Saturday, October 30, 2004

MPU 2: Atticus Finch


Today was more apocalyptic than usual, thanks to scary commentary by people speculating on what a second term for the current administration might look like. But I am not going to comment on that, since my basic sense is that government plans never work out as bad or good as you think they might.

Rather, I want to put in my plug for John Kerry and John Edwards, especially since any number of my friends or folks I read have been dismissive or cynical about them. There are a number of arbitrary reasons why I like them both. I was born in Boston and grew up in North Carolina, in a family with deep southern roots and, more recently, a tendency to become professionals and go into public service. The result is that I have deep respect and admiration for both Massachusetts and North Carolina.

I'd say that what both states excel in is raising good citizens, in the broadest sense that that phrase can be understood. There are number of factors--historic support of individual rights & tolerance, solid and extensive educational systems, both private and public, and a fairly deep trust in education and experience, rather than tactical skill and luck. And most importantly, a deep disdain for arguments that rest on hierarchy and force, rather than evidence and persuasion.

It is then no coincedence that two of the finest public servants in political life I know, John Kerry and John Edwards, hail respectively from Massachusetts and North Carolina. Yet it is not only where they were born or happen to come to maturity that matters. A lot has been said about lawyers in the campaign, but the fact is that, like all professionals, they come in many varieties. Kerry and Edwards happen to have been lawyers for the people--Kerry as a local prosecutor and Edwards as a litigator in civil product and medical liability cases. While we think of lawyers for the people as mainly public defenders, prosecutor and civil litigators have more power: they can change how a law is enforced or create the groundswell for law. Outside of an executive like a governor or a president, such lawyers are nearly the only individuals outside of legislatures who can change the way we are governed. They also do it from the right place: in the trenches where people are being affected and where you are accountable for your decisions in specific and decisive ways. Thus, Kerry and Edwards took different, but equally difficult routes into politics, especially when one considers that neither of their routes depended upon the usual trading-up tactics that party politics involves. It also means they owe relatively few people for their success. Notice how Kerry came into Senate a deficit hawk. Notice how Edwards has included tort reform as part a broader medical insurance reform proposal.

On apocalyptic days, it seems to me that the right and the left have forgotten that hard work and integrity are qualities we want to have in leaders. (Oh and that we must have leaders!) We tend not to believe that lawyers have these qualities, but this is because we rarely realize how complicated governance is now in the US, and that a law degree, for good or bad, prepares you to understand the complexities. That's why so many lawyers work for corporations, since they know how make things happen in government. It's comforting, then, to know that good lawyers also practice law in the name of the people. The next time someone makes a crusty remark about lawyers, take time to remind them that not all work for them. Some of them do work for us, just as Atticus Finch did.