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A Hearing For YOU? Well . . . Not Really!

For a long time the nation's oldest chartered bar association, the Philadelphia Bar Association, has been pretty much solidly liberal, as in all liberal, all the way, on all issues, all the time with no disagreement sought, invited or encouraged.

As awful as this may sound for an organization of lawyers (people who are charged with hearing at least two sides to every story, if not 200) we're here to tell you this is not really that unusual. Save for pockets of resistance in some parts of the midwest, south and west, America's organized bar has been largely radicalized and is in the control of lefties. In fact, the American Bar Association (ABA) itself is one of the most left-leaning organizations in the country. And, lawyers themselves (led largely by trial lawyers) have consistently been among the largest contributors to the Democrat Party and its candidates.
This didn't happen overnight.
It started gradually in the 1970s and 1980s as boomers began to come of age. And, as these same boomers succeeded in the legal profession and gathered more money and influence, this trend advanced rapidly into the 21st century. At the national, state and even local levels, bar associations were pushed further and further to the left.We know because we were there to witness it. We watched it. We saw it happen, closeup and personal.
It wasn't (and isn't) a pretty sight because it brought with it the same condescension, the same self-appointed elitism and the same intolerance for diverse views that define modern day liberalism.

And nowhere was this more prevalent than at the historic Philadelphia Bar Association whose founders included some of the very people who signed the sacred documents which created our democracy and supposedly guaranteed free speech and the full airing of all points of view, no matter how contrary or controversial.
And, sadly this intransigence remains the case today as that same association is firmly entrenched in the liberal camp.
But, why take our word for it? Listen to what Philadelphia Daily News columnist Christine Flowers has to say about it:

I’ve never been a member of the Philadelphia Bar Association, even though I was once on the editorial board of its professional journal, the Philadelphia Lawyer Magazine. But I never chose to pay dues and officially align myself with the association because, when I started practicing law in the early 1990s, it was clear there was no place for me at the table, let alone the “bar.”

As a conservative woman who believed abortion was both immoral and legally indefensible, it was impossible to feel welcomed or respected in an organization that had become increasingly left-leaning. This did not surprise me. Even my Catholic alma mater, the one with the crucifixes in the classrooms, wasn’t outspoken in its advocacy for the unborn. I recall a constitutional law class in which the teacher sped through the landmark Roe v. Wade decision as if he were embarrassed to focus on the ethics of killing what many of us considered babies. 

I haven’t given thought to the bar association these past few years. They do their thing, I do mine. For example, at 11 a.m. Tuesday, I’ll be speaking at a rally in the state Capitol rotunda in Harrisburg in support of pro-life legislation, such as Senate Bill 3, which would ban abortions after 20 weeks (they currently are permitted until 24 weeks) and criminalize dismemberment abortions. The rally also will support the defunding of Planned Parenthood, which is the nation’s single most prolific provider of abortions.

That’s my thing, which I doubt will interest many of the people who paid $65 a head to attend a reception at the Bellevue on Friday honoring Carol Tracy, executive director of the Women’s Law Project. Tracy is this year’s recipient of the Sandra Day O’Connor award, which the bar association presents to a female attorney “who has demonstrated superior legal talent, achieved significant legal accomplishments, and has furthered the advancement of women in both the profession and the community.” 

In an email news release, the association said Tracy was chosen for the award because she has led “major legal victories on the national scale in women’s reproductive rights, violence against women, and other areas of women’s rights, including serving as co-counsel in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case Planned Parenthood v. Casey.”

Click here to read the rest of Christine Flowers' superb column.

Sadly, 'An Obstructionist Approach To Government' . . .

Today, Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Val DiGiorgio released the following statement on Senator Bob Casey’s decision to oppose Judge Neil Gorsuch’s Supreme Court nomination:

“Senator Casey has again aligned himself with the far left. In choosing to oppose Judge Neil Gorsuch’s Supreme Court nomination, Bob Casey is directly disrespecting the will of Pennsylvania voters. These voters gave President Trump the chance to nominate Judge Gorsuch — a mainstream conservative who American Bar Association unanimously gave its highest rating of ‘well-qualified.’

“More concerning, Bob Casey has not stated whether or not he will join the Senate Democrats’ filibuster attempt to deny Judge Gorsuch an up or down vote by the entire Senate. This obstructionist approach to governing will not forgotten by Pennsylvania voters when they go to the polls in 2018.”

Hillary Gets Civil Rights Icon Medgar Evers' Name Wrong

Hillary Clinton spoke to a group of liberal worshipers Monday night at the ABA Annual Meeting in leftist-bastion San Francisco. The ABA has been in the hip pocket of the Democrat Party for many decades now, so nobody there would dare dispute anything she says.
It's all so perfect for the woman who apparently longs to be called Madame President.
Just one problem here: Even with a teleprompter, Hillary doesn't know what (or who) the heck she's talkin about.

