TO WIT: FINAL JUDGMENT
Though clever, I am yet mortal, and probably always will be. I therefore have only a little doubt that some day the chief Chief Justice will abruptly stand up, interrupting me in mid-sentence, and declaim “Enough, Counselor, I have heard quite enough from you.” He will then slam down the Book he had been reading and storm out of the Chamber, leaving me to be disposed of by the entirely white-clad tipstaffs. I am also reasonably certain that whatever quasi-formidable facts I have mustered, whatever meritorious argument I have presented for my case, it will just as likely go for naught, leaving me in the end with just the slimmest solace that, though the final disposition, whatever it may be, will probably have nothing whatsoever to do with the merits of the case, it was just like in real life.
Until recently, I paid little heed to the notion that someday there would need be a summing up, a closing to end all closings. Of late, however, I find that it occupies a fair portion of my time. These days my heart pounds a wee bit more erratically than usual when I open to a jury. My legs shake a tad more while waiting for a verdict, and they hurt a tad more at the end of the day. After all these years as a lawyer, my left hand finally knows what my right hand is doing. It’s reaching over to feel for the pulse. I am older now than I have been in a long time, and while I haven’t as yet seen the argument list, I am all too keenly aware that the date for argument has been set.
What I ought to be doing therefore is organizing, planning carefully the presentation of the case, marshalling the strong points and defusing the week ones, just as if I was preparing for trial, and I would start doing just that if the case were starting tomorrow. But no, the real problem is now trial strategy or preparation. The real problem is what do I say. What irrefutable facts do I know about me and my career that would impress the High Court? And if I’m having trouble, what chance do you have?
In an effort to discover whether the problem I am having is unique to me, I have discussed the matter with several of my colleagues. “If”, I said to each of them in turn, “you had to argue that your career entitled you to final admission to the Highest Court, what would you say?”
“Are you still writing those stupid articles?”, said the first. “Haven’t you got anything better to do?” What else can you expect from a collection lawyer. I don’t expect to spend eternity with him anyway.
“In my entire career, no one every complained about me to the Disciplinary Committee”, said the second obviously pleased that he had come through his first two years at the Bar unscathed. Additionally he offered that his escrow account still balanced.
“Oh God, not now”, said the third, “I’m too busy.”, and it wasn’t clear to me whether he was answering my question or answering his own.
Only slightly daunted, I went back to my office. It was late in the day, and inasmuch as I had no more clients to see, I began to think. Was I good? Was I good? Did I do the best I could? I cannot answer that, for I am too much the lawyer and there’s the rub. For every good argument I have ever had, there has been a lawyer on the other side, almost as clever, almost as nimble, with almost as good an argument in opposition. I am too well trained and experienced in the art of advocacy to put much weight in any argument, even my own.
Was I good, was I good,
Did I do the best I could,
Did I do the very best that I was able?
Would the verdicts have been higher
With more skillful questions fired,
Or if settled, did I leave much on the table?
Was I fair, was I fair,
Was I here or was I there,
Is there any substance to my reputation?
When my last turn comes to rise,
What will flash before my eyes,
What is passed upon determining salvation?
John Mortimer is a very able and skillful English lawyer-playwright, and he has just written his autobiography, “Clinging to the Wreckage.” In describing the life of the advocate, he says this:
There is no art more transient than that of the advocate, and no life more curious. During his working days, the advocate must drain away his own personality and become the attractive receptacle for the spirits of the various murderers, discontented wives, or greedy litigants for whom he appears…The advocate must acquire the art of being passionate with detachment and persuasive without belief. He must be convincing when he is unconvinced. The advocate has this much in common with the religious mystic, he can only operate successfully when he is able to suspend his disbelief. Indeed belief, for the advocate, is something which is best kept in a permanent state of suspension. There is no lawyer so ineffectual as one which is passionately convinced of his client'’ innocence.
And a two-edged art it is. While I was not prepared to suspend my belief when I entered the practice of law, I soon had it wrenched from its moorings by the vagaries of clients and causes, and now I do not know how to reattach it, even to my own defense.
So just what is it that I am supposed to do? When the time comes, I will rise, legs shaking as usual, I will muster whatever solemnity I can find for the occasion, and I will recite the best reason I have heard for a lawyer’s redemption. “Oh God, not now. I’m too busy.” It won’t be the first time I’ve stolen some else’s argument, but it will probably be the last.
© 1982 – S. Sponte, Esq.