The Sad Truth

The Sad Truth About the Legal Profession

page 346 of Legal Ethics in the Practice of Law (2d ed., R. Zitrin & C. Langford) contains a quote by noted Legal Ethics professor Stephen Gillers:  "Lawyers are not truth-seeking, unless the truth happens to help clients."  So true.  And such a given in the legal profession.  Still, it is something that average (read: non-lawyer) folk cannot understand.  Maybe that reflects favorably on them.  They wonder: how is it that the participants in the "search for truth" don't care about truth?

Let's go over this once more (and remember you didn't learn this here first):  litigation is about the "clash of opposites."  The assumption is that out of this clash -- this non-Hegelian dialectic -- the truth will emerge.  Or at least more of it than would emerge without The Clash. 

But, there is a delicate balance.  And, in my view, the best lawyers know when not to clash, but instead to seek harmony.  They aren't weaklings; they know that the rubber band can only be stretched so far.  They have credibility.  And their clients are the beneficiaries of that credibility. 

On the other hand, some lawyers work late in the laboratory, testing the tensile strength of the elastic material that they work with.  They are surrounded by many broken rubber bands.  They attract energetic clients who sponsor further experiments in the field of truth-stretching.  It is perfectly ethical to represent such clients, and to conduct such experiments.  However, sometimes the snapping of the rubber band has consequences, and the bar association has to conduct investigations.  And, sometimes, the stretching of the rubber bands merely diminishes the lawyer's credibility.  

It's all a matter of choice.  And it isn't hard to figure out what sort of choices a lawyer has made.  Judges do it all the time.  Often it has a direct effect on the decision rendered in the case, though you'd never learn that from reading the words of the final judgment.  Trust me.  That's the truth.

Last update: 7/8/2002; 6:53:48 PM.