Many of my clients say they want justice, but mean fairness; judges tell me fairness has nothing to do with justice, but they intend to convey they are fair. Young lawyers, not necessarily young in age, seek fairness for their clients, but they do so in the name of “justice” or so they say. Which do you prefer?

I seek only the truth which some judges, after years on the bench, know nothing about and care nothing about. To them they have become bureaucrats in black robes administering the law from high on the bench as if law and justice no longer had a heart or soul. To them life is just numbers and expert opinions; people just carbon and water. To them everyone lies, exaggerates or slants their version of the facts and that’s enough to close one’s heart to the ideals of why we do what we do as lawyers.

Do you want justice, fairness or is the truth enough?

As lawyers we should have not just mentors but also someone we look up to. One of my heroes, if you will, was William Kunstler. He was a great lawyer who knew how to make the law come alive. He knew how to take what he did and to give it meaning for the greater good. I suspect if he had been elected President, he too would be lost in the noise that drowns out the greater good with the politics of greed and avarice. Kunstler was also a poet.

Join me and listen to Attorney Kunstler speak about what is wrong with what we do, when what we care about concentrates only on what is simply legal.

 POV | Disturbing the Universe: Excerpt | PBS

This is truly a man with a vision; a man who understood the unfairness of a decision that is purely legal. He understood the confluence of where legality, fairness and justice intersect. And what is it we are doing in a daily practices as we move paper from here to there?

And so I say to you his daughters, Emily and Sarah, if you believe nothing else in life believe that your father was a man of great depth and understanding. At the time in which he practiced law, he served his clients well and he served us, the lawyers, honorably. The greater good he served changed the world and for the better. If he were alive today he surely would have spoken up against the likes of those that invaded Iowa and slandered the three Iowa Justices removed from high office.

To obtain a copy of the PBS Video on William Kunstler visit the PBS site and search for "Kunstler".