My Desert Lawyers

Letters to a Young Lawyer (Art of Mentoring)

Description

With wit, humor, and decades of personal experiences from which to draw, Alan Dershowitz dispenses advice on career, law, and life in a book aimed at those just starting out in the legal profession.

As defender of both the righteous and the questionable, Alan Dershowitz has become perhaps the most famous and outspoken attorney in the land. Whether or not they agree with his legal tactics, most people would agree that he possesses a powerful and profound sense of justice. In this meditation on his profession, Dershowitz writes about life, law, and the opportunities that young lawyers have to do good and do well at the same time.

We live in an age of growing dissatisfaction with law as a career, which ironically comes at a time of unprecedented wealth for many lawyers. Dershowitz addresses this paradox, as well as the uncomfortable reality of working hard for clients who are often without many redeeming qualities. He writes about the lure of money, fame, and power, as well as about the seduction of success.

In the process, he conveys some of the "tricks of the trade" that have helped him win cases and become successful at the art and practice of "lawyering."

Reviews

Rating: 1 / 5
Date: 2010-05-09
Summary: "Screed to a Young Lawyer"

Alan Dershowitz's "Letters to a Young Lawyer," or more properly, "Screed to a Young Lawyer," is a hodge-podge of short opinion pieces presented by Professor Dershowitz in his typical preachy and sanctimonious style. (But hey, if you have a choir, why not preach to it?)

Professor Dershowitz lamblasts the majority decision in Gore v. Bush and all but begs any discontented insiders (i.e., SCOTUS clerks) to blow the whistle on what he characterizes as the politically biased and preordained results of the decision. Curiously, Professor Dershowitz never breathes a word about the Supreme Court of Florida's actions in the 2000 election, reserving all his spleen for SCOTUS.

Professor Dershowitz ridicules the cliche that no one ever died wishing he had spent more time at the office. Instead, he warns the young lawyer about not working hard enough and then having his wife leave him for a more successful attorney or his ungrateful kids abandoning him in his old age. But Professor Dershowitz should know that being a successful lawyer doesn't mean your wife won't leave you (or you won't leave your wife). He divorced his first wife Sue Barlach.

More importantly, Professor Dershowitz uses a flawed analysis. When you're lying on your death bed, do you want your memories to be filled with images of your child's first steps, cuddling in the rocking chair and reading Dr. Seuss, etc? or do you want your memories to be filled with images of the midnights you spent getting that summary judgment brief out for the ungrateful corporate client who stopped using your firm when the partner who had the relationship with the client left the firm? That analysis is just as likely as the one Professor Dershowitz profers.

Professor Dershowitz also rails against posters on [...]. Associates make buckets of money, he argues, and they should accept the work responsibility that goes with it. To a certain extent that's true, but Professor Dershowitz glosses over the culpability of the law schools that continue to advertise to college graduates, charge exhorbitant tuitions, and pump out JDs when they know the market is over-saturated with attorneys, and most of the attorneys will struggle for years trying to repay their law school loans. And he never breathes a word about the big law firms that have all but abandoned their professional obligation to train new lawyers in the law. Instead, young lawyers are plunged into multi-year document reviews and other mindless activities that do nothing to enhance their skills as attorneys. Then, after two or three years, those associates with exceptional promise (i.e., business connections) are kept and the rest are fired, entering the over-saturated job market with few relevant legal skills, a mountain of law school debt, and the "stigma" of being a more expensive "senior" attorney. Nor does he talk about the increasingly vanishing case of the associate promoted to partner.

If you are a young attorney, I would not recommend this book. A far better read is Foonberg's "How to Start a Law Practice." Mr. Foonberg's book is both idealistic and realistic. He avoids the cynicism and bias of Professor Dershowitz, and he provides the practical advice that any young lawyer needs, not just those lawyers trying to start their own practice.

---

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2007-12-05
Summary: "From a Great Teacher of Law Of All Time To Students of Law At All Times"

This tried and true essential written by Alan Dershowitz, America's renowned civil liberties lawyer and Harvard Law School Professor, is at once fascinating and informative.

The book bears the hallmark of a great teacher writing a book to "...share the insights gained..in the hope that some may benefit from my mistakes...to encourage others to learn from my successes and failures, from my correct decisions and my erroneous ones." Like a true teacher, Dershowitz is not content with just giving monologue advice. He even leaves us with his address and email to encourage interactive conversations and discussions which is indeed a privilege to us all.

Any reader will benefit from Dershowitz's great wealth of experiences, the passion of his beliefs and tried and true advice as well as exploring the fundamental question of whether a good lawyer can be a good person. This thought-provoking book is here to stay.

---

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2007-01-08
Summary: "To Do or Not to Do?"

This book is a gift not only to its intended audience, young lawyers, but to every citizen of the United States. It is the work of an iconoclast, which will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with its author, Alan Dershowitz. The author pulls no puches in his description of the flaws of our justice system in action through our courts. He covers both tort and criminal cases. The prose is clear and not laden with the deplored "legalese" that has entangled so many who attempt to understand the issues addressed.

Threading itself throughout the book is the theme of moral dilemmas that lawyers, defense and prosecutor alike, as well as the judge, face in the execution of their duties and responsibilities. The complexities and nuances of making ethical decisions in carrying out one's legal role are explored in depth with grace and intellect. It is neither pugnacious nor polemical, which Dershowitz, rightly or wrongly, is so often accused of. I suspect that those characteristics are at least partly true of his temperament. This, however, is inevitable in one who challenges the system, asks the hard questions that others do not dare to raise, and risks pointing to the elephant in the room that many fail to recognize, much less comment upon.

