
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 20, 1990                   TAG: 9004200280
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B3   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: KEVIN KITTREDGE SHENANDOAH BUREAU
DATELINE: LEXINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

GRIFFIN BELL TAKES LAWYERS TO TASK

Lawyers cost too much for many people and are plagued these days by a "rampant lack of professionalism," former U.S. Attorney Griffin Bell said Thursday.

"The rich can afford a lawyer, but the middle class is really out of business," said Bell, speaking at the Washington and Lee University Law School. "They can't afford to be in court."

Bell also was critical of paying attorneys by the hour - a system which he said rewards mediocre lawyers - and pleaded for a renewed sense of professionalism, which he said has waned since his early days as a lawyer in the 1940s.

"Professionalism is how you act - how you treat the court, how you treat the lawyer on the other side, how you treat your client," Bell told a sparse crowd of W&L students and faculty at the university's Lewis Hall. "It should be a simple thing for trial lawyers to be professional."

Bell, a former federal appellate court judge, was U.S. attorney general from January 1977 until August 1979. A Georgia native, he is one of the attorneys representing the Virginia Military Institute Foundation in its lawsuit against the U.S. Justice Department - which has said VMI should begin admitting women to its corps of cadets.

Bell sidestepped questions about VMI, however, saying he wasn't lead counsel and couldn't discuss the merits of the case anyway.

But in an hour-long talk in the moot courtroom at Lewis Hall, the Atlanta-based lawyer spoke of courtesy, candidness and the need for court reforms.

He spoke of a case in Georgia in which an attorney misrepresented a prior case to a judge, and the judge didn't discover the case-citing was wrong.

"The lawyer was either too dumb to practice law, or he willfully misled the court. If he's too dumb, I guess he can just keep practicing," said Bell, to laughter. "In the old days, a lawyer wouldn't mislead the court."

Bell advised the 40 or so law students who attended his 2:30 p.m. talk to be courteous to opposing lawyers when trying a case.

Bell also said in dealing with their own clients, the students shouldn't hesitate to take charge. "The client has no right to tell the lawyer how to conduct the case. If you can't be in charge of the case, you're headed for trouble. Because the client may not have the same code of ethics you do," Bell said.

Bell also praised a legal education for all the different career choices it gives a student - from trial lawyer to corporate lawyer to businessman - and said the students would have "a wonderful opportunity to serve."

Bell is a 1948 graduate of Mercer University Law School. He was appointed to the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals by President John F. Kennedy in 1961, and remained on the appellate court until 1976.

Bell was nominated to become the 72nd U.S. attorney general by President Jimmy Carter.

by CNB