ABA Pushes For Gay Marriage Nationwide

From CNS News:
The American Bar Association (ABA) adopted a resolution this week calling for same-sex marriage nationwide, and urging government at every level to “eliminate” any restrictions on homosexual unions.
The ABA’s policy-making House of Delegates adopted Resolution 111, which states: “RESOLVED, That the American Bar Association urges state, territorial, and tribal governments to eliminate all of their legal barriers to civil marriage between two persons of the same sex who are otherwise eligible to marry.”
The only voice of opposition came from former Ohio Bar Association President Leslie Jacobs, who said that it would be “cowardice” for him to remain silent about the issue. Jacobs urged his ABA colleagues to avoid overreaching into areas of contentious social policy.
“We owe it to this House [of Delegates] to avoid action that would jeopardize the Association,” he said. “I personally believe it can be suicidal for the House to defer to an impulse to impose social and political and cultural values on the entire membership of the ABA – rather than to reflect some clear consensus of the bar.”
“When an attitudinal value is not broadly shared, and when people of goodwill have sharply divergent views that are fundamental and – frankly – irreconcilable, it is axiomatic I believe that lawyers will be found not only to disagree with each other but to be engaged as advocates on both sides of the proposition on the merits, whether in litigation or in legislation,” Jacobs said. . . .
Douglas Napier, senior legal counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, told CNSNews.com that Jacobs’ caution was well founded, adding that the ABA had gone “far afield” of its founding mission to address issues affecting the legal community.
“They [the ABA] aren’t speaking for the majority of attorneys,” Napier said. “They don’t represent the majority of attorneys in the United States, yet they put themselves out as the voice of the American legal profession.
“This is just another very, very clear indication that they’re out of sync with the majority of Americans and that they don’t speak for American attorneys,” said Napier. . . .
For the entire story see CNS News.

'Reply All' Threatens Career

From ABA Journal:
Observers are openly wondering how long an unidentified first-year associate at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges will hold his job, after reading a jaw-dropping e-mail thread. It began with a partner's standard-issue firmwide proclamation of victory on Friday in a federal court case involving the trademark rights of the Washington Redskins.
Responding in a series of lengthy e-mails, the associate questioned the morality of the firm's representation of a football team named in a manner that is offensive to a number of Americans—and, after discussing the perceived issue in detail, apparently hit the "reply all" key. This prompted another partner, in response to the associate's response, to question not only the associate's judgment but his writing skills, according to copies of the e-mails posted on Above the Law.
The Los Angeles-based litigation firm represents clients, not causes, writes one unnamed partner in defense of Robert Raskopf in one of the e-mails, and would have gladly won the case for opposing party, had Quinn Emanuel been hired to do so. The associate would do well to avoid indiscriminate use of the "reply all" function in the future the partner says. And additionally, the partner suggests, the associate should "note the lack of any parentheses in this e-mail. It makes it much easier to read."
Contacted by ATL for comment about what the law blog describes as an awesome thread, the associate says "I'm sorry if I worked through it in too public a manner" and describes Quinn Emanuel as "a cool firm with smart, nice and chill lawyers. Honestly."
ATL redacted names from the memos and posted this warning to commenters, "Please don't disclose identities in the comments or we will ban you from the wagon."
Raskopf and the firm did not immediately respond to the ABA Journal's requests for comment.

Top Lawyer's Dumb Behavior

From Debra Cassens Weiss at the ABA Journal:
A Kaye Scholer [big New York City law firm] bankruptcy partner has been charged with endangering a child after allegedly ordering her sparring children out of the car and driving off.
Madlyn Primoff, 45, pleaded not guilty on Monday, the Associated Press reports. She was charged after she came to police headquarters in White Plains, N.Y., to pick up her 10-year-old daughter Sunday evening, the Westchester Journal News reports.
Police said Primoff ordered the 10-year-old girl and her 12-year-old sister out of the car, but apparently allowed the older girl back in after she ran after the vehicle. A passerby saw the younger girl crying, bought her ice cream, and contacted police, the story says. Primoff reported the girl missing a short time later, according to the story.
Primoff spent Sunday night in the police lockup and was later released on $1,500 bail, the Westchester Journal News reports in a separate story. A modified court order allows her to live her children and talk to them, the Journal News and Times stories say.
Primoff is a partner in the business reorganization and creditors' rights practice group at Kaye Scholer, according to the firm’s website. She often represents clients in insolvencies involving structured products.
Barry Willner, managing partner of Kaye Scholer, issued a statement to the New York Daily News. "Madlyn Primoff is a very well respected partner at our firm, and we consider this matter to be personal and private," he said.
Primoff's lawyer, Vincent Briccetti, told AP that Primoff is a great mother who is grateful for support from friends and family.

Good Morning, NABE!

Good morning to all our friends convening for the National Association of Bar Executives Conference (NABE) at the American Bar Association (ABA) Annual Meeting in New York this morning.
We hope you have a wonderful time in the Big Apple and that you enjoy a great conference and soak up all of the sights and delights of the world's most exciting city.
We have so many good things to say about NYC (and so many fond memories from countless visits) that it would take a whole new blog just to begin to catalogue them.
We never tire of visiting one of our favorite summer islands - Manhattan.
So, even though we're no longer regular conventioneers, we might just surprise everyone later this week with a live shout out. Enjoy!