Talk:Lawyer/Archive 1

Definition

Just so things don't get more buried, I wanted to see if we can tidy up the headline definition. At the moment we have:

A lawyer, or legal practitioner, is a person certified to give legal advice who advises clients in legal matters. Some lawyers represent clients in courts of law and in other forms of dispute resolution.

This is, as I have tried to say, very much US POV. Most jurisdictions have no concept of "certification" to give legal advice, and there is no control of so doing. Apparently there is in the US (how odd). Anyway, I am happy with an article trying to look at a coherent concept -- such as a member of a legal profession -- and don't have any big deal with (eg) judges or legislators not being included here. That's fine. Its just the definition is nonsense in many places. Coolcaesar has hinted at some better definition -- to do with practising law -- can we put something better together (or I will try and get shouted at no doubt). Francis Davey 18:55, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

I fully concur with you that we need to have a definition that focuses on the practice of law as opposed to legal advice. Also, the American term is "licensing." I just traced the article history and it was User:B40tu who changed the wording from "qualified" to "certified" in mid-August at this edit. [1] It was User:Pce3@ij.net who first inserted the reference to legal advice on April 12. [2] He has now been permanently blocked. [3]

How about going to something like "a person qualified to practice law"? Or if you have a better idea for the article's lead, feel free to present it. --Coolcaesar 09:07, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Monopoly?

Could someone do some more research on the legal monopoly? Coolcaesar (who has done sterling work on this page) has put reference to an "1804 law" which seems to be the origin of the monopoly. Can a reference be supplied. I have had a browse through the statute book of 1804 and see nothing directly on point. Francis Davey 17:33, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, that's directly from the book by Stevens (the leading scholar on the history of American law schools) and Abel-Smith. If I recall correctly (I'm not in the public library right now), they cited the minutes of an 1804 Law Society meeting as published in the Law Society's Gazette as well as several older books from the 19th century on the history of solicitors. Apparently the Law Society had been sending delegations regularly to the Prime Minister since the early 1780s begging for relief from the special taxes. These included the stamp tax as well as several taxes levied directly upon the licenses of both solicitors and attorneys (who apparently existed in England alongside solicitors as late as the 1830s). When William Pitt the Younger was thinking about raising the taxes again in 1804, the Law Society went to him with the idea of getting a monopoly on conveyancing, Pitt refused to back off on raising license taxes but agreed to the proposed monopoly, and the Law Society immediately drafted a bill for Parliament's consideration at its next meeting. Unfortunately, I don't recall seeing a reference to a particular Act of Parliament, though.--Coolcaesar 20:03, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Section 14 Stamp Act 1804 (I missed it on the first pass). I really hate writers who say "a law of...", since they all have unique citations and its usually a mealy mouthed way of saying they don't know, or can't be bothered to do the research. All the references I consulted failed to give me a citation, so I had to search the statutes for it. I've toned down the "outraged" remark, since that seems to be overly strong (or possibly one historical POV) though it clearly was a quid pro quo. I thought "solicitors and attorneys" was a little odd, since they are now both the same profession, but other professions (such as barristers and notaries) were included under the Stamp Act, so I have made some mods. Francis Davey 20:45, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

French fusion?

I wonder if the reference to the French fusion of its jurists can be checked? Reading the French wikipedia seems to suggest (a) that Notaire and Avocat are separate; and (b) makes me suspect that there might be different rules for advocates before administative courts. Francis Davey 19:18, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I can't read French (I studied Latin), but that's what I got from the more recent essay by Anne Boigeol in the 2003 book by Friedman (as is currently cited). Apparently the conseil juridiques still existed in 1985 when her first essay was published in Abel's book, but then were merged with the avocats in 1991 according to her 2003 essay. Of course, Boigeol is a sociologist, not an avocat (see her personal Web page at [4]), so it's possible that as an outsider she may have misunderstood what exactly happened in 1991 and then her essays were further distorted during translation into English (both of her essays in English were translated from original drafts in French).

