see, Joe, we can also agree. Good post. 
Here in Massachusetts, the BOSTON GLOBE just reported that over 90% of disbarred lawyers were back in practice within 10 years of their disbarment. The article examined the cause of most disbarments-they causes were things like misrepresenting clients, stealing from clients, and other serious crimes.
Doesn’t seem to me that the Mass Bar assn. does much to curb its errant members!
Ten years of not practicing law seems to be a pretty serious method of curbing abuses of the system. I can’t imagine any of the disbarred lawyers who reentered the legal practice ever getting comparable fees to what they otherwise would have. I mean, who’s going to hire a lawyer who got disbarred a few years previous.
Those who cannot afford anyone else, and those who cannot afford anyone at all. I found this site when debating in a death penalty thread.
Certainly not all, or even a significant percentage of lawyers are pond scum. (Not sure I’ve met too many I would accurately describe as “Defenders of Freedom”, either.) As I’ve posted elsewhere, I consider the majority of lawyers I know to simply be doing their jobs, hopefully ethically and competently. Nothing more or less than I would expect of my plumber, fireman, or garbageman.
A couple of observations, tho. I think it is an unfortunate societal trend to believe all transactions must be entered into with an eye to adversarial proceedings upon either party’s dissatisfaction with the other’s performance.
I think it is unfortunate that, in some situations, individuals pursue on litigation following “accidents,” or instead of taking personal responsibility for their actions.
I think it is unfortunate that certain actions, say an uncontested divorce, or a simple residential home purchase, are viewed as essentially requiring the assistance of counsel.
Finally, while the rule of law and the availability of competent counsel are good things, I think there might be such a thing as “too much of a good thing.” And the U.S. does have quite a large number of attorneys. My understanding is that other civilized countries consider themselves to be governed by laws, but manage to muddle through with significantly fewer lawyers. I think having a tremendous number of lawyers might tend to emphasize the “legal” aspects of situations and relationships, while at times sacrificing the “human/social” aspects.
Must wimp out, tho, and admit I have no prescription for improvement.
I’m not a fan of pro bono requirements (and Illinois does not have any such requirement). Nor am I a fan of self regulation. Will certainly discuss either of these to whatever extent anyone wishes, but don’t want to hijcak this any further.
Hey, any of you who are in Chicago and want a good laugh should stop by the 7th Circuit this morning at 10:30 and see me take a bullet for my client!
90% of everything is crud.
lawyers don’t really produce anything useful. they have to make money off people who do produce something useful. many of the people who produce something useful are smart enough to outthink the lawyers. the lawyers have to deliberately cause confusion to force us to need them.
Dal Timgar
Perhaps a mite, cynical dal.
But I agree that at least a significant portion of lawyering can be viewed as parasitic. In many instances the discrete added value certain lawyers’ services contribute to a given product or service may not be clear. Often the lawyers’ contribution must be viewed more as of value because it upholds the integrity of the system within which business and human interactions take place.
Another view might be to consider legal services unavoidable overhead. If taking this approach, you must examine what an entity can do to minimize this portion of his overhead.
To echo Dal, I see the leagal industry as essntially non-productive. In this sense, it is like advertising-it does not add value to a product or service. In the broader sense, the legal industry is harmful to innovation, because it removes incentives to improve or invent new products. Talke the development of new vaccines, for example. There is now only one US pharmaceutical firm that makes vaccines for humans (MERCK). All of the others have dropped the business, because of the immense liability risk (human vaccines cause bad reactions in about 2-3 PPM of the population. To my mind, that is a “reasonable” risk. To the lawyers though, it is unreasonable.Anyway, MERCK was on the verge of dropping their vaccine lines, only the US Govt. strongarmed them into keeping it. So I would say that the US legal Industry exerts a deleterious effect on innovation.
First, let me apologize to Joe and all defense attorneys. What I meant was that most of the public perceives lawyers as either dishonest personal injury lawyers who encourage frivolous suits or dishonest criminal defense attorneys who somehow use dirty tricks to allow guilty people to go free.
Actually, both personal injury attorneys and criminal defense attorneys serve laudable goals in our society, and I’m sure most of them are honest and ethical. The problem is that the public only hears about the dishonest ones, then assumes that all personal injury/criminal defense lawyers are crooked, and that all lawyers fall into one of these two categories, and therefore all lawyers are crooked.
