quotations about lawyers
Lawyers are ideological enemies of informal justice.
RICHARD L. ABEL
Lawyers in Society
Lawyers are like painters--once they get into a house, you never know when you will get rid of them again.
PETER ANDERSON GRAHAM
The Red Scaur
The Post Office just recalled their newest stamps: They had a picture of lawyers on them ... and people couldn't figure out which side to spit on.
MARVIN LEBMAN
A Collection of Jokes and Funny Stories
Anyone who believes a better day dawns when lawyers are eliminated has the burden of explaining who will take their place. Who will protect the poor, the injured, the victims of negligence, the victims of racial discrimination, and the victims of racial violence?... Lawyers are the simple yet essential means by which people seek to vindicate their rights and we must not foreclose that means.
JOHN CURTIN
remarks at American Bar Association annual meeting, Aug. 13, 1991
No group has a greater responsibility today in helping maintain our free institutions of society than the lawyer. In fact, being a man of the law, he is uniquely equipped through training, outlook and experience to be a leader of his fellow citizens. American history confirms his tremendous contribution--helping draw up the basic documentation of our freedom, serving as a leader in local, state and national government, participating in the affairs of community life. At this hour, America especially needs the leadership of the lawyer. The moral fabric of our Nation is badly torn. Disrespect for law and order is widespread. The very principles of free government are being scorned and perverted. Flouting the law has almost become a hobby for some individuals.
J. EDGAR HOOVER
Texas Bar Journal, Feb. 22, 1964
Americans see lawyers as obstructionists, as defenders of murderers.... In reality, lawyers are the glue that holds society together. Without lawyers ... without law, you have anarchy.
BILL CUNNINGHAM
Cincinnati Magazine, Sep. 1992
Lawyers are like unrequited lovers--you give them an inch, and they go for the whole nine yards; you take off one shoe, and they pull down your pants.
ANDRES RUEDA
The Clawback
Lawyers are a bad lot.... They cheat their living out of honest people.
ALBERT R. CARMAN
Incurable!
Some lawyers are like unto the camel, which, before drinking out of a brook, maketh the water turbid with his foot.
ADOLPHUS WILLIAM WARD
"Abraham a Sancta Clara", Collected Papers
As to the essentials of a good lawyer, I have some very definite convictions. He should have a keen sense of right and wrong and a firm belief in basic moral values. I would hate to trust the welfare or protection of the life or property of any of my clients to a lawyer who had no respect for moral values, or one who had a callous indifference as to what was basically right and wrong.
JOSEPH T. KARCHER
New Jersey Lawyer, Nov. 1986
If you cannot avoid a quarrel with a blackguard, let your lawyer manage it, rather than yourself. No man sweeps his own chimney, but employs a chimney-sweeper, who has no objection to dirty work, because it is his trade.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Lawyers are in the business of advocacy, not judgment.
ALLAN C. HUTCHINSON
Is Killing People Right?
Lawyer even sounds like liar.
WALTER MOSLEY
Walking the Line
Why don't you ever hear of a lawyer getting attacked by a shark at the beach? Professional courtesy.
THOMAS F. SHUBNELL
Greatest Jokes of the Century
Lawyers are like rabbits. They have a nasty habit of multiplying.
LEO REILLY
How to Outnegotiate Anyone
Lawyers are the jackals of commerce.
ELBERT HUBBARD
Fra Magazine, Sep. 1911
Lawyers enjoy a little mystery, you know. Why, if everybody came forward and told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth straight out, we should all retire to the workhouse.
DOROTHY L. SAYERS
Clouds of Witness
Lawyers are like that famous vampire-bat, said to exist in Hungary, which seizes on a creature, and never lets go while there is blood left.
WALTER BESANT
Dorothy Forster
Lawyers generally know too much of law to have a very clear perception of justice.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
As a peacemaker the lawyer has a superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough. Never stir up litigation. A worse man can scarcely be found than one who does this.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
notes for a law lecture, July 1, 1850?