The basic problem is that there are very few law professors like Richard Abel or Rogelio Perez-Perdomo who are able to provide a sophisticated sociological analysis of the legal profession as insiders. I mean people who are properly law-trained but then can step back and analyze the profession with the appropriate sociological methods. It's a very small field and nearly all the law professors who specialize in it are in the United States. In the preface to the Abel-Smith and Stevens book which I read yesterday at the library, the authors note that their analysis in 1967 was the first attempt ever at a systematic sociological analysis of the English legal system, including the English legal professions. They were horrified to find that the raw statistical data available from the Law Society and the Bar Council was quite poor in quality compared to data already regularly maintained by most American bar associations in the 1960s.

The problem is that sociology of the professions, in general, has been and is primarily an American project. The American Bar Foundation funded pioneering studies on the American legal profession in the 1950s, but the first large-scale studies of other countries' legal professions started occurring only in the 1970s thanks to Stanford Law School (this story is told in the preface to Friedman's book). Many of the essays in Friedman's and Abel's books were written by practicing lawyers or sociologists, and the quality suffers as a result, since they couldn't always find a law professor who was capable of doing a proper sociological analysis.

What we really need is a French avocat who can cite to materials in their own language (and probably available only in France) to correct the article (if it is incorrect) and then modify the footnotes to indicate that Boigeol has indicated the opposite but her analysis is wrong. --Coolcaesar 20:28, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Lawyers did go through several fusions in France. First avocats and avoues in 1971 followed by avocats and conseils juridiques in 1990. The resulting profession is called "avocat". The professions of huissier de justice and notaire remain separate. Lawyers need to take a separate exam in order to gain rights of audience before the supreme courts (Conseil d'Etat for public law and Cour de Cassation for private law). These avocats are called "avocats au conseil" as opposed to "avocats a la cour" (who cannot go further than the cour d'appel). Sprotch 13:51, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

You cannot become a lawyer in Arizona without attending an ABA-certified law school

Quit reverting to the old page. One cannot practice law in this state w/o, in addition to passing the bar exam, first graduating from a (certified) law school! -- Joe

Law is helping so therefore, anyone should be able to do it. Not anyone they should know what there doing. The world should have many more honest lawyers.

What is a lawyer?

There's a POV problem with this article. In my jurisidiction England and Wales there isn't, quite, the notion of a "lawyer" that seems to be being used in this article. This is illustrated by the recent deletion of reference to judgers, legislators etc.

Now it is usual to refer to people who do legal work -- such as drafting legislation, working as clerks of the court or judges and so on -- as "lawyers", since they are legally qualified and their work is concerned with the law. They are frequently not solicitors, barristers, legal executives or a member of one of the more specialised legal professions.

The problem appears to arise from the US POV where there is in general some notion of "giving legal advice" which one is not supposed to do if one is not a "lawyer" and therefore the term "lawyer" has to be defined restrictively. That is not really how things work here where "lawyer" is a loose non-technical term. Francis Davey 08:58, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

That's an interesting difference and one that I was unaware of even after reading all those books and articles I cited in the article (the difference was probably edited out by helpful American editors trying to make their books more accessible to American lawyers). In the United States, we do not refer to legislators, legislative aides, law clerks, or judges as lawyers when they are working in those other capacities. In fact, our professional responsibility rules are quite clear that a judge cannot practice as a lawyer while serving on the bench. By taking the oath and putting on the robe, he becomes a judge and loses his status as a lawyer. Then when he retires and goes back into private practice, he becomes a lawyer again. Similarly, a law clerk cannot practice law while working for a judge. And so on.

It sounds like what you're saying is that the term as used in England and Wales is comparable to the broad civil law term "jurist" and that it refers to anyone who's law-trained. Now that I'm aware of the difference, I'll start looking for sources that explain it and planning a rewrite of the first few paragraphs. Of course, if you know of any books in England that explain the difference and could provide a citation to a specific page, that would be helpful. --Coolcaesar 16:44, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the difficulty is that "lawyer" doesn't have a precise meaning in England and Wales and this is, in turn, because it doesn't matter very much. Since we don't have any legally defined notion of "practicing law", the concept never has to be sharpened. I suspect that "lawyer" is a rather fuzzy-edged concept here. The sharp concepts are the professions, such as "solicitor" or "barrister", and it is pretty clear when someone is a member of one of those professions and whether they are, or are not, acting within the compass of their profession by their profession's rules. Francis Davey 19:15, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the more I think about it, I'll take your word for it for now and adjust the article to indicate the dialect difference but I'll keep looking for a source to back this up. --Coolcaesar 16:10, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Canada

