Freepmail or ping me on the thread to be added to the John Armor for Congress ping list.
Posted on 03/17/2008 7:38:14 PM PDT by Congressman Billybob
The title is from a song by Warren Zevon, I’d always heard the line as a telegram from a banana republic in crisis, and that the whole line was, “Send lawyers, guns and money; all Hell has broken loose.” Still, this is a column about lawyers that is favorable, and kind.
This morning, a lawyer I’ve known all my life invited me to go to the beginning of the session of the Superior Court in Sylva, the seat of Jackson County. (For those unfamiliar with that town in the Blue Ridge Mountains, many of the late scenes in “My Fellow Americans” with Jack Lemon and James Garner, were filmed there, including the legendary “All-Dorothy Marching Band” and the bathroom toe-tapper, “Macarena” scene.)
Richard wanted to introduce me around to some of his friends and colleagues who’d be gathered at that Court House for the start of the session. While we were there, I visited with about a dozen lawyers, and an equal number of court personnel. And I experienced something I’d almost forgotten, something I very much miss by being a semi-retired lawyer.
Sylva is a small town. Most of the lawyers who handle cases in that court know each other well. They’ve been up against each other before, and know they will be up against each other many times in the future if they stay in practice in this small community, As a result, the lawyers in that courtroom this morning were unfailingly polite and soft-spoken with each other and with the judge.
Do I suggest in any way that they fight less for the side they represent in a case than in the “big city” courtrooms? Not in the least. I watched a lawyer this morning give a one-hour argument which he will almost certainly lose, trying to get summary judgment for the defendant “women’s shelter” where an angry husband got in, dragged his wife out, and shot her dead on the front lawn in front of shelter personnel, and where her son found her body minutes later.
I know exactly why the lawyer was fighting for summary judgment for the defense, If that case goes to the jury, they will vote to drive up a money truck and throw money out the back with a pitch folk, to pay the damages on the horrendous facts of that case.
But this is not about who will, or should, win any of the issues presented in court this morning, Instead, it is about the highly civil way that lawyers behave in a small town, with a small trial bar who are always encountering each other. And that basic decency grabbed hold of the visiting lawyers who were there, some from elsewhere in North Carolina, others from out of state.
The visiting lawyers were probably experienced in trial work like I remember from the courtrooms of Baltimore City, a quarter century ago. There I found many lawyers who would cheerfully cut the throats of opposing counsel if it would give them a slight advantage in the pending case. I’m being metaphorical here, by a slight margin. However, the Gordon Gekko line from “Wall Street” does come to mind, when he said of an opponent, “I want him bleeding from all orifices.”
Yes, there were some lawyers whose word was good in the Baltimore courts. There were a few lawyers who, even as opponents in a case, could be relied upon to keep a commitment, and do something they said they would do. But that was not the norm.
This morning in Sylva, that was not only the norm, it was universal. And it made me nostalgic, just a bit, for the profession I have largely set aside and will not return to. But it is not the lawyers, but their environment, that is different here.
In a small town, all people in all professions and lines of work tend to be more personal, more courteous, in their dealings with others. There are exceptions, of course. But in a small environment, the Golden Rule becomes a long term survival technique. You do unto others as you would have them do unto you, because you know that they will almost certainly get the opportunity to do unto you.
There could be no better proof that the Golden Rule actually works as a mode of conduct than that it works among a random selection of actual lawyers. It’s like training put bulls to be lap dogs. I saw it succeed, this very day.
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About the Author: John Armor practiced in the US Supreme Court for 33 years. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu He is running for the 11th Congressional District of North Carolina.
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John / Billybob
Someone I know uses this as his e-mail ‘signoff’:
I went home with the waitress
The way I always do
How was I to know
She was with the Russians, too.
I was gambling in Havana
I took a little risk
Send lawyers, guns and money
Dad, get me out of this!
Warren Zevon
Freepmail or ping me on the thread to be added to the John Armor for Congress ping list.
Thanks for keeping Warren’s memory alive. One of the true, irreplaceable greats.
As Rick actually put it in Casablanca, "I was misinformed."
Do try to get it right.
Sounds like we need the nice lawyers from Sylva to settle the disputes on this thread. /sarcasm
Thanks for the ping MitchellC. Good article, Congressman.
Once they're done, could we borrow the pitch folk to use on the Union County Commissioners?
So true. And while he was certainly not a Republican, he was a libertarian. He never played the victim, even while dying of mesothelioma. He called it "the cancer". He took responsibility for his life and never publicly blamed others for his deadly illness.
Ahh, but there are some that are cool. I went to a Warren Zevon concert Feb 17 in Columbus Ohio with a proclamation from the Republican Mayor, Gregory Lashutka. The proclamation lauded Warren Zevon and declared it “Perfect Hair Day” in Columbus. I had two Republican judges (big Zevon fans)with me to award Warren with the proclamation. We met him back stage, gave him the proclamation and got him to sign three Lee Ho Fuk menus that I had picked up in London seven years earlier.
Ah-hoooo indeed.
Make that Feb 17, 1999.
Well, nobody likes lawyers, until they need one.
Maybe not even then.
I like “Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner” myself.
Wish in one hand, and spit in the other, and see which one gets full first...
(Which probably isn't the way you first heard it, either, but I'm a grade-school teacher.)
That said, I loved “Lawyers, Guns, and Money” myself, and although I didn't and don't own another of his albums, I do have the one with that and Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner. He had a quirky, black sense of humor that I still miss, and no body is as funny.
btt
I stumbled across this thread because I was reading one about Congressman Billybob. I didn’t become aquainted with Warren Zevon’s music until he was near death and only then because I wanted to hear Dwight Yoakam sing Dirty Life and Times. I can’t believe I missed out all those years because he wrote some amazing music. I love Studebaker. I’ve had days like that, fortunatley none recently. It must have been great to know him personally.
Warren was one of the greatest thinkers in rock and roll and I still devote a decent chunk of my time trying to keep his music alive. The reward is in the doing. It has led to some extraordinary experiences. I encourage you to keep listening to his stuff; it will blow your mind. He wrote the song "The Envoy" in the early 1980s and it is amazing how contemporary it remains.
Captain Renault: What in heaven's name brought you to Casablanca?
Rick: My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.
Captain Renault: The waters? What waters? We're in the desert.
Rick: I was misinformed.
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