July 2002

Letters

A recent Bar News letter (May, p. 10) quoted a November 12, 2001 Washington Post article by Dan Keating and Dan Balz as saying "Florida Recounts Would Have Favored Bush." On this evidence, the letter holds Editor Mark Panitch guilty of not "acknowledging that there are alternative views."

Is that letter advocating a viewpoint quota system? If so, or even if not so, the letter should have acknowledged that the very next word of the article from which it quotes expresses just such an "alternative view." That word is "But," and it is followed by "Study Finds Gore Might Have Won Statewide Tally of All Uncounted Ballots."

The first part of the quote referred to various partial recounts; you have to read the article all the way to learn who would have gotten the most votes if there had been a complete recount. Cutting the quote short yields a conclusion directly opposite from that of a complete quote.

Likewise, cutting legal processes short will yield results directly opposite from what is correct under our Constitution. This appears to be exactly the point of the Panitch article that the letter purports to criticize. Under our Bill of Rights, it is scarcely a debatable proposition.

I seem to have missed the announcement as to when Washington State Bar News and the WSBA were sold to the WSTLA/ATLA lobbying consortium. Having read in recent issues the editorials of Mr. Panitch castigating the insurance industry and the attorneys who work on its behalf, and his partisan attack on President Bush and his policies to deal with the threat of terrorism in the United States, I can only assume the sale occurred prior to Mr. Panitch's being appointed editor.

There seems to be a strong trend of the WSBA, Bar News and KCBA to take partisan political stands supporting liberal Democratic policies. The leaders of these organizations are entitled to their individual political views, but I object to their using my dues and the name of professional organizations to which I belong to advance their private partisan agendas. If I were voluntarily paying for Bar News, I would cancel my subscription in protest, but I am not voluntarily paying for Bar News. It is primarily supported by my involuntary dues paid to the WSBA as part of my privilege to practice law.

WSTLA/ATLA are voluntary organizations that can and have volunteered their time and large amounts of money to the Democratic Party and its candidates. They do so to promote their members' economic and social interests, and they are entitled to do so. However, the WSBA and Bar News are supposed to represent the common interests of all attorneys of every political stripe. I resent their being hijacked to a partisan set of causes.

If the opinions of attorneys on matters of political and/or social policy are of value for public distribution, then it seems to me that in the Internet age the WSBA should be able to poll the opinions of its members on those issues and announce the polling results. It would be far more honest to announce that 23 percent of Bar members support kinder drug-offense sentencing, 22 percent oppose it, and 45 percent didn't vote or have no opinion, instead of announcing that the WSBA supports kinder drug sentencing. We do this in judicial candidate polling — why not for other issues if our views need airing to the public.

If a Washington lawyer is cloned, does the clonee have to be admitted pursuant to admission to practice rules in order to practice law in the state of Washington? Or, in the alternative, does the clonee enjoy the status of the clonor?

I am told that life experience is not transferable by cloning. This, then, may prove Holmes' notion that the life of the law derives from experience, not logic. By Holmes' account, the clonee ought not to be entitled to practice merely by that status.

If the clonee does enjoy the status of the clonor, then do they each share a common WSBA identification number?

The possibility of cloning lawyers also leads to issues, of course, of discipline of the clonees. What jurisdiction, if any, do discipline authorities have with respect to cloned lawyers?

It is evident that the rule against perpetuities might be subject to revision. Send in the clones.

Bar News Content Provokes Thoughtful Debate

I watch with amusement letter-writers who are upset with (a) Mark Panitch's political views; (b) Lisa Stone's article on the "glass ceiling" for women lawyers (interestingly I saw no comment on Rosemary Daszkiewicz's March counterpoint article); and (c) letter writers upset with other letter writers. You'd think Bar News was going to hell in a hand basket.

But one thing is for certain: people are reading Bar News because of interesting articles which provoke thoughtful debate. This is much better than some of the bedtime reading we see in some legal publications which put us to sleep.

Look at the excellent articles in the May issue like Randy Gordon's incredibly literate, punchy comment on what we ought to be about as lawyers; or the evolution of our discipline system from "crime and punishment" to professionalism; or the element of "fairness" in applying the Consumer Protection Act in "unfairness."

Mark Panitch may not be Mr. Right, but he certainly is not Mr. Wrong. His approach and that of the Bar News Editorial Advisory Board has stimulated a lot of excitement in Bar News readership.

Keep it up!

Readers are invited to submit letters of reasonable length to the editor. They may be sent via e-mail to comm@ wsba.org  or provided on disk in any conventional format with accompanying hard copy. Due date is the 10th of the month for the second issue following, e.g., May 10 for publication in the July issue. The editor reserves the right to select excerpts for publication or edit them as appropriate.