There's a slight mistake with regards to the legal profession in Canada. To be clear, in order to practice law in Quebec you need a BCL. In the rest of Canada you need an LLB. Its true that McGill University (Located in Montreal, Quebec) offers a joint LLB/BCL programme. However it should be understood that ONLY a BCL is required to practice in Quebec, and ONLY an LL.B is required to practice in the rest of the country. The combined programme simply allows for the possibility that the student will, upon graduation, be able to choose any jurisdiction in Canada to pursue a career. One other thing...it should be mentioned that like Quebec, the State of Louisiana is a Civil Law Jurisdiction - Loomis51 21:15, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

University of Ottawa (located in Ottawa, Ontario) offers a similar program.

There should be a slight correction to this page, the Oxford BCL is no longer a two year degree, and has not been a two year course for some time. The two year course is the BCL, MPhil. The BCL being solely a one year course which can be taken by non Oxford graduates in one year. As a student about to commence the BCL, but with a law degree from another University I may attest to this. (see www.ox.ac.uk). Cambridge also is slightly different from the normal UK system- I have also made this correction.

By removing Greg Palast from the lawyer article you are destroying the wiki's credibility and leaving the number of lawyers in the US as a figure for which we list no source. Although I agree that Palast is not the ideal source for this figure, he is better than no source at all. Susan Mason

Oh yeah, that is the only piece of information on Wikipedia that is now not attributed to an outside source. Salsa Shark 06:49 Mar 19, 2003 (UTC)

The fact that the wiki is largely unsubstantied is no reason to purge it of what little references there are. Susan Mason

I tend to agree with Susan on this one, oddly enough. The fact that few articles have attributed tidbits does not mean this particular one should not. A better goal would be to get information from a more credible source, and cite that. -- cprompt

Oddly enough, I continue to agree with myself despite Cprompt's assertation of his viewpoint. The Greg Palast article should be removed only after we have obtained a more official statement. Susan Mason

---

I put a little bit in on the current problems the legal profession is facing. Specifically how the legal profession's reputation has taken a hit in recent times. Such as the acts of ambulance chaser sand the health care crisis. I know there are many good and hardworking attorneys out there who only want to protect the legal rights of others. But there are others out there who are only in it for the money, and love getting their hands of large cash settlements, which they take a large part of. I think in the interests of NPOV, we need to devote part of the article to current issues facing us.

JesseG 04:11, Aug 28, 2004 (UTC)

I re-wrote this section somewhat to make it clear and also to try to minimise some generalisations. The consequences of ambulance chasers may not be as readily identified as you suggested. --195.166.17.214 09:54, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Section about Lawyers in the US

Specifically, the paragraph that deals with lawyers/capita in the us

Could an argument be made also that the presence of a Common Law system almost mandates a larger legal sector as most law is judge-made and thus subject to interpretation? Contrasted with the civil law system, where laws are more codified and thus the size of the legal profession managing these laws isn't as great, this could account for the greater proportions of lawyers in a Common law nation. Additionally, since the US is a common law system with the largest number of internal political divisions (i.e. 50 states) and a federalist system of government, it would seem that a larger legal profession would be almost a foregone conclusion.

do you think this argument is something that should be added?

what happened to the poland section now we have no representation of civil law countries in this article. Paladine

It was still there. Anon removed Wiki markup, thus section from TOC disappeared, but data was still there. Reverted. Przepla 19:11, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Lawyers??

I didn't understand a thing on this page. Perhaps because it was written by lawyers? ;) Details about law practices in US/UK/Pol should be moved to a separate article and more text should be devoted to the profession and history. Nichalp 20:02, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're getting at; the page is no more unreadable than other Wikipedia pages on other professions like "Physician."

In my opinion, the page, as is, does a decent job explaining what a lawyer is at present, what they do, and how to become one.

