week.

Inflation Plus

The increase results from continuing inflationary pressures, "plus some additional important expenditures, some of which affect costs and others income," Sacks wrote, adding that the proposal contemplates a "moderate adjustment in financial aid."

Sacks was unavailable for comment yesterday.

Although the anticipated increase in "regular on-going Law School expenses" for next year is approximately the same as this year's--about 8.5 per cent--the proposed increase is about 50 per cent greater than last year's.

George Putnam, University treasurer, said last night, "Percentage-wise this year's increase is a little higher than in the past, in part because Harvard's tuition has always been relatively low among law schools."

"Students feel mostly impotent about the hike," one student said yesterday. "We don't feel it's by any means routine--it's hard to justify a 12-per-cent increase with only an 8.5-per-cent rise in costs," he added.

Jess Hungate, a member of the Law School Board of Student Advisors, said yesterday, "Students are upset about it, but they are not up in arms. The main thing is that there has not been a big stink."

Hungate said this year the Law School will direct some of the money from its alumni fund into "library improvements that in the past has gone toward minimizing tuition increases."

Although Sacks has not yet submitted the proposal to the Corporation for formal approval, "the Corporation will in all likelihood pass it," O'Brien said last night.