The nature of truth and justice are thoroughly analyzed from the perspective of the defense and the prosecutor. Particular emphasis is placed on the role fo the defense lawyer who is committed to pursuing the best interests of his or her client, even when he or she knows that a successful strategy may place a guilty defendant back on the streets. The analysis is fascinating and thought provoking, as is the entire book.

The book culminates with a consideration of morality and right conduct irrespective of one's profession or roles in life and, hence, has universal applicability.

Hugh Rosen, D.S.W., author of "Silent Battlefields: A Novel" (Philadelphia, Pa)

---

Rating: 3 / 5
Date: 2006-12-27
Summary: "Straightforward insight about our Criminal Justice System"

When reading the "Introduction" to "Letters to a Young Lawyer" or even by reading it's title, a potential reader might have the impression that Dershowitz's book is an inspirational, motivating, and impelling read for lawyers and non-lawyers alike. With emphasis on the word "advice", he repeatedly provides throughout the beginning with a fair amount overall. Part I of the book does the best job of all in giving a reader ethical guidance and forewarnings about the profession. However, to say the whole book is solely admonition wouldn't be entirely true.

His tone halfway through turns from lessons to disesteem. Leaving the advice lending role shifts to a bombastic ranting about unjustness in today's justice system. This sort of shift might not be possible by some other authors, but with Dershowitz's experience and knowledge about the subject, he achieves it brilliantly. His despondency is borderline excessive for a motivational book but is adequately accompanied by frankness about realities in the profession. It may just be a part of the veracity in his writing that keeps the reader's attention though.

How many lawyers today will do an about-face and write:
(Pg.80) Here are some of the key rules of the justice game:
I. Most criminal defendants are, in fact, guilty.
II. All criminal defense lawyers, prosecutors and judges understand and believe Rule I.

Many chapters dealing with actual advice would most likely prove to be invaluable. Some theories are even proving to be factual today. Such as the case with Chapter 29 - The Difference Between a Prosecutor and a Defense Attorney. In particular, Dershowitz discusses the flaws of politicization of the justice system which might motivate prosecutors to prosecute an innocent citizen. Was this not just exemplified recently with DA Nifong's overzealous sortie against the Duke lacrosse team?

Much of the text of the book examines issues of morality of lawyers. To be honest, I hadn't had much respect for Defense attorneys who represent some of the most contemptible human beings in the world before reading this book. However, as with all of Dershowitz's books, he obligates a reader to approach his or her preconceived opinion about the topic from a different angle. He contends with disparagers, that in fact, it is necessary and a responsibility of a equal and just society to sufficiently represent anyone in need of legal counsel, whether guilty or innocent.

One of the most vital chapters in the whole book is the first. Chapter One- Pick your Heroes Carefully. He lucidly writes to a reader, that one most discriminate among heroes and idols thoughtfully in order to as he puts it; "Learn to live with disappointments and still emulate those characteristics of your role models that warrant emulation."
Surprisingly this book has few imperfections. Although in some part's Dershowitz strays away from authentic "advice" to actual animosity about topics ranging from the 2000 Presidential election, the Supreme Court, to capital punishment. Nevertheless it is not as to the extend of a vast majority of books published these days which are solely about an author's political persuasion.
In writing about the oxymoronic "Lawyer's Morals" he never discusses what follows if a Defense Attorney actually "proves" a guilty defendant innocent, which considering his record, he would be quite knowledgeable about.

To dispel any myth of "strong language", there is especially nothing wrong with hearing a "damn" or "hell" in educational book which is minuscule in comparison to any 50 Cent song you might hear in your child`s iPod. If you're a reader offended by weensy curse words, the legal profession might not be up your alley in the first place.

---

Rating: 4 / 5
Date: 2006-02-23
Summary: "What is happening in the US Justice System?"

This is one of a series of books written by different writers aimed at mentoring a range of groups from young conservatives to golfers. The format is to talk about skills which can be of use for those starting out.

Dershowitz's book is rather pessimistic. It suggests that university courses are seldom of much use and there is no attempt to important skills such as that of advocacy. Most young lawyers have no real notion of what advocacy is about and often assume that it is about presentation and appearance. He goes on to debunk a few heroes of the legal profession by showing their clay feet. Clarence Darrow used to bribe witnesses and jurors. Oliver Wendell Holmes was a believer in eugenics and the killing of the weak and the mentally disabled.

He goes on to suggest that the system of justice in the United States is anything but, at least in criminal law. To be appointed judges have to either be elected or to attract the notice of politicians. They do this by trying to lock up as many criminals as they can rather than operating within the true meaning of the justice system and the US constitution. Prosecutors are perhaps the most important players in the system and according to Dershowitz they routinely abuse their position by failure to make proper disclosure or by concealing matters favorable to the accused. The court system refuses to properly supervise prosecutors and when they become aware of breaches they develop legal doctrines to excuse it. He thinks that the Supreme Court does not really operate as a traditional court. Generally a court is meant to hear argument and be swayed by it. He says that the Supreme Court selects from a large number of cases a few that interest it and that they make up their minds of what will happen prior to the hearing and any advocacy before it is pointless or in effect a puppet show. What he seems to be suggesting is that the Supreme Court is more of a legislative body than a judicial one.

Dershowitz's advice taken over all is that one should never assume that the system will bring about fair outcomes. To be a lawyer one has to develop toughness a sense of realism and skills to be able to work against a system which will almost automatically result in conviction. (Except maybe in civil cases. Judgments in civil cases are not likely to prevent a person ascending to a judicial position or moving forward in the system whilst a position of being pro-defendant is a sure fire career killer )