LAWYER QUOTES IV
quotations about lawyers
Lawyers are the jackals of commerce.
ELBERT HUBBARD
Fra Magazine, Sep. 1911
Successful trial lawyers are like heat-seeking missiles carrying payloads of information prejudicial to their opponent's case, constantly looking for the chance to unload their cargo, right up until the final moments of trial.
DAVID BERG
The Trial Lawyer
Lawyers are like that famous vampire-bat, said to exist in Hungary, which seizes on a creature, and never lets go while there is blood left.
WALTER BESANT
Dorothy Forster
There were lawyers who promoted quarrels to get fees. But they were the pariahs of the profession. The best lawyers were peacemakers, and though, of necessity, professional partisans when engaged in litigation, they were generally honorable partisans.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Reminiscences
I realized the true function of a lawyer was to unite parties riven asunder. The lesson was so indelibly burnt into me that a large part of my time during the twenty years of my practice as a lawyer was occupied in bringing about private compromises of hundreds of cases. I lost nothing thereby -- not even money, certainly not my soul.
MAHATMA GANDHI
An Autobiography
The Post Office just recalled their newest stamps: They had a picture of lawyers on them ... and people couldn't figure out which side to spit on.
MARVIN LEBMAN
A Collection of Jokes and Funny Stories
I cannot believe that a republic could subsist if the influence of the lawyers in public business did not increase in proportion to the power of the people.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE
Democracy in America
It is an ill cause that the lawyer thinks shame o'.
JOHN RAY
A Complete Collection of English Proverbs
No group has a greater responsibility today in helping maintain our free institutions of society than the lawyer. In fact, being a man of the law, he is uniquely equipped through training, outlook and experience to be a leader of his fellow citizens. American history confirms his tremendous contribution--helping draw up the basic documentation of our freedom, serving as a leader in local, state and national government, participating in the affairs of community life. At this hour, America especially needs the leadership of the lawyer. The moral fabric of our Nation is badly torn. Disrespect for law and order is widespread. The very principles of free government are being scorned and perverted. Flouting the law has almost become a hobby for some individuals.
J. EDGAR HOOVER
Texas Bar Journal, Feb. 22, 1964
Lawyers are like wine--you can pay a lot of money for a fancy bottle that tastes like vinegar, or you can find a good deal that fits your budget and your palate alike.
KAREN A. COVY
When Happily Ever After Ends
Lawyers are like rabbits. They have a nasty habit of multiplying.
LEO REILLY
How to Outnegotiate Anyone
How many lawyers does it take to change a light bulb? How many can you afford?
BLANCHE KNOTT
Blanch Knott's Treasury of Tastelessness
He who will always be his own lawyer will often have a fool for a client.
J. HUNTER
attributed, Day's Collacon
Lawyers are in the business of advocacy, not judgment.
ALLAN C. HUTCHINSON
Is Killing People Right?
Americans see lawyers as obstructionists, as defenders of murderers.... In reality, lawyers are the glue that holds society together. Without lawyers ... without law, you have anarchy.
BILL CUNNINGHAM
Cincinnati Magazine, Sep. 1992
Lawyers are like painters--once they get into a house, you never know when you will get rid of them again.
PETER ANDERSON GRAHAM
The Red Scaur
[The Utopians] have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of people whose profession it is to disguise matters and to wrest the laws, and, therefore, they think it is much better that every man should plead his own cause, and trust it to the judge, as in other places the client trusts it to a counsellor; by this means they both cut off many delays and find out truth more certainly; for after the parties have laid open the merits of the cause, without those artifices which lawyers are apt to suggest, the judge examines the whole matter, and supports the simplicity of such well-meaning persons, whom otherwise crafty men would be sure to run down; and thus they avoid those evils which appear very remarkably among all those nations that labour under a vast load of laws.
SIR THOMAS MORE
Utopia
If you cannot avoid a quarrel with a blackguard, let your lawyer manage it, rather than yourself. No man sweeps his own chimney, but employs a chimney-sweeper, who has no objection to dirty work, because it is his trade.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Lawyers generally know too much of law to have a very clear perception of justice.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
We lawyers learn to study the faces of our witnesses, to form quick judgments, and to act upon them.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Laicus: Or, The Experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish