Jack “Frenchie” Helm was my oldest friend.  By that I mean, we were friends, and he was really, really old - forty-three years older than my friend (his youngest son) Jelly and me.  We started calling Frenchie “Frenchie” because our friend Crash felt strongly that Mr. Helm, as he was known back then, could and therefore should wear a beret.  Being the wise man that he was, Frenchie knew full well that no one can or should wear a beret and, therefore, never put Crash’s theory to the test.  The name stuck just the same. 

After Jelly had grown up and moved away, Frenchie and I continued to talk semi-regularly on the phone, and to meet for lunch whenever we could.  While I very much enjoyed our discussions about books, politics, and sports, that time was best spent listening to Frenchie talk about the formative times of his life.  These included wistful reminiscences about the simple joys of his boyhood growing up in depression era Louisville (idolizing his stoic but loving 9 ½ foot tall police-sergeant father), to thoughtful recollections of both the splendid triumphs and appalling failures of the human spirit he witnessed during his career as an artillery officer in the United States Army during World War II and the conflict in Korea (stranger than fiction accounts of army life that, if they weren’t true, would fall somewhere between Slaughterhouse 5 and Catch 22).  In addition to being a great storyteller, Frenchie was also a great storylistener.  He listened attentively, laughed enthusiastically, and held his usually perceptive questions and comments until the end.  The point I am trying to make so far, in order to fully drive home the point, I’ll be trying to make later, is that Frenchie was one of the finest and most thoroughly decent people I have ever known.  So that you don’t have to take my word for it, and as much as he would not want me to, I should probably share a couple of examples of how he lived his life. 

He was thoughtful.  Frenchie, who had a lifelong love of learning, chose not to accept his diploma from Male High School out of concern that if he did, his brother (who did not graduate) might be made to feel dumb.  He was generous.  Although he did not have a great deal of disposable income to dispose of, at the beginning of every school year he would pay for some young man to go to Trinity High School who would not otherwise have been able to afford it. The only condition he placed on the gift was that he never be told who got the money, and that the recipients never be told who gave it.  Frenchie was useful.  He taught an adult literacy class for the homeless at Wayside Christian Mission and, spanning some four decades, served as a sponsor for an untold number of fellow travelers in the secret society for sobriety.  He was hard-working.  When Frenchie got out of the Army, he started a small cleaning/janitorial supply service.  He found profound satisfaction in a difficult and often thankless job well done.  Frenchie was spiritual.  Way too modest to set himself up as an example to others, he led a life of calmness, compassion, and consideration that nevertheless served as an example to everyone who knew him. 

So, here’s what happened.  When he finally semi-retired, he sold his business but continued to work as a consultant to a number of other businesses - mostly churches.  The guy he sold the business to sued him, alleging that the consulting work was in breach of their sales agreement.  It wasn’t.  Frenchie, who knew he hadn’t done anything wrong, took being accused of wrongdoing very personally.  It mattered to him.  Unfortunately, as the case wound its way through the Jefferson Circuit Court, he was made to feel that it didn’t matter to anyone else.  More importantly, he was made to feel like he didn’t matter.  No one, including and perhaps most importantly the judge, ever acknowledged his existence despite his presence in the courtroom.  When he wasn’t being outright ignored, he was being given the clear impression that he was taking up more important people’s much more valuable time.  No one, including and perhaps most importantly the judge, took the time to explain anything about what was happening or why.  He was marginalized, patronized and, as a result, more than a little demoralized by this experience. 

Listening to him describe his slog through Circuit Court was very upsetting to me.  Frenchie was upset too.  The difference being that I was mad about how he had been devalued, while he, as was his way, was concerned about how others might be similarly devalued.  His take was not that he deserved more and better - and here’s the point - but that everyone deserves more and better.  Anyone and everyone who has their day in court (even the jerk who sued Frenchie) deserves not only to be acknowledged, but to be made welcome by the people, including and perhaps most importantly the judges, who spend every day in court. 

With this in mind I promised Frenchie three things: (1)  I would make sure to always introduce myself and speak directly from the bench with the parties in both civil and criminal cases; (2) I would make clear to them what it was we were doing that day in court; and (3) when deciding what to do, I would try to explain why I thought that’s what needed doing.  All of this takes a little extra time and, as such, sometimes annoys busy lawyers who I watch watch their watches or thumb-thump their smart-phones while I chat with a criminal defendant about his haircut or ask after his grandmother.  But, as I learned from Frenchie, it’s important that I take that time, because feeling disrespected and being disrespected feel pretty much the same.

​I had only been on the bench about four months when Frenchie died in 2004, but I think about him every time I head out to the bench.  I think about him because the last thing I see as I’m leaving my office is a hat (a fedora - not a beret) that Frenchie gave me.  It sits on top of my coat/robe rack as a reminder of my promise to my old friend and of my responsibility to complete strangers. 

