I really don’t think you have to worry about that.
Okay, so you just think all the people who would need pro bono assistance are dangerous losers, and helping them would be a waste of time. But you don’t think doing pro bono work is for losers. I’m on the trolley.
People getting pissed at him for doing a bad job? I daresay he might have to worry about that a lot. Maybe he can snow them by claiming that stuff that goes wrong is always someone else’s fault, though.
No, people deciding that they want RR to be their lawyer for everything.
I think Inner Stickler is referring to the probability of one of Rand’s clients retaining his services again.
ETA: Beaten to the punch.
I’m really good at the whole ninja posting thing.
Fair enough, though I can imagine some Militia types who retain Randy for their endless “The 16th Amendment was never ratified!” challenges because his rhetoric about liberals and such suggests he’s one of them.
I’d much rather simply give to a charity the equivalent in money than do pro bono work, unless there was some specific project that caught my attention.
The reasons:
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I practice in an area of law that isn’t really useful to the sort of clients who typically require pro bono work (I do medical regulatory stuff - licensing of medical devices and the like). If I did pro bono work, it would probably have to be in an area I’m not that familiar with. This would short-change the pro bono client. The pro bono requirements are more typically geared to the non-specialized type of lawyer, who practices in a field such as criminal or family.
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Once you accept a client, you have duties towards them. Those duties are not capped by the amount of time you are willing to spend on their file. If for example your client is involved in some sort of litigation, you can’t simply say “well, my 20-50 hours a year are up, see ya next year”. You have an obligation to not drop their ball, which may take more time than originally budgeted.
I somehow doubt militia types will be able to afford our little tax lawyer’s hefty hefty fees.
I understand some of them are pulling in hefty meth money.
Well, you could just refuse cases which might involve litigation. Fair point, though.
Mr. Excellent, your grasp of the definition of “requirement” is markedly unexcellent. And you aren’t doing so well with “obligation” and “should” and “aspirational” either.
Maybe this will clarify things for you: what happens if a lawyer admitted in Maryland works only 10 pro bono hours? What about 0?
Everybody in BabyJesusLand weeps.
ME is not the evaluation mark you’re supposed to want.
I do antitrust litigation. Generally not a big call for pro bono antitrust attorneys. But I am an attorney first, a litigator second, and an antitrust litigator third. There’s plenty of work out there that doesn’t need specific knowledge in the area; often all pro bono matters need is a letter with Esq. on the bottom to make the other person sit up and take notice.
That’s true, though again there are thousands of projects in every community that are very time discrete - the work I do with Holocaust survivors is a commitment of around 6 hours per client. And if a case goes further - well it is our ethical responsibility as lawyers to see it through, or, alternatively, to work with another attorney to have them take over the case.
As a liberal lawyer who actually does a couple hundred hours of pro bono work a year (sometimes by choice!) I’ve gotta point out that even a stopped watch is right twice a day and Rand Rover is right on this one. It is in the canons of ethics that we are supposed to do pro bono work and do it with the same vigor as our other work to help provide the poor access to justice. Well whoop de fucking do. The government has come up with the canons that indirectly accuse us of being unethical if we do not donate our time. How is this not a badge of servitude? Is this mandated for every other profession, or just another dump on lawyers? And why do big firms like Rand’s think 20 hours a year is enough to help people out? Access to justice is a lot more difficult in a system that requires hundreds of hours (if not thousands) for trial preparation and presentation and you are poor. It just is not there.
HP is suing it’s former CEO John Hurd for joining Google and might use his inherent knowledge of HP’s trade secrets. It is going to fail according to most analysts, making it a frivolous suit. Attorneys and courts will spend tens of thousands of compensated hours on it. Meanwhile people who can’t afford to buy even an hour or two of a lawyer’s time are losing their homes because institutions are not automatically applying extension laws correctly to them. The government’s answer? Let’s declare pro bono an “ethical obligation” but do nothing to enforce it. Shit, why not just pass a law prohibiting rain on Saturdays and Sundays except during declared drought emergencies?
Christ MOL, you are quite the nuanced thinker (that’s sarcasm). I don’t think ALL pro bono clients are dangerous losers. I just think that the risk of exposing myself to a dangerous loser outweighs the reward of getting a smiley next to my name.
But that doesn’t even explain all of my aversion to pro bono work. The biggest factor is that I don’t like how other people believe they have a claim on my labor simply because I’m a lawyer.
Well, our firm is comprised of Enrolled Agents, not lawyers. . . and I don’t feel like we’re misanthropic, but. . .
We do oodles of pro bono work. Lots of people have horrific tax problems and are getting 90% of their pay check levied or bank accounts cleaned out because of it. We’re not talking tax protesters, but rather a guy who is a contractor of some sort, but his wife gets horrible cancer and his choice is to pay his quarterlies or to pay for chemo. Then the problem snow balls, all while his business goes to the shitter because of the economy-- and you’ve got a family who owes 100k in taxes and is making 20k a year. If it gets bad enough, the IRS will sometimes take that guy to tax court and that, I imagine, is where our OP here comes in. Well, maybe not- tax lawyers can do all kinds of things (including everything we do) and it sounds like he maybe does more corporate stuff, I’m just saying that’s where they come in with our practice. Anyway, the situation I gave is vastly more common than you’d think- I know, it’s how we stay in business.
Now, I know a lot of people who think the guy in the above scenario is a criminal and shouldn’t be helped. Trust me, I hear it all the time. Plus, guys with problems like that are much more common than non profits in need of help. So, odds are, if Rand had to do pro bono* tax law* work, it’d be more in line with what I do and most folks do not like handling tax representation problems before the tax agencies- it’s a pain in the ass, to say the least. Plus, maybe he may just have a different view about it than I do-- I look at that contractor and think, “Wow, that poor guy” whereas someone else might look and think he’s trying to evade the law.
Wow, that was babbly. Sorry. Long story short: even if it’s tax law, he might not be helping out Bessie’s Home for Wayward Teens or something universally accepted as noble and true.
FWIW: I think it’s bullshit that they are forcing pro bono stuff just so they can get a gold star. That sort of goes against the spirit of volunteer work, but maybe that’s just me.
Either you knew it was an ethical responsibility when you signed up, or you are stupid.
If you knew, and had no intention of even attempting to fulfill it, that speaks loudly about your character (and fitness, I’d add).
Stop being a lawyer, then.