"An Exclusive Club" Archives

"An Exclusive Club"

A prospective client is in the office. He has an interesting case. He needs a lawyer. Without good legal advice he will be in real trouble. He cannot afford legal fees. The lawyer listens. He repeats to himself his personal resolution not to take on another no-pay case. But he makes the fatal mistake of continuing to listen to the facts. He peruses the documents. He asks more questions. He knows the scheme and he knows the swindlers. He shuffles the documents into chronological order. It is likely that this poor fellow will lose the little he has. The lawyer is hooked. Vanity enters the picture. The lawyer thinks (and says) he can outsmart the swindlers.

There is an exclusive lawyers’ club whose members cannot turn away an interesting case just because the client has no money to spend on legal fees. I am told that a lawyer seeking admission into this club must satisfy application requirements that far exceed those of Harvard, Yale, Georgetown, and Stanford.

"An Exclusive Club," by Jacob Stein, Washington Lawyer, December 2006