Letters

Bar News welcomes letters from readers. We do not run letters that have been printed in, or are pending before, other legal publications whose readership overlaps ours. We ask that, if possible, letters fall between 350 and 500 words in length, and that they be e-mailed to the editor at tradelaw@thompson-law.com. We reserve the right to edit letters. Bar News does not print anonymous letters, or more than one submission per month from the same contributor.

Keeping up with the Joneses

When the December Bar News published an article on attorney liens, several readers pointed out that the article’s failure to reflect significant recent developments in the law, including action by the U.S. Supreme Court that occurred more than eight months prior to the article’s publication, rendered the article misleading, if not false.

Instead of accepting responsibility for these errors, the editor chose to dismiss the complaints as unjustified. “A number of readers contacted the author and/or Bar News about ‘omissions’ from the article, when in fact the events cited occurred after the issue of Bar News was in production,” wrote the editor (Bar News, January 2005).

While mistakes can be forgiven, the editor’s unwillingness to accept the criticism cannot. At this point, the editor has only two options:

Option 1: Admit that the Bar News received a submitted article, sat on it for at least eight months, and published it without the slightest attempt to perform any editing, updating, or citation-checking.

Option 2: Continue to maintain that the production cycle of the Bar News exceeds eight months, thereby preventing the magazine from providing any reliable information to its readers on a timely basis, and cease publication forthwith.

Those are the available options. Pick one.
 
Steve Jones, Olympia

I am a member of the WSBA and I argued the Banaitis case in the U.S. Supreme Court. I was one of the persons who wrote to you about the “omissions” in the Blaney article last month. I now have received this month’s Bar News.

Needless to say, I am disappointed. You appear to be intentionally misleading your readers. These developments did NOT occur after the Bar News was in production. Cert. was petitioned in December 2003. That’s more than a year ago. Cert. was GRANTED 3/29/04. That’s nine months ago. Neither of those facts was mentioned in the article. The author of your article emailed me to tell me that she submitted the article “last spring.” The Bar News should take the blame for not checking to see if any updates were warranted when publishing an article that was seven or more months old. You managed to publish the “update” promptly (within 30 days of its receipt), so your production deadlines are obviously not that onerous. You owe your readers two apologies. One for running an outdated article. Second for trying to cover up your error. Shame on you. Twice.

Philip N. Jones, Portland

The Nine Rules of Highly Ineffective People

I write in response to President Ron Ward’s column in the January 2005 Bar News. He there opines that society has a duty to provide legal services to the poor, and, by extension, that members of the bar have an obligation to donate time and money to this cause. His argument is based on the notion that there is some constitutional guaranty to “equal access to justice.” I take exception to Mr. Ward’s premise and to his conclusions.

The federal constitution, via court decision, only provides for publicly paid counsel for criminal defense of the indigent. There is no constitutional language or intimation that an indigent deserves publicly paid counsel either to advance or defend a civil cause. Public policy and legislative history to the contrary notwithstanding, there is no constitutional language or intimation that justifies any so-called transfer payment to the indigent.

The policy dispute here arises from a perception, echoed in Mr. Ward’s article, that people are poor because of some extra-personal cause. In other words, people are “victims” of poverty. The corresponding view is that the rich are “fortunate.” These views exalt chance as the cause of wealth distribution and denigrate personal choice and responsibility.

It is true, in a few cases, that individuals do not have the ability to provide for themselves, either through birth defect or subsequent disability. The vast majority, however, are poor because they chose it. Poor choices often occur early in life. Failure to choose productive and prosperous habits and beliefs commonly occurs in such mistakes as:

1.  Believing that one is not a person of value;
2.  Choosing not to study and learn to the full extent of educational opportunity, both in school and at the public library;
3.  Choosing not to attend college or university or otherwise qualify oneself for highly compensated employment;
4.  Choosing to engage in addictive and/or destructive habits such as alcohol or substance abuse;
5. Choosing to father or give birth to children out of wedlock;
6.  Choosing to marry or cohabitate with any individual who does not believe in one’s value and capacity for excellence;
7.  Choosing to spend to the limit of one’s income (or beyond one’s income), thus guaranteeing effective poverty at any income level;
8. Choosing not to participate in the American dream of owning some portion of the productive factors of society; and
9.  Choosing to ignore or disclaim responsibility for one’s ultimate success or failure in any of life’s endeavors.

There is no virtue or nobility in poverty, and anyone who asserts such does a disservice to the poor. Poor habits are no more desirable than any other unproductive, destructive or dissipative behavior. Everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. However, it disrespects everyone involved to enable the voluntarily incompetent, indolent, irresponsible and/or foolhardy to enjoy the fruits of someone else’s labor.

Providing for a man who refuses to provide for himself neither edifies him nor makes him more able to provide. It does no good for the poor to say they are not responsible for their actions. Supporting a man in his delusions is not educational. True charity provides a hand up, not a handout. That government governs best which governs least. Smaller government is part of a rising economic tide that lifts all boats.

The American ideal is equal opportunity, not equal outcome. Litigation insurance and other like products are readily and inexpensively available. The poor should be encouraged and helped to choose first, not to be poor and second, to properly provide for their own needs. Consumer protection legislation already provides tremendous disincentive for abusive behavior in the form of triple damages, plus attorney fees and court costs. The same laws provide tremendous incentive for contingent fee representation.

Sixty plus years of the New Deal, and forty plus years of the Great Society have amply demonstrated the pernicious folly of governmental “safety nets.” Such nets are not safe, and they serve more to ensnare than to protect. I agree with sentiments recently expressed by Bill Cosby. If one is to stand up, one must ignore the voices of those who tell him to stay down. That Mr. Ward is one of those voices speaks ill for our profession and does nothing for the poor. We all deserve better.  
 
David L. Evans, Federal Way

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