If the page were to be rewritten to focus on the history of the profession, that would actually make it much harder to understand, for virtually everyone but lawyers. The profession has changed radically depending upon which country and time period you are talking about. Although modern American lawyers like to see themselves as the intellectual descendants of the great Roman orators, they have very little in common except for their general responsibility to advocate on behalf of specific named clients.

And if you're talking about law as a profession in the strictly "professional" sense, I'm not sure what you're getting at. The professional responsibility of lawyers is an important topic, but not appropriate for this article. It's really a subject of legal ethics, which most non-lawyers find boring.

--Coolcaesar 03:19, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)

POV section on tort reform

The section discussing tort reform etc. seems highly biased towards support for lawyers and high damage awards. David.Monniaux 11:49, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I've attempted to address the issues slightly, though I am by no means an expert in the field, other than knowing a physician that has been the subject of (what he describes as) frivolous tort claims. The person in question firmly believes that tort is at least partially responsible for recent increases in premiums. --Bletch 22:03, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

In my reading, the first paragraph now seems predominantly unbiased, but the second paragraph still uses politically-based terminology ("big business," a favorite for liberals like myself--but no place here) --Bastique 16:28, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I took a bit of a heavy hand to the article and rewote a bit of the first paragraph and just excised the second. If you think it can be saved, feel free to rewrite it.

In the United States, judges, lawyers and jurors give power to each individual to appear before the court; allowing one person to stand against a government, a big business or an insurance company to fight for what rightfully belongs to that individual, whether it be against a large business who has injured a worker, an insurance company that refuses to pay out a fair premium for an accident, or a government that seeks to take away civil rights. Of particular importance to the system of law is the juror. Each member of every jury holds the power of the Constitution in his or her hands, and the knowledge that the system works because that juror has given his or her valuable time to make it work. Most jurors take this responsibility very seriously, as each juror realizes, at some point in one's life, one may be required to depend upon a jury of one's peers to adjudicate a case at bar.

--CVaneg 20:19, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Right to counsel

I wonder which were the first countries:

• To allow the defendant in trials for severe crimes to have a lawyer. If I understand it correctly, in England, before the Prisoners' Counsel Act of 1836, felony defendants could not have a lawyer in court. This probably extended to other common law countries.
• To mandate, in such trials, that the defendant should have a lawyer, and to appoint a lawyer if he did not have one. In France, this was mandated in the Napoleonic Code of Criminal Instruction.
• I'm unsure about US courts at the time. It seems that the right to counsel was a much later addition when it came to trials in state courts. One finds a mention of a 1853 Indiana Supreme Court decision declaring it a right, and a 1963 US Supreme Court decision making it a right for some crimes even in trials under state law. [5].

David.Monniaux 07:12, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Criticisms section missing?

A lawyer was in the #Wikipedia channel talking, and I was wondering why lawyers are so disliked (and also why jews are so disliked as well in society, I plan to go there next to check out the roots of antisemitism but anyway...) I see there is no criticism or public opinion section in this article to my disapointment. I think the article is unbalanced unless we give the factual account of how the public seems to dislike lawyers (almost as disliked as politicians are they not?). We'll find some polls and other info hopefully to flesh out the facts and add it to the article :). --ShaunMacPherson 06:24, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree; I'd imagine that crticisms toward law are rooted in a realization of how law becomes more about a game rather than justice. I'd like to see more too, but I just removed a section that was original research. --Bletch 22:57, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I wonder if something should be added about lawyer criticism... not about the actual profession, but about the beliefs that lawyers are usually distasteful human beings. They can regularily be found on internet discussion boards, arguing rudely about mundane things. Being a lawyer may appear to be a profession that involves lying and cheating others in order to enhance an already huge bank account. Peoplesunionpro 19:29, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Unless you can support your overbroad assertion (frankly, ridiculous on its face) with a citation to a reliable, neutral, verifiable source like the Wall Street Journal or Time magazine, your baseless innuendo is original research and is inappropriate for Wikipedia. If inserted into the article without adequate support, your assertion will be treated as vandalism and reverted immediately. Also, Wikipedia is not a soapbox. See Wikipedia core content policies like Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not.