My friend Bill Adams, a long-time Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney and the much-beloved “Philosopher King of Portland,” once told me that life is like a conveyor belt.  You get on and if along the way you discover that you can bake, then you get off and you are a baker.  If you can build, you get off and you are a builder; etc., etc.  If, however, you can’t actually do anything, then you continue to ride the conveyor belt of life straight on to law school. 

Having taken that ride myself, I have always admired people who can do tangible things.  People with the kind of skills that would guarantee them a seat on an overcrowded lifeboat.  As such, I am drawn to television shows like Top Chef (cooks), Wheeler Dealers (auto mechanics), and Restored (carpenters/ plumbers/masons/roofers/landscapers) in which people are doing under pressure and hopefully under budget that which I don’t have the skills to do under any circumstances.  What I don’t watch are shows about lawyers.  Even if I was inclined to do so, my wife wouldn’t let me.  She claims that I ruin them for her by saying things like, “oh come on!”, or “that would never happen”, or just “pul-leeeease.”  When she quotes me saying things like that, she uses the voice that all long-suffering wives use when they are imitating/mocking their goofball husbands (it’s like the voice of Lenny from Of Mice and Men but with the tone and attitude of a complete know-it-all blowhard).  I don’t remember ever saying any such things (or sounding that way) but I do recall the occasional harrumph, chortle or highly audible sigh.  In fairness, I doubt cooks, auto mechanics, or building contractors are allowed to watch Top Chef, Wheeler Dealers, or Restored with their significant others either.

Lawyers have skills too.  The kind of skills that might be used to convince the rest of the people in the aforementioned overcrowded lifeboat not to toss them overboard (or to toss somebody else instead).  Our skill set is developed through and honed by reading.  We are among the last of a dying breed of readers.  It’s what we have to do when we’re at work.  It’s also what a great many of us choose to do when we’re off work.  It is my leisure activity of choice.  I am rarely without the book I am reading (which I carry tucked under the waistband of my pants in the small of my back) and another book “on deck” (which I do not stuff in my pants) for when I am finished with the first one.  I am allowed to read books about lawyers.  I have read quite a few.  I am not a particularly good audience for books set in the courtroom any more than I imagine plumbers are for books set in the bathroom, but I have read a few - very few - that I enjoyed a great deal.  If you either take pleasure in or haven’t given up the search for pleasurable stories which feature lawyers and lawyering, then I am pleased to recommend the ones I have listed in the SIDEBAR below.

Regardless of what you choose to read, reading allows you to better understand your world by allowing you to visit other people’s worlds.  The more you read the more readily you can use the language and ideas expressed by others to better express yourself.  The well-read lawyer is well-prepared to draft briefs that are well-written and make arguments that are well-spoken.  Well?  What are you waiting for?  As Socrates wrote in a book I haven’t read, “employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored so hard for.”  Or, as Dr. Seuss wrote in a book I have read, “the more that you read, the more things you will know.  The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” 

There comes a point in every lawyer’s career when (s)he starts to wonder whether (s)he still qualifies as a “young” lawyer. When you get to that point in your own career, there is simple test.  Ask yourself whether at any time within the last calendar year you have felt the urge to denounce and lament the decline of civility and decorum in the courtroom.  If the answer is “yes”, then sorry/congratulations, you are no longer a young lawyer.  Only lawyers of a certain age have been practicing long enough to reminisce about the golden age of lawyering (i.e. when they were young lawyers).  Each preceding generation of lawyers is shocked and appalled by how each succeeding generation of lawyers has brought the profession to an unprecedented and ruinous all-time low.  It’s not unlike how the jitterbug generation was horror-struck by the hooligan rock ‘n roll generation that followed, who, in turn, thought their punk-rock progeny were, you guessed it, punks! 

As a judge of a certain age, I find myself more and more often waxing nostalgic about the glory days I spent trying cases in the old Jefferson County Hall of Justice.  But were the good old days really as good as I remember them?  It begs the question; how can anyone remember fondly anything that took place inside the old Jefferson County Hall of Justice?  A building so horrible that it was once and best described as being, “like the men’s room in a bus station but without all the charm”.  Still and all, having started practicing law when lawyers from the greatest generation were still setting the bar for the bar, I can’t help but wonder about the latest generation.  And the more I wonder, the more fully I appreciate why the crooner crowd who listened to Bing Crosby in the 1940s were upset by Elvis and his swiveling pelvis in the 1950s, and why those suffering from Beatlemania in the 1960s were understandably concerned about people struck down by Disco-fever in the 1970s.  These may not have been signs that the end times were nigh, but they were signs that civilizedation as they knew it was coming to an end.  The fact that lawyers appear in court dressed in “business casual” attire, chew gum, and don’t stand up when they address the Court - now that’s a sign of the apocalypse.

