Advocate General

“ The peculiar duty of the defender-general is, to act on behalf of the administrative authority in its capacity of defendant, and on behalf of every defendant who has not the means of engaging another advocate, and to obviate any prejudice he sees likely to result to justice from want of skill or other causes on the part of a defendant who pleads his own cause, or on the part of the advocate who pleads it for him. ”

“ He became judge of the Cinque ports in 1855, succeeded his father in the same year as admiralty advocate, was appointed a queen's counsel in 1858, when the probate and divorce court was established, and in 1862 was appointed queen's advocate and knighted. The American war, then raging, raised numbers of questions on which he, sometimes alone, sometimes with the attorney-general and the solicitor-general, was the responsible adviser of the ministry. ”

“ But here is an advocate without us, in heaven and with the Father. The proper office and business of an advocate is with the judge; with him he pleads the client's cause. The Judge with whom our advocate pleads is the Father, his Father and ours. ”

“ Most earnestly we invite and call upon all Bachelors of Law to ponder well upon the duties of an Advocate. Entitled as the Advocate is to a fair remuneration for Duties of an Advocate.his services, he should never let the acquisition of wealth be the main end or object of his actions. He should seek to compose and to restrain, not to foment and foster, the evil passions of those who consult him. His first duty to his client is, if possible, to save him from litigation. ”

“ Many men have found it so engrossing that it has become the one subject of their lives whether in the Court House or at home—they have thought and spoken nothing but law, they have taken law as their familiar communing with it day and night, they have parted with it only at their latest breath. You will soon find yourselves brought face to face with that curious ethical problem which has staggered the best and the wisest, and which every lawyer must solve for himself. How far is an advocate justified in pleading, or bound to plead, a cause which he believes or knows to be wrong? ”

“ The term advocatus came eventually to be the word employed when the bar had become a profession, and the qualifications, admission, numbers and fees of counsel had become a matter of state regulation, to designate the pleaders as a class of professional men, each individual advocate, however, being still spoken of as patron in reference to the litigant with whose interest he was entrusted. ”

“ The arms which an Advocate wields he ought to use as a warrior, not as an assassin. He ought to uphold the interests of his clients per fas, but not per nefas. He ought to know how to reconcile the interests of his client with the eternal interests of truth and justice." Act, gentlemen, upon these principles. ”

“ Those who contend for such indulgence argue that the profession is an instrument for the administration of justice: he is to do all he can for his client: the application of laws is a matter of great complexity and difficulty: that the right administration of them in doubtful cases is best provided for if the arguments on each side are urged with the utmost force. The advocate is not the judge. ”

“ The legal requisites for practising as a lawyer vary with the place or government. In Canon Law, it is necessary that an advocate be a doctor or expert in ecclesiastical jurisprudence, that he be twenty-one years of age, duly approved, etc. ”

“ These advocates are not state officials, but are sworn to the due execution of their duties. In case a client has suffered damage owing to the negligence of the advocate, the latter can be made responsible. ”

“ A partial remedy for possible evils may be found through the appointment of a judge from the civil courts, or of an experienced lawyer who should become the adviser of the court-martial, in place of the judge-advocate —thus leaving to him the duties of an attorney in behalf of the Government. ”

“ If the advocate refuses to defend, from what he may think of the charge or of the defence, he assumes the character of the judge; nay, he assumes it before the hour of judgment; and, in proportion [32] to his rank and reputation, puts the heavy influence of perhaps a mistaken opinion into the scale against the accused, in whose favour the benevolent principle of English law makes all presumptions, and which commands the very judge to be his counsel. ”

“ Let no one think that he can attain to sound judgment without hard work. The judgment of the advocate must be based on the maxim, “He that judges without informing himself to the utmost that he is capable cannot acquit himself of judging amiss.”
A client is entitled to the independent judgment of the advocate. Whether his judgment is right or wrong, it is the duty of the advocate to place it at the disposal of his client. In the business of advocacy judgment is the goods that the advocate is bound to deliver. ”

“ His eagerness for his client's cause must never lead him into any measure that is dishonest or dishonorable: should a client venture to suggest such measures, the Advocate may justly spurn him from his door. ”

“ Wherever mere experience and attainments are sufficient—wherever the qualities required in a professional adviser may possibly be united in a single well-selected individual (as in the case, for example, of a law officer) , one such person for general purposes, and a staff of clerks to supply knowledge of details, meet the demands of the case. ”

“ It is that which empowereth a man to plead for a man, or one man to plead for another; not in common discourses, and upon common occasions, as any man may do, but at a bar, or before a court of judicature, where a man is accused or impleaded by his enemy; I say, this Advocate’s office is such, both here, and in the kingdom of heaven. ”

“ The strange notion that an advocate—one that has pleaded causes at the bar—has, in a manner, disqualified himself for the bench, leaves the administration of justice open to inexperienced young men, who, having taken a degree in Roman law, and nominally attached themselves for a short [Pg 325] time to an advocate, as practitioners, are suddenly raised to the important station of judges, either by marrying any of the Queen’s maids of honour, or some more humble beauty on whom the Prince of the Peace has cast a transient gleam of favour. ”

“ Now, precisely the difference between the advocacy of the judge, and the advocacy of a special counsel retained by the prisoner, expresses the difference which we contemplate between the biographer as he has hitherto protected his hero and that biographer whom we would substitute. Is he not to show a partiality for his subject? Doubtless; but hitherto, in those lives which have been farthest from éloges, the author has thought it his duty to uphold the general system, polity, or principles upon which his subject has acted. ”

