Can an Effective Lawyer be a Morally Upstanding Person? An Examination of Legal Ethics (thesis)
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Author
Torbert, James Holland
Subject
Washington and Lee University -- Honors in Philosophy
Legal ethics
Conduct of life
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Honors thesis; [FULL-TEXT WILL BE AVAILABLE FOLLOWING A 5-YEAR EMBARGO] James Holland Torbert is a member of the Class of 2023 of Washington and Lee University. In this essay, I will analyze various scholarly responses to a widely debated question within legal ethics: does the lawyer's role mint permissions to violate ordinary morality? I will begin with a brief introduction to ordinary morality. I will then propose the idea of role obligations and offer a few commonly accepted views of role obligations. In the next section, I will move into various responses to the overarching question of the thesis presented by legal ethicists William Simon, Bradley Wendel, Tim Dare, and Charles Fried. I will first offer Simon's conception of Substantivism and critique of Positivism. Next, I will offer Wendel's critique of 'the Substantive' and defense of 'Fidelity to Law.' I will then move to Dare's 'Standard Conception of Law' and Fried's 'Lawyer as Friend'. In the next section, I will offer two
commonly debated cases within legal ethics and apply the views I offer from Simon, Wendel, Dare, and Fried to each case. In the next section, I will raise the economic inequality objection to Dare, Wendel, and Fried offered by Sung Hui Kim. Finally, I will explain why this thesis is relevant to lawyering today and the importance of the economic inequality objection in reshaping discussions around ethical lawyering. [From introductory section]