Democratic lawyers believe-as much of the rest of U.S. society and the bar do not-that ordinary people, acting collectively with peers, receptive professionals, and other allies, can and must play a leading role in efforts to reshape our society and political
Archive
Zacharias (2009), “True Confessions About the Role of Lawyers in a Democracy”
This essay suggests that, in a very limited sphere, lawyers play a unique role in the protection of the rule of law.
Luban (2021), “Complicity and Lesser Evils: A Tale of Two Lawyers”
This Article explores that dilemma in a stark form: through the moral biographies of two lawyers in the Third Reich, both of whom stayed on the job, and both of whom can lay claim to mitigating evil.
Gatto (2016), “Race Law Revisited: A Brief Review of Anti-Semitism and the Role of Lawyers in Fascist Italy”
This article analyzes the ethical dilemmas faced by Italian lawyers during World War II, focusing on their roles in Fascist society, their responses to Mussolini’s 1938 race laws, and their involvement in addressing the treatment of Jews in Italy, drawing on legal histories and survivor narratives.
Fybel (2022), “Judges, Lawyers, Legal Theorists, and the Law in Nazi Germany”
This essay argues that the German legal system, including courts, judges, and lawyers, enabled and often supported the Nazi regime’s rise and its race-based atrocities by legitimizing Hitler’s incremental consolidation of power under the guise of law.
Gadowska (2020), “Poland: Opening the Legal Profession”
This chapter explores how reforms in the recruitment of self-governing lawyer councils between 1989 and 2017 expanded access to the legal profession and improved the availability of legal services through a 15-year process of social and legal change.
Hendley (2017), Everyday Law in Russia
Hendley argues that despite political interference in high-profile cases, ordinary Russians do engage with the legal system in everyday disputes, revealing a more nuanced and pragmatic relationship with the law than commonly assumed.
Smith (1978), The Soviet Procuracy and the Supervision of Administration
Monograph analyzing the evolution and role of prosecutors in the Soviet Union.
Kucherov (1953), Courts, Lawyers and Trials under the Last Three Tsars
A historical look at the 19th-century Russian legal profession, highlighting anarchist trials and how lawyers used jury nullification to win acquittals.
Litvinov (1972),The Trial of the Four
Memoir authored by one of the defendants in the trial of the group who protested in Red Square the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Army.