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Thursday, March 02, 2006
Do Lawyers Adopt the Values of their Clients?
Lawyers are masters at building arguments. But is it possible that the most artful arguments they construct are the rationalizations they tell themselves as they carry out the economic agendas of their business clients?
In their recently published book, Urban Lawyers: The New Social Structure of the Bar, distinguished legal sociologists John Heinz (Northwestern Law), Robert Nelson (American Bar Foundation / Northwestern Sociology), Rebecca Sandefur (Stanford Sociology), and Edward Laumann present carefully assembled empirical evidence that suggests that lawyers' political views tend to reflect their clients’ economic interests. Further, this situation is not necessarily the result of self-selection.
To understand their findings, a few background facts are in order. Urban Lawyers is a replication of a Heinz’s and Laumann’s seminal Chicago Lawyers study, which was originally published in 1982. Drawing upon detailed interviews of approximately 700 practicing attorneys, Chicago Lawyers presented a comprehensive analysis of the social structure of the Chicago bar. Its most famous finding was the “two hemisphere” thesis, which concluded that the Chicago bar was functionally divided into two distinct sectors defined by a lawyer’s clients. One hemisphere served organizational clients (primarily corporations) and the other provided personal legal services to individuals.
Comparing the 1975 and 1995 samples, the 1995 group was slightly more likely to identify themselves as Democrats. (This is not surprising since the Daley political machine had alienated many liberals in the 1970s.) Yet, on a series of questions designed to measure their attitudes on various economic issues, the 1995 Chicago lawyers were:
• more content with the society’s distribution of wealth;
• less in favor in of government invention for the poor, disadvantaged and unemployed;
• less supportive of equal access to healthcare;
• less supportive of organized labor;
• less concerned about concentrations of power in the hands of a few companies.
Of course, between 1975 and 1995, the country as a whole became more conservative, right? The authors acknowledge that possibility. Yet, this finding was particularly interesting. Drawing on national survey data of the general population, the authors note that in 1975, 78 percent of the public agreed with assertion that too much power is consolidated in the hands of a few large companies, compared to 58 percent of Chicago lawyers. However, when the same question was posed in 1995, 75 percent of the general public held this position (-3 percent) compared to 31 percent of Chicago lawyers (-27 percent).
What accounts for this large divergence of opinion? One possibility is a large shift in client base of the typical Chicago lawyer. Although the division between organizational and personal services lawyers still persists, the “hemisphere” appellation, as in “half,” no longer applies. In 1975, 53 percent of Chicago lawyers worked primarily for business clients. By 1995, this number increased to 64 percent. Further, with a surge in the demand for corporate legal services, large Chicago corporate law firms extended their recruitment efforts to regional law schools–i.e., students who are, as a group, less socioeconomically privileged than their elite law school counterparts. Using regression analysis, the authors also observe that various law practice variables, such as income and practice setting, have modest predictive power for attitudes on economic issues but no predictive power on social issues such as abortion and affirmative action.
Arguably, these results are consistent with a theory of economic materialism. And as I have followed various developments in the legal profession, I grow more concerned. As my time at PrawfsBlawg winds down, in a later post I will attempt to apply this framework to a contemporary issue confronting the legal profession.
By the way, Urban Lawyers is an excellent book for those interested in the social and economic forces currently shaping the legal profession. I highly recommend it.
Posted by Bill Henderson on March 2, 2006 at 05:45 PM in Law and Politics | Permalink
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Comments
Snowball, you raise a good question. A simple proportion analysis (i.e., the proportion of Chicago went up 22% between 1975 and 1995) might explain about half the attitude migration. A nationwide political shift would explain a bit more. So something else might be going on.
In fact, Heinz et al. note that the youngest lawyers (< 32 years old) are quite conservative as a group. When I went to law school at Chicago, law & economics was built into virtually every course (though the L&E label was seldom discussed). Certainly L&E has influenced how I look at the world. At most law schools, L&E has become the dominant way to frame policy discussions, at least for business law, contracts, and torts. And that might produce young lawyers with views on economic policy that might be categorized as more conservative.
Of course, there is nothing sinister about this outcome. If there is a cogent countervailing view, scholars are free to make it. That might explain the new interest in the law & socioeconomics movement.
Posted by: William Henderson | Mar 3, 2006 9:24:49 AM
I wonder to what extent the shifts in legal education over the last 30 years have led to the shifts in lawyers' attitudes on economic issues?
After 3 years of being taught law and economics dogma (especially if it wasn't taught very well), shouldn't young lawyers be expected to take a more conservative or libertarian view on economic issues?
Posted by: snowball | Mar 3, 2006 2:12:33 AM
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