I have never been one to hold litigants accountable for the fashion crimes they commit in my presence.  I did once have to ask a defendant charged with domestic violence who showed up for arraignment wearing a “wife-beater” undershirt to please wear a shirt when he came back to court.  When he looked puzzled, I explained to him that the reason they call it an undershirt is that it is supposed to be worn under an actual shirt.  I have always held lawyers to a different (i.e. higher) standard.  It would never have occurred to me to wear anything other than a suit and tie to court.  Not a jacket and tie.  A suit and tie.  It would appear that either or both have become optional.  It really bothers me when I see lawyers dressed casually for court.  I’m not saying it should.  I’m saying it does.  To me, and people like me (of whom there are still many), it is disrespectful. Not willfully disrespectful, but disrespectful nonetheless because it evidences a failure to consider that dressing appropriately for the occasion is a sign of respect. 

I, like my mother before me, am offended by the sight of people chewing gum in public.  I’m not saying I should be.  I’m saying I am.  It’s not just that I find chewing gum to be extremely tacky, it’s because the extreme tackiness of the gum being chewed allows it to adhere so readily to the underside of counsel table where I found (and scraped it off) on a regular basis.  That’s right - counsel table.  I know I could have hung a sign on the front door that read, “ATTENTION COUNSEL: CHEWING GUM IN THE COURTROOM AND/OR STICKING ABC GUM ON THE UNDERSIDE OF COURTROOM FURNISHINGS IS STRICTLY PROHIBITED”; but should that have been necessary?  If so, then what else would I have to tell people not to do?  Don’t spit tobacco juice, sunflower seeds or phlegm on the carpet?  Don’t carve your initials into or write on the walls?  Don’t set anything on fire?  As much as my reaction to this behavior may make me look and feel like a crotchety old man yelling at the neighborhood kids to stay off my lawn, I can’t help but feel that I shouldn’t have to yell at them - they should know that shouldn’t be on somebody else’s %#@* lawn!  
​   
Having been raised under the professional tutelage of the Hon. Mark Miller at both the Commonwealth’s and the United States Attorney’s offices, I am physically, mentally, and emotionally unable to remain seated when a judge enters a courtroom or, when addressing the Court, cannot open my mouth unless I am standing on my feet.  I, like my colleagues who were Millerized as baby lawyers, am chagrinned at seeing seated lawyers talking to sitting judges.  I’m not saying I should be.  I’m saying I am.  I get that it is a formality, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t important.  There comes a time in the life of every institution when the purpose underlying its rituals are in danger of being forgotten leaving behind nothing but ingrained but meaningless tradition.  Lawyers stand up when addressing the Court for the same fundamental reason that judges wear robes while sitting down and listening to them.  It is not only a sign of respect for the proceedings, but a reminder to the participants that the rules that fix their professional responsibilities and govern their behavior inside a courtroom, which may be different anywhere/everywhere else, are worthy of their respect.  Moreover, and as a practical matter, if they are already standing when the end of the world does come (brought on by gum-smacking lawyers arguing their case while sporting sweatpants and a golf shirt) they will have a leg up on everybody else in the mad dash to get out of the building before it comes crashing down around them.

Words have meaning.  That meaning can be literal, figurative, simple and straight-forward, or nuanced to the point of obscurity. The intended meaning is a creation of the speaker.  The perceived meaning is a creation of the listener.  When, for example, a lawyer says the word “clearly,” it is intended to mean “obviously.”  Clearly, if something is obvious then, by definition, it need not be pointed out.  As such, when a judge hears the word “clearly” (usually preceding an argument that sounds purposefully obscure) it is perceived to mean, “Your Honor, I have no idea how to explain this.” When preceded by the statement, “I’ll be brief,” “clearly” means the same thing, but signifies to the judge that it will take much much longer to not explain.

Both intention and perception are best appreciated in context.  When a lawyer says, “may I approach the bench” while en route to the bench, they aren’t asking for permission - they’re announcing their presence.  “May I approach?” can mean anything from “I need to discuss a pressing matter of law” to “I have a pressing need to go to the bathroom.”  The intended meaning is made apparent from the circumstances surrounding the request/announcement, the tone in which it was made, and (particularly with respect to the latter) the way the lawyer walks as (s)he approaches the bench.
 
The best example of the interplay between intended and perceived meaning is the dreaded, “with all due respect your honor.”   It could mean, “I acknowledge and appreciate the deference that should be afforded to someone in your esteemed position."  It might not mean anything - just something lawyers sometimes say as a prelude to saying something else, like “may it please the court” or “let me ask you this.”

I can assure you, however, that whatever the lawyer/speaker is trying to say, the judge/listener only hears: “Hey stupid! Let’s go over this again, only this time I’ll speak more slowly and use smaller words so that even a nitwit like you can follow along.”  “With all due respect” is to good Southern lawyers what “bless your heart” is to good Southern mothers.  It is meant to both provide fair warning about and seek absolution for the scurrilous observations to follow.

​Words have meaning.  Choose your words carefully in the hope that what you meant by what you said doesn’t get lost in translation.