Vol. 1, No. 5 (July 1991), pp. 76-78

JUDGES AND LAWYERS: THE HUMAN SIDE OF JUSTICE by Paul Wice. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1991. 350 pp.

Reviewed by Donald D. Landon, Department of Sociology and Anthro- pology, Southwest Missouri State University.

With the burgeoning public interest in the work of justice officials, it is not surprising that a book purporting to be a humanistic account of the lives and work of judges and lawyers should appear. Paul Wice has set out to write an alternative textbook to the many texts on the legal system which emphasize "jurisprudential, historical, legalistic, procedural and struc- tural approaches." His intention is to write an account which emphasizes a more "humanistic and social-psychological perspec- tive."

That perspective leads Wice to discuss the hazards of the case method in law school classrooms, the problems of breaking into the job market, early career socialization, the modal personality characteristics of lawyers, varieties of judicial personalities, the negative impact of the heavy workload on a lawyer's private life, and the strains and hardships of serving in the judiciary.

The strength of the book includes its good organization and completeness of coverage. The lawyer's career is examined from the earliest days in law school through types of practice avail- able, their economic rewards, social status and client interac- tions. Similarly the work of judges is detailed in an informative and orderly manner. An excellent chapter on legal ethics and regulating the profession identifies the ethical risks entailed in various practice settings. The chapter on the art of judging provides a useful inventory of the nature and variety of judicial tasks.

While it is not clear to this reviewer what kind of a course would utilize this kind of text, the effort to build a more "humanistic" account of law careers is laudable. But it is precisely the effort to produce a unique "humanistic" approach that creates the greatest problems for the author. Scholarly studies of the humanistic dimension of lawyering and judging are few and far between. There are novels, memoirs and television dramas, some of which Wice cites but relatively little empirical data on the social-psychological dimensions of legal careers. The paucity of this kind of material makes Wice's venture risky at the outset and allows stereotypical understandings to fill the empirical vacuum.

In many instances the author attempts to fill in the empiri- cal gaps by reference to his own general research experience which includes interviews with over 500 judges and lawyers and observing courtroom proceedings in fifteen U.S. cities over the last 20 years. Unfortunately the author frequently gives a great deal of personal opinion on substantive issues but relatively little empirical data. For example, he offers a Taxonomy of Judicial Personalities which categorizes judges as Routinizers, Educators, Humanists, and Advocates. The only documentation he provides for the taxonomy is "20 years of personal courtroom observations."

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Similarly the author attempts to provide a personality assessment of lawyers. He describes the "modal personality" of lawyers as containing three substantive qualities: (l) a strong ego with extroverted demeanor, (2) an aggressive or contentious disposition, and (3) a skeptical or cynical nature. He offers as evidence for this "modal personality" the combina- tion of his "work on criminal lawyers with a review of the literature." The only literature cited as evidence was a study published 34 years ago on the effect of legal education on lawyer attitudes. So it appears that the effort to create a "uniquely humanistic" portrayal of lawyers and judges has forced Wice to rely exces- sively on the authority of his own opinions. Throughout the text descriptive detail of lawyers' personalities, perceptions and feelings are detailed without any anchoring documentation. In one instance he gives a detailed account of the layman's view of the life and work of judges without providing a shred of evidence to support the description. If the value of a textbook lies, in part, in its carefully documented arguments, this book falls short of the mark.

One of the most serious shortcomings of the book is its injudicious use of very dated studies. For example, Wice's description of the sole practitioner relies almost exclusively
on Carlin's LAWYERS ON THEIR OWN published almost 30 years ago and limited to a single setting (Chicago). Identifying problems of the unfitness of lower court judges, the author cites a study 23 years old. Discussing "current trends in judicial conduct," Wice relies on a study published 20 years ago. The description of the work of a senior law firm partner is based on a study published 25 years ago. The discussion of the cost of legal services is based on a study published 25 years ago. A lengthy description of Washington lawyers is based on data between 13 and 20 years old. Robert Nelson's definitive work on Washington lawyers was published only three years ago but is not mentioned in that discussion.

Some of the citations reveal a less than careful checking of facts. For example, on page 96 Wice describes the efforts of the legal profession to deal with its ethical problems and indicates the ABA responded by adopting "a new Code of Professional Respon- sibility in 1969." He makes no reference to the fact that the current Model Rules of Professional Conduct replaced the Code in 1983.

Or similarly, the author uses a study of divorce lawyers (O'Gorman) published 27 years ago as the authority for defining "the major professional dilemma facing divorce lawyers." That dilemma, he quotes from O'Gorman, is that "they are obligated to uphold laws whose deficiencies they acknowledge and lament, (and) they represent clients whose problems they are expected to solve without violating laws or professional ethics." O'Gorman, of course, is commenting on the difficulties faced by divorce lawyers operating under the then current adversarial law of divorce for whom the task was to prove fault, e.g., mental cruelty, adultery, etc. as required by law. The whole exercise of proving fault when none existed made a sham of the law and judicial

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proceedings which both lawyers and judges acknowledged. With the move to "no-fault" divorce laws in most jurisdictions that particular dilemma declined in importance. But the citation of O'Gorman reveals a carelessness in applying research findings which compromise the value of the text.

The stated objectives of the book provide the opportunity for a creative summary essay on the humanistic dimensions of lawyering and judging. Unfortunately, no such essay or concluding chapter appear. The book ends abruptly with a chapter on the strains and hardships of judging.

The back cover description of the book's content opens with the statement "Here's a text that does justice to the legal profession." The book falls a bit short of that claim.