President's Corner

by Patricia C. Hannigan, Esquire

I am happy to report that, following publication of last month’s IN RE:, in which I solicited volunteers to assist in the domestic violence prevention effort, several members of the Bar answered the call. I greatly appreciate the response, and I re-issue the invitation. With any luck, we are on our way to improving communication and coordination between those on the front lines in the battle against domestic violence on one hand, and concerned, talented members of the Bar on the other.

On the same topic, please note that elsewhere in this issue is an article by Ronald T. Keen, Executive Director of the Domestic Violence Coordinating Council, about Visitation Centers. At a Visitation Center, a child of a violent relationship can safely be transferred from one parent to the other for visits, without the parents having to confront each other. It’s a sad commentary to admit that our culture needs such facilities, but isn’t it good to know they are there? In future issues of IN RE:, I hope to continue the process of educating the members of the Bar (definitely including myself) about what resources are available in the effort to combat domestic violence and to promote the protection of ourselves, our children, our employees, our clients and the public at large.

Turning to another recurring theme these days, I just read an article in the January/February 2003 issue of Bar Leader, authored by Robert J. Derocher, about efforts of bar associations across the country to improve the image of lawyers. According to Mr. Derocher’s article, a CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll published last July showed that “only 25 percent of those polled believed that most lawyers can be trusted, and that 70 percent believed that ‘you can’t be too careful’ in dealing with lawyers.” These reports drive me crazy. With exceptions almost too rare to bear mention, the lawyers I know, by and large, are the most honest people I can imagine. And as a profession, we regulate ourselves to a degree that sometimes seems to border on the neurotic. So what’s the deal, and how do we fix it?

I think part of the problem, frankly, is simply inherent in the nature of our system. A good lawyer, at least in most areas of the practice, is a good advocate. We are taught to analyze issues dispassionately and to be able to present either side of any argument. It’s only by having strong advocates on both sides of an issue that our whole system of justice stays in balance. However, to many people, the ability to argue either side of an issue is fundamentally intellectually dishonest. (In my opinion, that’s why judges – who are also lawyers after all, but who have given up the luxury of advocacy in order to take on the job of being right – are widely respected while lawyers are not.)

The DSBA Executive Committee last November wrote to the editors of the News Journal in an effort to promote public education on this very topic. We wrote, in part:

The citizens of this country enjoy a broader range of freedoms and liberties than any other people in the world. Our justice system, although far from perfect, provides us with the quickest, fairest resolution of disputes of any system on earth. These successes, all too easy to take for granted, do not happen in a vacuum. They are the direct result of the every-day efforts of attorneys who, through the very act of representing their clients, also serve the ends of justice.

It is as a result of equal forces brought by attorneys on opposite sides of legal issues that the law is tested and improved. To impugn an attorney for being on one side or the other shows a basic misunderstanding of, and lack of appreciation for, the very process by which our whole legal system works.

Do such public education efforts make any difference? Who knows. We do know that such efforts abound. According to Mr. Derocher, for example, the Florida Bar is spending three quarters of a million dollars on “a full-fledged news bureau, a statewide email campaign and extensive polling to gauge the program’s effectiveness.” The Wyoming State Bar Association is distributing posters reading “Lawyers Help People.” The Virginia State Bar has inaugurated a campaign the slogan of which is “You Have Rights – Lawyers Protect Them.”

The DSBA Executive Committee in January referred to the Committee on Community Service and Public Information a request from a member of our Bar that we consider how to address this issue on a “permanent, on-going basis.” Such efforts will take time and cost money. Several other bars have assessed members fees to defray the cost, in the belief that the effort is a critical one, even if we cannot readily assess the results. Are we prepared to make that sort of commitment in Delaware?

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Return to March 2003 Table of Contents.