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36 Litig. 64 (2009-2010)
My Son the Lawyer

handle is hein.journals/laba36 and id is 136 raw text is: Literary Trials My Son the Lawyer by Peter Baird Editor's Note: Our friend Peter Baird, a senior editor of this journal, wrote about everything in his life. His read- ers knew him well. From his doctor father, he learned the medical credo, which he applied to lawyers, who also have the opportunity to misuse power. Here is Peter, transcending death, with a final caution to us all. Dear Tom: On Saturday, October 19, 1996, you will be sworn in as a member of the State Bar of Arizona. You may wish to remember that date in years to come. It will be the anniversary of your entrance into a great profession. You have been blessed with intelli- gence, diligence, education, and oppor- tunity. And, you will have, I am sure, an interesting and rewarding career in the law. Nobody may have told you this and, if they have, it probably did not sink in because it is something most of us have forgotten or have never even stopped to think about: Lawyers have power. Consequently, you, as of Saturday, will have power. Please understand that your power will be very real. It will be officially vested in you by the state and federal governments and it will be unofficially accorded to you by society in general. Indeed, the reason why lawyers are so often scorned and made the butt of hostile jokes is not that some of us are bad or unethical because there are bad and unethical people in all profes- sions. Rather, it is because we have sig- nificantly more power than most other citizens and we sometimes abuse that uncommon power. Just think after you are sworn in on Saturday, you could draft a com- plaint; fill it with destructive blather; name anybody or any institution as a defendant; file it next Monday with the court without anybody's consent; trig- ger toxic publicity; and destroy a repu- tation, marriage, business, savings, or future that took a lifetime or many life- times to build. You, single-handedly, could do all that before the judicial My Son the Lawyer was originally published as A Lawyer's Letter to his Son in LITIGATION (Summer, 1997). Literary Trials is edited by Robert Aitken, an Associate Editor of LITIGATION, who is a lawyer in Palos Verdes Estates, California. Winter 2010 6 4 Volume 36 LIIATO 'ube system could finally get around to deal- ing with what you had filed and before the media eventually would report the outcome in a back-page squib hidden away among ads for trusses and dating services. Next Monday, you could also have a subpoena issued from the court to any- body within range. You could force the person you subpoenaed to appear at your convenience in your office or at court where you could cross-examine the daylights out of him or her with- out their permission. It happens all the time. Although your power could be extreme if you became a criminal prosecutor who indicts or a judge who extinguishes life itself, the power I'm talking about can be far more subtle than that and it is not restricted to law- yers or judges who handle litigation. For example, transactional lawyers can cut corners in their due diligence, with- hold vital information, undermine pub- lic markets, and fleece investors out of their hard-earned savings. Moreover, all lawyers, whether litigators or non- litigators, hold the power that comes from knowing clients' secrets, which, if divulged, could create incalculable problems. Given all this new power that you are about to have, I commend to you a negative exhortation that new physi- cians have been hearing for centuries and that new lawyers should hear as well. In Latin, the negative exhortation is, Primum non nocere. Translated into English, it is, First, do no harm! For lawyers this commandment does not mean that we should be timid or wishy-washy or shrink from ethi- cally and zealously representing our clients just because there may be pain or loss or controversy ahead. Rather, it means that we should never abuse our power or use it mindlessly or for purely destructive purposes no matter what the personal, financial, or professional incentives might be. If you make this commandment your credo and if, before you take any pre- cipitous legal step, you ask yourself whether you are doing harm, then you will care well for your clients. At the same time, you will elevate your pro- fession and ennoble yourself. Congratulations, I am very proud of you. Love, Dad L LITIGATION Number2

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