There are legitimate critiques of the legal profession and the article already summarizes such criticism with numerous citations to well-known sources like the National Post.--Coolcaesar 05:14, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Removed Original Research

I've removed the following section under the heading 'public opinion':

Lawyers are also the object of scorn in many lawyer jokes and are usually identified one of the more disliked profession, often just a head of politician. The reasons for this dislike are numerious and varied although cheif among them could be that: defense lawyers are seen as helping morally corrupt individuals get off on technalities, that in the american adveserial system the object isnt truth but 'winning' and that lawyers play fast and loose with the truth.

This low opinion is somewhat paradoxical in that many lawyers enter the profession because of a desire to help for and advocate on behalf of individual and their freedoms. It could be that in a nonloser pays system in America, the fear of the large cost of being sued (since you lose money even if you 'win') translates into a fear and dislike of lawyers.

I've had some mixed feelings about removing this; as the first paragraph has some truth to it, though the second paragraph is a bit more argumentative. --Bletch 22:52, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why can't this section be properly written. I take issue with the silly and factless comments made here and the attacks on the legal profession.

Please clean up your act.

Tim

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Thank you for your suggestion regarding [[: regarding [[:{{{1}}}]]]]! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make whatever changes you feel are needed. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the Edit this page link at the top. You don't even need to log in! (Although there are some reasons why you might like to…) The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes—they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome.

---

How can I find the definitions of New Zealand terminology. Is it the same as the british system? I understand the difference between solictor and barristor but what is the definition of attorney? C Nicol

Benefits of Admission

Fascinating revert to omit "permission to practice law" from the "Benefits of admission" section. Real contribution there. (Sixten8 06:22, 4 August 2005 (UTC))

I see your point. I will add that text back in, but I believe the existing text about the bar identification numbers should stay. Unauthorized practice of law (the problem of "fake lawyers") is a serious problem in the most populated states like California and New York. --Coolcaesar 23:10, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Neutrality?

Is there really a necessity for the neutrality disputement in the Current Issues section?

Why this passage had to go...

I just removed the following paragraph:

In recent years, there has sometimes been competition for graduates of first and second tier law schools such that various mega firms in New York City and other large U.S. cities hired graduates of Canadian top tier law schools in preference over graduates of U.S. third tier law schools.

I read Law.com regularly (as well as the ABA Journal, and the Daily Journal, the main legal newspaper in California) and I have never seen anything about such a bizarre trend over the past 3 years. Law.com is the online operation of American Lawyer Media, which publishes American Lawyer magazine and the National Law Journal.

Of course, self-authenticating assertions can stay on Wikipedia, but this is a rather daring assertion that frankly, sounds ridiculous. After all, Canadian law is quite different from American law, both in terms of substantive rules and preferred writing styles. Until someone can bring in a citation to prove it, I think it has to stay out of the article. --Coolcaesar 04:38, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

One citation would include the following off the official University of Ottawa Faculty of Law website:

http://www.commonlaw.uottawa.ca/eng/student_services/career/handbook/ch4_job_market.htm

"Going South of the Border

Canadian law students at the top of their class are increasingly sought after by major firms in New York, and to a lesser extent, Boston. Currently, US firms conduct OCIs at McGill University and the University of Toronto early in the fall semester. The rigorous legal training, lavish monetary compensation, and prestige of working on some of the world's major transactions are but a few of the highlights offered south of the border. As well, students may seek work in the US to gain international experience and contacts which they intend to bring back with them when they return to Canada. On the other hand, the demanding hours, fast pace, and intensity of the work will certainly not be for everyone. Typically, competition is fierce, with firms getting thousands of applications from law students across the US. For more information the CDRC has a copy of the National Association for Law Placement's NALP Directory of Legal Employers 2002-2003, as well as copies of the New York Law Journal available for in-office viewing."

user:Aquarius rising

Right, but that's a rather subjective observation by one law school's career services office. Do you have any citations to legal newspapers or magazines to demonstrate that point? --Coolcaesar 13:55, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

This article is a mess

Hello everyone:

At 38 kilobytes, I think we are getting to the point where the Lawyer article has to be broken up into separate articles.

