Alito urges public service by lawyers

Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. on Saturday reflected on the transformation of the law profession in front of packed audience at the University of Virginia.

“I do not dispute that the lawyer profession has undergone many changes,” Alito said on the day that marked the third anniversary of his appointment to the high court.

Alito was the keynote speaker for the university’s 10th Conference on Public Service and the Law, which took place Friday and Saturday on the law school’s campus.

Alito spoke of how certain ideals of the law profession may be receding because of commercialization and an increasing focus on salaries because of high tuition costs, ultimately leading some to see the demise of the profession. But during his roughly 25-minute address, Alito said he remained optimistic that a new model — the “lawyer-public servant” — could become prevalent in today’s society, and encouraged all current and future lawyers to devote at least some of their career to public service.

“Public service permeates our consciousness,” Alito said.

Prior to his seating on the Supreme Court, Alito served for more than 15 years on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and as the U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey.

Alito partly based his lawyer-public service phrase off of an idea that the late Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist pinned of the “lawyer-statesman” — used to describe some of the country’s founding fathers such as Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton — which many concur is slowly becoming a thing of the past.

Alito said that many of the ideals that existed among the country’s most revered figures — such as understanding the duties a lawyer has to his clients, courts and the law — are still found among many lawyers today.

“Throughout the profession it remains an ideal,” he said about lawyers’ desires to do good through the law.

To move forward as public servants and reinvigorate the profession, Alito said, people must accept the commercialization of law practices as something inevitable and irreversible while keeping in mind the profession’s traditions.

“It will … bolster and strengthen the model of the lawyer-public servant,” he said.

Alito encouraged institutional thinking, which he said is an older type of thinking that is defined by what life asks of people. For lawyers, the institution they belong to is the legal system as a whole.

“Our task is not to invent anything anew,” he said.

Alito said that lawyers can deliver services to new areas of need that have been created by the economic downturn and struggling housing and credit markets.

“We can think institutionally as we face new challenges,” he added.

Alito’s encouragement to become public servants while being stewards of the law — something, he said, would give greater meaning and satisfaction to any legal career — left many in the audience moved by the message.

“It was inspirational, I thought,” said Lydie Essama, a first-year UVa law student who is interested in international dispute resolution. She added that she thought that the construction and contents of Alito’s address, where he linked the occupation’s past to the present, was very appropriate for the audience.

First-year law student Erin Houlihan also said she thought the address was thoughtful. She said she wants to go into international human rights law, and joked that she is going to be “dirt poor” for her entire life as a result.

“And he just affirmed that that’s OK,” Houlihan said.