Advice from an Experienced Trial Lawyer

“William Wirt’s Advice to a Young Lawyer”

This week’s post is a little different.  I found a book written in 1850 entitled, Success in Life: The Lawyer, by L.C. Tuthill, and thought you might enjoy one of the chapters from that books, entitled “William Wirt’s Advice to a Young Lawyer.”  Wirt, who was the prosecutor in Aaron Burr’s treason trial, is credited with turning the Attorney General’s position into a position of influence (he held the position for 12 years, the longest tenure of any U.S. Attorney General).  In this letter, he includes several tips that are still worthwhile more than 150 years later.  Enjoy!

“To work insatiably, requires much less mind, than to work judiciously”

In 1806, Mr. Wirt removed to Richmond.  The following excellent advice forms a part of a letter written about this period to a young lawyer, in whom Mr. Wirt felt great interest.

“Endeavor to cultivate that superior grace of manners which distinguishes the gentleman from the crowd around him.  In your conversation avoid a rapid and indistinct utterance, and speak deliberately and articulately.

Blend with the natural hilarity of your temper, that dignity of sentiment and demeanor, which alone can prevent the wit and humorist from sinking into a trifler, and can give him an effective attitude in society.

Get a habit, a passion, for reading — not flying from book to book with the squeamish caprice of a literary epicure, — but read systematically, closely, and thoughtfully, analyzing every subject as you go along, and laying it up safely and carefully in your memory.

Determine with yourself that no application shall be wanting to lift you to the heights of public notice; and if you find your spirits beginning to flag, think of being buried all your life in obscurity, confounded with the gross and ignorant herd around you.  But there are yet more animating and more noble motives for this emulation: the power of doing more extensive good — the pure delight of hearing one’s self blessed for benevolent and virtuous actions, and as a still more unequivocal and rapturous proof of gratitude, ‘reading that blessing in a nation’s eyes;’ add to this, the communicating the beneficial effects of this fame to our friends and relations; the having it in our power to requite past favors, and to take humble and indigent genius by the hand, and lead it forward to the notice of the world.  These are a few, and but a few, of the good effects of improving’ one’s talents to the highest point, by careful and constant study, and aspiring to distinction.”

On reviewing his past life, at this period, Mr. Wirt seems to have been forcibly struck with the warning and encouragement which it presented to young men.   “I have, indeed,” says he, “great cause of gratitude to Heaven.  In reviewing the short course of my life, I see where I made plunges from which nothing less than a Divine hand could ever have raised me; but I have been raised, and I trust that my feet are now upon a rook.  Yet, can I never cease to deplore’ the years of my youth, that I have murdered in idleness and folly.  What a spur should this reflection be to young men!”

The eloquent author of the Life of William Wirt says: “We have remarked of Wirt, that his life is peculiarly fraught with materials for the edification of youth.  Its difficulties and impediments, its temptations and trials, its triumphs over many obstacles, its rewards, both in the self-approving judgment of his own heart, and in the success won by patient labor and well-directed study; and the final consummation of his hopes, in an old age not less adorned by the applause of good men, than by the serene and cheerful temper inspired by a devout Christian faith; all these present a type of human progress worthy of the imitation of the young and the gifted.”

But this “progress” is not to be made without constant effort.  Wirt in his figurative style thus describes it:

“You will find it pretty much of an Alp-climbing business.   The points of the rooks to which you cling will often break in your hands, and give you many a fall and many a bruise; but instead of despairing at the first fall, or the twentieth, remember the prospect from the summit and the rich prizes that await you.  Up with a laugh, catch a better hold next time, and try it again.”

“The law is to many, at first, and at last, too, a dry and revolting study.  It is hard and laborious; it is a dark and intricate labyrinth, through which they grope in constant uncertainty and perplexity-the most painful of all states of mind.  But you cannot imagine that this was the case with Lord Mansfield or with Blackstone, who saw through the whole fabric in full daylight in all its proportions and lustre.”

The pleasure with which Wirt entered into a trial of legal strength, after he had “toiled and moiled” in his profession for many years, is thus expressed:

“I have some expectation of going to Washington in February to plead a cause.  I shall be opposed to the Attorney- General, and perhaps to PINCKNEY.  ’The blood more stirs to wake the lion than to hunt the hare.”  I should like to meet them.”

To the friend to whom he has so frequently addressed stimulating arguments, Mr. Wirt again writes:

“You must read, sir; you must read and meditate like a Conestoga horse — no disparagement to the horse by the simile.  You must read like Jefferson, and speak like Henry.  If you ask me how you are to do this, I cannot tell you, but you are nevertheless to do it.”

“By the way, there is one thing I had like to have forgotten.   One of the most dignified traits in the character of (Patrick) Henry, is the noble decorum with which he debated, and the uniform and marked respect with which he treated his adversaries.  I am a little afraid of you in this particular, for you are a wit and a satirist.  Take care of this propensity.  It will make you enemies, pull a bee-hive on your head, and cover your forensic path with stings and venom.  Let it be universally agreed that you are the most polite, gentlemanly debater at the bar.  That, alone, will give you a distinction, and a noble one too; besides, it is a striking index and proper concomitant of first-rate talents.

For two or three years you must read, delve, meditate, study, and make the whole mine of the law your own.

Let me use the privilege of my age and experience to give you so few hints, which, now that you are beginning the practice, you may find not useless.

1.  Adopt a system of life, as to business and exercise; and never deviate from it, except so far as you may be occasionally forced from it by imperious and uncontrollable circumstances.

2.  Live in your office; that is, be always in it except at the hours of eating and exercise.

3.  Answer all letters as soon as they are received; you know not how many heart-aches it may save you.   Then fold neatly, and file away neatly, alphabetically, and by the year, all the letters so received.  Let your letters of business be short, and keep copies of them.

4.  Put every law paper in its place as soon as received, and let no scrap of paper be seen lying for a moment on your writing-chair or tables.

5. Keep regular accounts of every cent of income and expenditure, and file your receipts neatly, alphabetically, and by the month, or, at least, by the year.

6.  Be patient with your foolish clients, and hear all their tedious circumlocution and repetition with calm and kind attention; cross-examine and sift them until you know all the strength and weakness of their cause, and take notes of it at once, whenever you can do so.

7.  File your bills in Chancery at the moment of ordering the suit, and while your client is still with you to correct your statement of his case; also, prepare every declaration the moment the suit is ordered, and have it ready to file.

8.  Cultivate a simple style of speaking, so as to be able to inject the strongest thought into the weakest capacity.  You will never be a good jury lawyer without this faculty.

9.  Never attempt to be grand and magnificent before common tribunals, — and the most you will address are common.

10.  Keep your Latin and Greek, and science to yourself, and to the very small circle which they may suit.  The mean, envious world will never forgive you your knowledge, if you make it too public.  It will require the most unceasing urbanity and habitual gentleness of manners, almost to humility, to make your superior attainments tolerable to your associates.

11.  Enter with warmth and kindness into the interesting concerns of others — not with the consciousness of a superior, but with the tenderness and simplicity of an equal.

12.  Be never flurried in speaking, but learn to assume the exterior of composure and collectedness, whatever riot and confusion may be within; speak slowly, firmly, distinctly, and make your periods by proper pauses, and a steady, significant look.

You talk of complimenting your adversaries.  Take care of your manner of doing this.  Let it be humble and sincere, and not as if you thought it was in your power to give them importance by your fiat.  These maxims are all sound; practice them, and I will warrant your SUCCESS.”