November/December 1998
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November/December 1998 |
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Classifieds Letters Display Ads Archives Article Index Nov-Dec '98 issue Latest issue MSBA Home Page |
 Speaking Your Mind by Mark Gehan |
| What are your bar leaders thinking? View our archives of President's Page columns. | During the recent gubernatorial campaign, Governor-elect Jesse Ventura made a statement to the effect that we ought to consider the decriminalization of prostitution. I thought it was a serious political blunder at the time. The following day, with great predictability, Norm Coleman and Skip Humphrey expressed their outrage at Ventura's suggestion. Subsequent events notwithstanding, Ventura's speculation calls to mind other watershed moments in ill-considered public speaking. When George Romney said he had been brainwashed by the government on the subject of the war in Vietnam, he was instantaneously out of the running as a serious presidential candidate. Ditto when Ed Muskie cried in public. When Jimmy Carter, who is certainly one of the most decent persons to be president, admitted that he had lusted in his heart, he became something of a laughingstock. Those who are brave enough to live a public life must be very careful about their behavior in their private life. Beyond that, it is obvious that they must measure every utterance. An unguarded moment of thinking out loud can be a career buster, but candor surely has its place in public discourse. |
 MARK W. GEHAN of St. Paul is president of the MSBA. A partner in the firm of Collins, Buckley, Sauntry & Haugh, he received his J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School and recently served as special master in the historic Minnesota tobacco litigation. |
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| One criticism that has been leveled at the MSBA is that in its effort to be the umbrella organization representing all lawyers, it has stifled reasoned discussion among persons of good faith who happen to disagree with each other. Lawyers have said to me that they disagreed with proposals made at conventions or meetings of the Board of Governors, but that they thought it was inadvisable to speak up. There is nothing we can do to make life easier for politicians, but among ourselves, we should not hesitate to disagree respectfully. Just as we should admire a lawyer who provides ethical representation in a controversial cause, so can we respect those who challenge us or provoke us with controversial ideas. | ||
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Among the members of a small group, tolerance comes rather easily.
Because we have many points of connection, a disagreement on
principle often does nothing more than stimulate the dinner table
conversation. The MSBA is not a small group, but we also have
many points of connection. We share our profession. We have had
the same education and subscribe to the same code of ethics.
Our profession is our college. We are, in fact, colleagues. Let
us resolve that no colleague of ours should hesitate to be different
or to express a point of view different from that of a majority. |