Here is my suggestion for how to break it up:

Lawyer becomes a very general description of what lawyers do. I mean REALLY general. Maybe we can have one description for what common law lawyers do and another for civil law lawyers. And then all the other messy details (education, admission, career path, statistics, etc.) should be shunted off to country-specific articles. Like Lawyers in the United States, Lawyers in Poland, etc.

Some things (like freeways) are similar enough around the world to remain mostly together in one article, but I think the whole concept of what it means to be a lawyer is different enough from one country to the next that it has to be broken up. Otherwise, people will keep on wandering in and adding stuff, and we will end up with a 200KB overview of lawyering in 55 countries which no one will actually read.

What does everyone think?

--Coolcaesar 04:44, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

Complete Rewrite / Request for Split

I propose a rewrite of this article. I have copied the wiki to a new sandbox on my user page, see it here User:Davidkinnen/Legal Sandbox I also propose country specific information be split off into seperate pages. I have already started to create country specific pages. Davidkinnen 13:29, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

I have rewritten this page and have hived off some sections onto their own pages. You can see them at:

• Lawyers in Poland
• Attorney at Law
• Education of Lawyers in the United States

I propose creating the following pages:

• Education of Lawyers (general article)

Davidkinnen 09:51, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Generally a good idea, I think. If I were trying to reasearch "education of lawyers in the UK" on the current page I would have to look at several different sections, and still would not have found any references to the LPC or articles, which together make up a whole 3 years of the qualification process. (Sorry, I know I'm using the old terminology.) Davidkinnen, let me know when you hive off that page (or section in your Education of lawyers page) and I will be happy to add my twopennorth to it. And I promise to use the current terminology, too. AndyJones 20:16, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, the split I suggested sort of went okay, except not quite the way I contemplated. For example, the article title above actually should be Education of lawyers in the United States; WP style is to capitalize only proper nouns and the first word of the article title, not every noun. Yes, I know that's weird, but the vast majority of pages are already set up with headings and article titles that style, and the Manual of Style reflects that, so we should be consistent. --Coolcaesar 05:57, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I see. Perhaps I should start an Education of lawyers in England and Wales, pulling all the necessary information out of Lawyer then padding it with the bits which are missing. Lawyers from other jurisdictions can add their articles as they see fit. How about and Educuation of lawyers disambiguation? At present it would only have two links, but I'm sure Canada, Scotland and Singapore, and then others, will leap in once they realise articles are needed.

Lawyer Jokes

Forgive the flippant comment, but do you think there's room for something on Lawyer Humour? It's a genre of humour that represents something of public opinion of the trade. Could be a useful (and dare I say, entertaining) addition to the article. --Sweet-indigo 15:54, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

I doubt it. Nearly all lawyer jokes are probably in violation of Wikipedia's neutrality and notability policies (that is, they are neither neutral nor notable). However, a mention of some of the more famous cultural references to lawyers might be appropriate, such as the famous line from Hamlet about "Let's kill all the lawyers," which was actually spoken by one of the bad guys. --Coolcaesar 21:06, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, although not in Hamlet but in Henry VI Part II. I do agree something about the negative reputation of lawyers (as evidenced in lawyer jokes) is necessary. AndyJones 20:08, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

Just a suggestion: Why doesn't someone start a new entry/page titled "lawyer jokes". By any lawyer's reasoning that avoids the neutrality requirement and "notable", well, it is an entire subgenre of the art of humor (how's that for loaded phrasing?).

The problem is that lawyer humor is very cultural-specific, since legal practice varies so much from one country to the next. A brief yet comprehensive and accurate analysis of the issue could be done only by someone with knowledge of legal practice in many countries as well as lawyer jokes in those countries. There are only a few hundred people in the world who are knowledgeable enough to do that without having to do any special research. I could theoretically do it, but it would take me about 10 hours of research to get it right, and there are more fun things I'd rather research for WP.

I'm not really terribly keen on the idea. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and a page of jokes doesn't sound very encyclopedic, however you dress it up. Agree with (not sure who, possibly Coolcaesar) above that lawyer jokes on both sides of the atlantic are very different in their focus. AndyJones 17:00, 7 November 2005 (UTC)