Letters
Bar should help lawyers serve all their constituencies
In the April
"President's Perspective," State Bar President Sorenson discusses
the Bar's mission "to provide quality and accessible legal services to
all individuals." He indicates that in order to achieve that goal, the
State Bar must provide programs and resources to support rural and
neighborhood attorneys. He contrasts that function with "divert[ing] the
precious resources of this organization to solving global or societal
problems. We need to use those resources to make the practice of law
viable in our communities and for our members and their families."
The historic function of the lawyer in America is to serve community,
clients, and society. All lawyers must struggle to reconcile these
roles. The State Bar's mission is to assist all lawyers to achieve that
reconciliation. The State Bar leadership must continue to create and
support programs and resources that allow and assist all lawyers to find
the balance; lawyer referral and information staff, Bar ethics programs,
and innovative local bar project funding are current examples. The State
Bar leadership should be committed to expanding programs and resources
that allow lawyers to serve all their constituencies. Creating conflict
between assisting members and solving societal problems is damaging to
the State Bar and to members.
Louise G. Trubek
Clinical Professor of Law
U.W. Law School
Who will cross the drawbridge?
Apparently embarrassed by the hundreds of thousands of excess dollars
hidden away in various "reserve" accounts, the ever burgeoning staff and
the State Bar Board of Governors have retained the services of Donald
Trump's design team for the construction of a new palace in which the
staff and board can hold court for their serfs, we lowly members. This
is far more appealing than, for instance, a dues-free year that returns
the excess cash to the members who provided those funds.
The new palace is justified on the basis that "our" headquarters has
to grow to "serve" the membership. There will be additional staffing
increases, concomitant with the size of the new building; how else to
"reach out" to each and every member? Bureaucracy expands to fill space
available.
We cannot understand why it is the obligation of the State Bar of
Wisconsin to provide meeting rooms, conference rooms, on-site libraries,
and so on for those attorneys who happen to be in Madison. If it is the
obligation to provide such in Madison, why not around the rest of the
state? In Madison, there are taxpayer-provided law libraries at the
City-County Building, the Federal Building, and of course, the grandest
of all, the U.W. Law School. Meeting rooms, conference rooms, and so on
can be provided by any of the many hotels or, on an individual basis, by
many of the Madison-area law firms.
We believe that the true fact is that this building is justified only
by the desires of a relatively small number of people who want to see
their names emblazoned forever on a big brass plaque that will greet
visitors for the foreseeable future (or at least until the next batch of
staff and governors decides to build an even larger palace).
Perhaps we should survey the membership to see how many have even
visited the old hovel or would want to visit the new Schloss (and are
willing to pay to do so).
We suspect many (if not most) lawyers' sole visit to the present
headquarters was at the time they were sworn in at the State Capitol and
visited the Bar headquarters for some milk and cookies afterwards.
Perhaps we could fund it exclusively through a user fee so that those
who wish to cross the drawbridge to visit the king and court can pay the
toll for the same while those of us who don't can avoid this scam.
William W. Graper
Robert W. Kohn
John P. Savage
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
Lawyer
