Lookie! I'm thinking like a lawyer!

[kellinator]

I was just printing out an article for a professor and happened to read the first sentence or so:

"Law professors often tell first-year students that they should concentrate less on learning the rules of a particular subject, such as property or contracts, and more on the elusive goal of 'thinking like a lawyer.' Entering students, whose impressions of law school may have been shaped by popular culture, often believe their teachers."

Something about that pop culture bit got me thinking... Let me try this.

"Dammit, the ethics committee called again. My assistant is hot. I wonder what I can do today to piss my boss off. I think I'll drink some Scotch."

No, dammit, that's just thinking like Jack McCoy.

This would have been a better entry if I had written a bunch of those and let you guess who I was thinking like, but unfortunately I've just realized that that's really just about it for me and TV lawyers. Now, if they were cops...

Comments

[bossieboots.livejournal.com]

I prefer to think like Jack Malone.

"My life is in the toilet."

[lunza.livejournal.com]

You forgot:

"The bastard's guilty, but I'll take the case so I can get famous."

[raistlinbrown.livejournal.com]

I grew up watching L.A. Law, and that made me want to be a lawyer. Then I remembered all that hard work in The Paper Chase, and my laziness won out.

[teague.livejournal.com]

Could be worse...

"I like bugs. I really like bugs more than people. Damn, both of my subordinates are hot, but I relate to bugs so much better. Why am I interogating a suspect? That's a cop's job..."

heh heh. Can you maybe guess that character?

[chicating.livejournal.com]

I could think like Clair. "Dang. I know I shouldn't have let go of my transit pass."
I'm a sick motherfucker. I love Claire and I couldn't resist.

[sertrel.livejournal.com]

Tee hee. There's always thinking like Casey Novak. I usually have to drink at least six or sesven drinks before I get to that level, though. =)

Thinking like a lawyer:

[gamgee.livejournal.com]

I'm standing in Party Barn (yes, a drive-through beer place), picking up a few cases of beer and a mini-keg for my law journal's after-exams/final edit party with the editor-in-chief of the journal and another staff editor that is a friend of mine.

I look up and they've got a calender on the wall with the date on it, but the year is 1983. Oh, it's one of those "you've got to be this old" signs. But--and this next bit I said out loud before I realized I was speaking--"huh... that calender acts as a cheet sheet for undergrads that can't hack it in math."

This leads to someone pointing out the "The clerk may be an undercover officer" sign. I turn to my two friends and say, "Wait, you know the urban legend that if you ask an undercover cop if he's a cop, he has to say yes, right? The one that's bullshit."

"Yeah, it's crap. Why?"

"Well, let's say that happens. Then the cop (1) [yes, I enumerated while talking] made a material representation (2) upon which you reasonably (3) relied, (4) to your detriment when you get fined."

"Wait... you're going after a promissory estoppel claim?"

"Yeah. Why not."

And it was another half an hour before I suddenly said "Oh. Sole proximate cause. You can't make the claim because, while you reasonably relied, the misrepresentation didn't proximately cause your fine. Your interceeding wrongful act did."

To which, from my two passengers comes a chorus of "Darn!"




Oh, and that whole thing about learning to think like a lawyer and not learning the elements of the actual substantive theories... it's horseshit. First year exams are all about spotting the issues and then walking through the elements.