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. wo, . ad . ' " “ <@trviateiy not all American lawyers have turned into-Wwentess -after dangerous thoughts, There seems to have been a sizable and even surprising minority at the Bar Assn. meeting that fought the resolutions. i ‘But what has come over the rest of our American lawyers? . Mere ts a profession which has played a great and creative role , in American history. Almost half the signers of the Declaration © ” of Independence, and more than half the members of the Con- stitutional convention, were lawyers. Jefferson was a self-trained lawyer, Andrew Jackson served a brief apprenticeship to the law, Abe Lincoln read law and rode elrenit, Woodrow Wileon was a _ lawyer before he became a professor, and Franklin Roosevelt was - one before he became @ politician, ‘ +” Even in colonial times—as Daniel Boorstin tells us in his new . | .book, “The Americans: The Colonial Experience’ (Random House) fy —lawyers were effective in the making of the new American os society because most laymen knew law and most lawyers had not . Pee 4 grown so specialized as to cease to be men. Politics and law were _ fused: lawyers had a sense of statecraft, and politicians had | a feel- ~ | ing for logic and intelectual order. . ‘ * * * : What has caused the decline of the American lawyer, as wit- ! i ness the spectacie of a-convention-ful of leaders af. their profes- | i sion who have been playing.G-man in Chicago? ( Partly, I think, the lawyers have identified themselyes with the corporate managers fron. whom thelr lushest business and oo their biggest fees come. Partly also, and more recently, many lawyers have identified themselves with the prosecution phase of the law and have come te see themselves as stern inquisitors who are not to*be swerved from the pursuit of politically-hated men. It Is interesting that Mr. Brown, who headed the committee in Chicago, had served as counsel for one of the inquisitorial groups in Washington. ‘ Thus while some lawyers have acquired a Wall Street mind, {I others have acquired a G-man mind, and some have combined the - two, Is it heresy for me to suggest that neither of thése mental frames will help the legal profession to fulfill its best role in our society? * * ¥ Obviously Tam speaking only about some lawyers, not all. I have no way of telling how representative the group in Chicago was of the profession as a whole, or what the vote would have been if each member had a chance to vote by secret ballot, rather ; than to “stand up and be counted” in open convention as one rf truculent delegate urged, For him, evidently, the vote was not a * canvass of convfttion but a testing of patriotism. aaa | One thing that has happened to the profession is that a liberal 4 elite~perhaps even a clvi] liberties elite—has been separated from 7 | the profession as a whole, leaving a big gap between the best : lawyers and judges and the general run of thent. ; Someone at the convention argued for the resolutions, on the , ground that lawyers must continue to criticize the Supreme Court’s decisions, By all means. . But such criticism must be hammered out by men who study - the law, as wel] as practice it. The law does not grow greater or richer by the taking of a voice vote at a gathering which resembles an American Legion convention more than it does a scholar’s study Of-e-fudge's cilambers,