Random, I think this is what you were talking about. But despite problems with the California system, generally there are plenty of disciplinary actions by State Bars (e.g., http://www.ncbar.com/disact.htm ).
Saint Zero, I think you will find that most, if not all, bar associations have programs committed to improving the relationship of the legal community with the public, in addition to the myriad volunteer programs that serve the public, thus giving us “good press” as a byproduct.
dal_timgar, according to your own assertion, 90% of your commentary is crud. This is borne out by your obvious ignorance, in that most people would agree that laws, enforceable contracts, wills, living wills, powers of attorney, etc. are useful things. If you think that the legal profession purposely obfuscates to perpetuate our own employment, you clearly have no grasp of the complex implications of even the simplest business transaction.
AerynSun, you suggested to dal timgar “If you think that the legal profession purposely obfuscates to perpetuate our own employment, you clearly have no grasp of the complex implications of even the simplest business transaction.”
Is it possible many people resent lawyers to some extent because they represent something not entirely respectable about human nature?
Why are the simplest business transactions necessarily so complex? Is it because folks enter into obligations with an eye towards how they will get out of the obligation if it becomes inconvenient? Do people gravitate towards an adversarial solution because they are unwilling to compromise? Do some people wish to externalize costs created by their actions? Do some people wish to avoid pesonal responsibility for their actions or shortcomings?
So, do we dislike lawyers because they represent an aspect of human nature we are not all that comfortable with?
(Got my panel for my argument this morning. Manion, Evans, and Williams. Not nearly as bad as it could have been. Course I should probably be preparing instead of hanging around this board!)
I think lawyers are necessary because there can be valid disagreements in simple human interactions. I believe laws are so complex because they attempt to cover every concievable point and possible angle. Humans, being the wiley, creative creatures we are, keep coming up with new angles.
To be honest, if me winning wasn’t justice, I’m not sure I’d want to win.
i will concede to being what most people regard as a cynic, tho i am inclined to regard it as objective. had an english teacher call me cynical more than 30 years ago in highschool.
i cannot recommend the book THE SCREWING OF THE AVERAGE MAN by David Hapgood highly enough. it has an entire chapter devoted to the legal profession. having worked for IBM and in other areas, most professions want their customers to have delusions of about how great and glorious the profession is. IBM never talked about benchmarks and von Neumann machines. the less the suckers know the better.
the cynical, Dal Timgar
Entertain this little scenario.
I have my argument this morning. My client has an position that can technically be advanced, but just because the arguments can be made, doesn’t mean they should win (if you know what I mean.) The other party has a VERY strong case, and a very sympathetic position.
My opponent’s lawyer presents an extremely weak argument, stressing two easily refutable misstatements, and downplaying the issue on which my position is technically arguable, but extremely unconvincing.
So I get to style my argument by responding to those 2 softballs. In fact, one of the judges asks me a question concerning the second of the 2, which allows me to prtesent my position more persuasively than I could have hoped for. Meanwhile, the court appears not terribly interested, possibly somewhat confused, and asks no questions about what I consider the glaring weakness in my case.
So, I did my job as an attorney. Won’t know the outcome for days/weeks/months. But what would your opinion be if my client wins, simply because I am a better oral advocate, even though many if not most fully informed observers would think a decision for the other party would be the “right” outcome?
I, for one, certainly understand why the lawyer gets a heaping helping of blame. The loser feels (whether justifiably or not) that some injustice has been perpetrated upon him, and that the one doing the perpetrating is a lawyer. “Just doing my job” isn’t an excuse in someone’s eyes if that job means “screwing me unfairly.” Heck, a hit man does his job, but it’s not going to endear him to the person on the receiving end. I’m not saying this perception is fair or deserved, mind you, just that it makes sense for someone to feel that way.
My opinion would be that you served your client’s interests, that the rule of law was kept, yet justice was not done. This is an example of one of the imperfections inherent in the system. The quality of one’s lawyer has more to do with the outcome than justice or fairness. I don’t know of any way to correct this within an adversarial system though.
To me, the most telling sentence in Dinsdale’s post was:
I fail to see any way to place the blame for this at the feet of either the adverssarial system or the lawyers. No system of justice can funstion properly when those empowered to judge fail in their duties.
