Legal Ethics
Indiana AG Hopes to Improve Lawyers’ Reputation
Posted Jan 16, 2009 8:28 AM CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss
Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller says he’d like to improve the reputation of lawyers.
At one time, lawyers were family counselors and trusted advisers, Zoeller says, and he’d like to revive the tradition, according to the Indianapolis Star. He said pro bono work has been an effective image booster.
"That giving back to the community raised the level of the position of a lawyer," he said.
The article says that most mornings, Zoeller recites the Thomas More lawyer's prayer. "Stand beside me in court, so that today I shall not, in order to win a point, lose my soul,” the prayer goes.
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Comments
B. McLeod
Jan 16, 2009 9:44 AM CST
Presumably he means real pro bono work, not the kind where the “pro bono” lawyers make the $2.2 Million fee claim if their client wins on the merits.
In my opinion, overzealousness in argument (the subject of Sir Thomas More’s prayer) is not the main reputational problem lawyers face today. Rather, the profession is being pulled down by the lawyers and firms who press increasingly strained readings of the ethical rules, in order to handle matters or claim fees where they should not. The result is a growing public perception that lawyers are no better than street corner prostitutes scrabbling for a fee.
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