It can be fairly asserted that the qualifications of the American lawyer
for his traditional task as the official interpreter and guide of
American constitutional democracy have been considerably impaired.
Whatever his qualifications have been for the task (and they have,
perhaps, been over-estimated) they are no longer as substantial as they
were. Not only has the average lawyer become a less representative
citizen, but a strictly legal training has become a less desirable
preparation for the candid consideration of contemporary political
problems.
Since 1870 the lawyer has been traveling in the same path as the
business man and the politician. He has tended to become a professional
specialist, and to give all his time to his specialty. The greatest and
most successful American lawyers no longer become legislators and
statesmen as they did in the time of Daniel Webster. They no longer
obtain the experience of men and affairs which an active political life
brings with it. Their professional practice, whenever they are
successful, is so remunerative and so exacting that they cannot afford
either the time or the money which a political career demands.
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