Absolutely I’d rather suffer 10,000 guilty men free than 1 innocent man incarcerated. The power to deprive a person of freedom is enormous. The barriers before imposing such a sentence ought be equally enormous. To be fair, I’m all for some “innocent error” exceptions (putting the address on the wrong line in a warrent, &ct.). But I am completely in favor of attorneys using what many people refer to as “technicalities” to assist their clients. The “technicalities” are the rules the State must play by to impose its enormous power. If they can’t play by the rules, than the electorate should get mad enough to insist on a government that can.
…Sorry for my absence today in this thread (unavoidable).
To Aeryn, 2nd Law and all the rest taking me to task as a lawyer hater with no understanding of the legal system.
FTR: My father is a lawyer and a damned good one (and that’s not just my opinion as at some point in the 80’s he was named as one of the ten best attorney’s in Chicago by the Chicago Tribune [I think…whatever it was it was a real deal). He is easily one of the most upstanding, righteous, honest people I have ever known (and that’s harder for me to say than you might think…whatever other problems I have with the man are my own but as reagards the law and being a ‘citizen’ he is golden).
Also, my dad instilled a deep respect for law (as a concept) as well as a fair amount of understanding of how it works in the US. I do not claim to be an expert in legal theory by a long shot but neither am I totally uninformed.
If you actually read the OP you’d see that I lay credit where credit is due. Lawyers certainly are a fundamental basis of our society. That said it is disingenuous to hold that lawyers are given a purely bum rap. The collective bad taste in society’s mouth regarding attorneys did not evolve in a vacuum. I submit that part of this problem is that lawyers do not police themselves as well as they should. Certainly the Bar exists to smack those who step out of line but I don’t believe it really gets the job done except to stop the most blatant of offenses.
manhattan suggested that letting 10,000 people off on a technicality is preferable to further restricting what rights we do possess as citizens to be free of wrongful prosecution. While I understand exactly what he is speaking of I still have a problem with some of it. What he derided as ‘technicalities’ sometimes are just that (technicalities). If a search warrant is served and the house is described as tan but the lawyer gets his murdering client off because the house is really beige THAT is a technicality (BTW…that example is made up to illustrate the point–I think got that one from some movie). Justice is clearly not served and I do not believe manhattan’s fears are realized if that particular scumbag is put in jail anyway.
This might be changing the gist of the OP but here it is anyway.
It seems that there is a divide between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. As manhattan pointed out much of the loopiness in legal documents came about because some clever attorney wiggled through a loophole in the document that was bearing on his/her client.
As a serious question to the lawyers reading this thread: How often do you argue against another attorney trying to squirm through a minor hole in the law when it should be clear to all that the opposing client is trying to avoid what was obviously expected them (from society, the contract, whatever)? (Anyone have children do something wrong and then claim that no one actually said they couldn’t do that? Kinda along those lines.)
As someone mentioned earlier I too make no claim to having the answers. I doubt even the lawyers reading this would claim our justice system is without fault but they are right to challenge anyone to think of a better one. It’s hard…any system you are likely to dream up will have those that will take advantage of it. The current system, faulty as it may be, seems to strike the best balance between individual rights and society.
In the end, however, it seems to be a common perception that the last thing you get in the justice system is justice. Yes, yes…I’m sure there are thousands of cases where everything went as it should. Nevertheless, it goes wrong FAR too often. Look at Illinois recently, 12 innocent people put on death row. While 12 people may be a tiny fraction of all cases it speaks to hugely manhattan’s ‘10,000 guilty go free’ bit to avoid one wrongful prosecution. All too often we see that the best attorney wins (usually–but not always–equating to the most expensive attorney) instead of justice really being served.
Is that really a false perception?
If justice really works why should I have to hire an expensive attorney? If my cause is just shouldn’t any attorney do?
Shall we rephrase this question a bit …
“If the judicial system really works why should I have to hire an exceptional attorney? If my cause is just shouldn’t any attorney do?”
The judicial system is made of fallable humans. A legal decision is based on the application of the law to a set of facts. Reconstruction of historical events (i.e. the facts) is difficult to acheive, and the law is constantly in a state of flux. In an ideal world, any attorney would serve, but this isn’t a perfect world, and if your defense is going to be determined by a specific determination as to what the historical events were, or to a reinterpretation of the existing law, you may need an exceptional attorney to win your case.
You may notice that I replaced “expensive” with “exceptional.” While all exceptional lawyers are not expensive, most people who are exceptional in their field expect to be paid more than those who are average. As I once heard it put, “when you have cancer, you don’t go to the free clinic.” At least not if you can afford to go to a specialist (or if your insurance covers it).