“ Nevertheless, to the reader of to-day the views of the man in the street, the common citizen of a bygone age, about the place in the world of the advocate is more precious than many black-letter folios of crabbed juridical learning. ”

“ No person convicted of Catholicism may practice the common law as a counsellor, clerk, attorney, or solicitor, nor may practice civil law as advocate, or proctor, nor shall be justice, minister, clerk, or steward in any court, nor practice medicine, nor perform as apothecary, nor be officer in a town, in the army, or navy, or forfeit 100 pounds as punishment. ”

“ The number of avocats is not limited; every licentiate of law being entitled to apply to the corporation of avocats attached to each court, and after presentation to the court, taking the oath of office and passing three years in attendance on some older advocate, to have himself recognised as an advocate. ”

“ There are, I believe, some persons who can hardly persuade themselves that the profession of advocacy can ever be consistent with personal honour ; but this opinion is probably influenced mainly by a mistaken notion of what the Advocators duty is, or by the recollection of some par- ticular instance or instances, rare and exceptional, in which the individual Advocate has forgotten his duty and abused his privilege. So easy is it, gentlemen, for a very small number of evil-doers to bring discredit on any brotherhood to which they belong ! ”

“ As you are neither learned nor sufficiently instructed in letters or in the difficult matters which are to be discussed, to take counsel of yourself, touching what you should do or reply, we offer you to choose as your advocate one or more of those present, as you will. ”

“ We find illustrations of much the same kind in the profession of an advocate. In the interests of the proper administration of justice it is of the utmost importance that every cause, however defective, and every criminal, however bad, should be fully defended, and it is therefore indispensable that there should be a class of men entrusted with this duty. It is the business of the judge and of the jury to decide on the merits of the case, but in order that they should discharge this function it is necessary that the arguments on both sides should be laid before them in the strongest form. ”

“ An advocate, by the sacred duty which he owes his client, knows, in the discharge of that office, but one person in the world, that client and none other. To save that client by all expedient means—to protect that client at all hazards and costs to all others, and among others to himself—is the highest and most unquestioned of his duties ”

“ The advantage that he has that has the Lord Jesus for his Advocate is very great. Thy Advocate has the cause, has the law, has the judge, has the purse, and so consequently has all that is requisite for an Advocate to have, since together with these he has heart, he has wisdom, he has courage, and loves to make the best improvement of his advantages for the benefit of his client; and that which adds to all is, he can prove the debt paid, about which Satan makes such ado-a price given for the ransom of my soul and for the pardon of my sins. ”

“ Being more adapted to the part of a jurist than an advocate, owing to the striking uprightness of his character, he applied himself to this branch of his profession, and it may truly be said that his vivid sense of truth and justice had much to do with his effectiveness as a jurist. ”

“ If this is so, how important is it for those who are busily engaged with men with whom they must often deal at first sight; how important for the physician, the divine advocate, or the counsel examining witnesses and watching the countenances of juries, to have some rules and signs to aid their acute judgments. ”

“ The example of the Judge seems to authorize the Advocate to get himself well paid for his prevarication, and that even in the presence of his poor client, whose wretched condition would raise compassion in any breast less obdurate than that of the lawyer. ”

“ As an advocate in the Criminal Court, as counsel in the Civil Courts, as a cross-examiner in involved Equity suits, or in reducing complicated issues, he could dive into the depths of the sea of legal lore and bring out conclusive points in favour of his clients. ”

“ Some lawyers, though they are otherwise able and shrewd, yet not being always in court and ready, do suffer their poor clients to be baffled and nonsuited23 by their adversary; yea, it so comes to pass because of this neglect, that a judgment is got out against them for whom they have undertaken to plead, to their great perplexity and damage: but no such opportunity can Satan have of our Advocate, for he is with the Father, always with the Father; as to be a Priest, so to be an Advocate-"We have an Advocate with the Father." ”

“ I want to call attention to that, your Honor, Section 12 is the section providing that the state should cherish science, literature and learning. Now, your Honor, I make it a rule to try not to argue anything that I do not believe in, unless I am caught in a pretty close corner and I want to say that the construction of the attorney-general given to that, I think, is correct and the court added a little to it, which I think makes your interpretation correct for what it is good for. ”

“ Any lawyer, who shall even listlessly turn the leaves of the many volumes of opinions of attorney generals in the libraries of the Federal departments, can understand and appreciate how delicate and far-reaching are the questions which come before an attorney general. ”

“ Nevertheless, although an advocate is bound by obligations of honour and probity not to overstate the truth of his client’s case, and is forbidden to have recourse to any artifice or subterfuge which may beguile the judge, he is not the judge of the case, and within these limits must use all the knowledge and gifts he possesses to advance his client’s claims to justice.
Many good men have been troubled with the thought that advocacy implied a certain want of honesty. ”

“ The advocates of society, like the people's advocates, are disciplined in the practice of truth and justice, and if they think that there is anything in the case in favour of the appellant they are honourably bound to state it to the tribunal. ”

“ No advocate is admitted in petty courts, small towns, or villages; where the poverty of the people, and, for the most part, the low value of the matter contested, make despatch absolutely necessary. In those places the parties shall appear in person, and the judge make a summary decision. ”

“ The successful promoted advocate, who in Britain and the United States of America is the judge, and whose habits and interests all incline him to disregard the realities of the case in favour of the points in the forensic game, then adjudicates upon the contest. ”