Letter to the Editor Re: Civility at Bench and Bar
| Pages | 379 |
| Publication year | 2021 |
68 CBJ 379. LETTER TO THE EDITOR Re: CIVILITY AT BENCH AND BAR
To The Editor:
The discussion of the Hartford County Bar's efforts to improve civility in our profession reported in the October 1993 Connecticut Bar journal was quite good, but no new solutions were offered. I do not believe that the five-part agenda you propose will restore lost attorney civility and professionalism. A minor help, perhaps, but not a solution to the problem of lost civility in our profession or a reversal of the trend.
The five-part agenda addresses civility by trying to get lawyers to improve our behavior toward opposing counsel and the courts. Of course it is quite natural to assume that lawyers can be made "better" by focusing on their relationships with opposing counsel and the courts. This assumption presumes that professional groups can change the behavior of their members in the limited sphere of their profession, isolated from the members' behavior outside of the profession. Unfortunately, a solution to the problem of decreasing civility has not arisen from reliance upon such an assumption. To find a solution, the problem has to be examined from a different perspective.
I have concluded that it is unrealistic to expect lawyers (or anyone) to have two personalities, a work "self" and off-work "self". Accordingly, I believe the attorneys will only be "better" attorneys if they become better people. Simply, it is naive optimism to expect lasting and beneficial behavior- changes from training an attorney to treat opposing counsel and the court with courtesy, when the same lawyer treats her associates and staff without courtesy - or her parking lot attendant, or her children, or the restaurant waiter. Teach lawyers to be better people and lawyers will be better lawyers.
How can that be done? Teach lawyers how to give compliments. Teach lawyers how to give constructive criticism. (The sarcastic personalities that populate our profession in these troubled times...
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