

"...the bar always wins": Are lawyers evil? - Jun8
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/06/opinion/dickens-v-lawyers.html?_r=1&hp

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Jun8
In the current public imagination, the highest circle of "evil" is generally
reserved for bankers, financiers, etc. who "suck the blood" of the public,
causing irreversible damage to companies and causing country-wide (and
sometime world-wide) recessions. The lawyers are not as vilified as they were
in Dickens' time.

"Samuel Johnson, the great critic who himself once hoped to enter the bar,
knew better: “A lawyer has no business with the justice or injustice of the
cause” — that is “to be decided by the judge.” The best means we have of
discovering truth is to take opposing sides and let them tango. If a lawyer
had to believe in the client’s cause, most people would go undefended."

I cannot wrap my mind around this concept, which seems not only wrong in an
operational sense (i.e. does not lead to best working legal system) but also
wrong morally, which may or may not be an issue.

Can the lawyers on HN clarify if indeed this is the prevalent mentality?

