Lafayette Louisiana Private Investigator Lawyer Referral

Louisiana Family Law Lawyers

A good lawyer knows the law.

A great lawyer knows the judge!

George R. Knox
Attorney at Law
117 W. Convent
Lafayette, LA 70501

Tel: 337-264-9083
Fax: 337-237-1920
email: george@georgeknoxlaw.com

Experienced Trial Lawyer

Specializing in Family Law

Acadiana's Premiere Family Law Lawyer

(let him know Scott Frank referred you)

An attorney at law (also known simply as an attorney or lawyer) in the United States is a person licensed to practice law by the highest court of a state or other jurisdiction. Alternate terms include attorney-at-law and attorney and counselor (or counsellor) at law.

Comparison: attorney in fact and attorney at law

Broadly speaking, an "attorney" is one who acts on behalf of another person in some capacity. For example, an "attorney-in-fact" is a kind of agent who acts on behalf of another person, typically with respect to business, property, or personal matters, and who does not have to be licensed to practice law or to have any other license from the government. The term power of attorney refers to the authority of an attorney-in-fact to act in the name of another person, and to the signed document which is evidence of such authority.

By contrast an attorney at law, or lawyer, is a person trained and licensed to practice law — to represent clients in legal matters (both in and out of court), and to give legal advice. In the United States, the term attorney, standing alone, is generally intended to have this meaning (and not to mean "attorney in fact").

The term Attorney General is used to designate the chief law enforcement officer of a state or other political jurisdiction. The attorney general is a lawyer who represents the government, prosecutes criminal cases, defends the government from lawsuits against it, and brings civil lawsuits to enforce consumer protection and antitrust laws.

Comparison to older domestic terminology and foreign terminology

In common law jurisdictions outside the United States (e.g., England, Canada, and Australia), attorney is incorrect as a general term, and lawyer or solicitor are used instead. However, in these areas, the specific terms crown attorney, power of attorney, and Attorney General, are used. In intellectual property, patent attorney is commonly used.

In earlier times, some states, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court, maintained a divided legal profession, as can still be found in the United Kingdom, consisting of attorneys (who practised in courts of equity), solicitors (who practised in courts of law) and barristers, also known as counsel, whom solicitors and attorneys instructed to appear in the higher courts. In deference to this practice, when an attorney at law is admitted to practice in some states, his or her certificate of admission bears the title Attorney and Counsellor-at-Law in recognition of his inheritance of both of these roles.

Some attorneys use the post-nominal Esq., the abbreviated form of the word Esquire.

The job of an attorney

Once admitted to practice by the highest court of a state (a function sometimes administered by the state's bar association), an American attorney may file legal pleadings and argue cases in any court in that state (except federal courts, which usually require a separate admission), provide legal advice to clients, and draft important legal documents (such as wills, trusts, deeds, and contracts). American attorneys use the term lawyering to refer to the art of practicing law.

In some states, real estate closings may be performed only by attorneys, even though the attorney's role in a closing may involve primarily notarization of documents and disbursement of settlement funds through an escrow account.

Most academic legal training is directed to identifying legal issues, researching facts and law, and arguing both the facts and law in favor of either side in any case.

Media images

Contrary to the media image of attorneys, much legal work requires hours of in-depth research in a law library or in an electronic database like Westlaw or LexisNexis. Few television programs and movies accurately portray the long nights surrounded by a pile of books or printouts which form the core of the occupational life of many attorneys.

One occasional exception is the television program Law & Order, which sometimes shows the main characters researching at a computer late into the night (always using Westlaw, due to a contract between Westlaw and the show's producers). Some episodes also show lawyers keeping a small rack of clothes in their office for those times when research lasts all night and the character does not have time to go home to change.

Another notable portrayal of the profession was the series Murder One which focused on the lawyers (and the law office) as central characters. The Practice did as well, but its accuracy may be questionable.

Movies and television also do not show the stressful "juggling" aspect of litigation; most litigators have many cases in progress at any given time. Each case has deadlines that must be carefully monitored, and court dates which one must not forget to attend. The other side in any case can serve additional motions that will further complicate things. Repeated failures to attend to details—or indeed, even a single mistake, in some instances—can lead to malpractice suits or disbarment.

In litigation, attorneys spend much time discovering the facts of the case to develop a "theory of the case" that integrates facts and law in a way most favorable to their client. The discovery phase of a case sometimes turns into an unpleasant war of attrition over petty technicalities although many lawyers believe that civility is more commonplace in discovery than the unfortunate but well publicized exceptions.

In addition, there are a large number of attorneys whose practice specializes in activities that never involve them in litigation, such as writing legal opinions, advising clients, drafting contracts, preparing tax strategies, and preparing and prosecuting filings with government agencies such as the Internal Revenue Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Patent and Trademark Office. It can be rare for such attorneys to appear in court, and even to wear a suit or a tie, though this reality is all but absent in media depictions of attorneys.

The economic position of attorneys

A fair number of attorneys are unemployed or underemployed. The phenomenon of many lawyers being unemployed, underemployed, or paid at relatively low wages may be a consequence of changes actively pursued, including by the American Bar Association (ABA), starting in the 1960s. Many in the profession had determined that legal services would remain difficult or impossible to attain for the less well-off unless the supply of lawyers was increased relative to the demand for legal services. In sharp contrast with the medical profession and medical schools, the ABA has encouraged the creation and accreditation of new law schools since that time. In a peculiar irony, both the cost of obtaining legal services and that of obtaining health care have risen ahead of inflation. In a further twist the National Law Journal reported that starting pay at the nation’s biggest law firms (those with 501+ lawyers) in 2005 was proportionately at its lowest point in a decade. Associates received only 11.7% of the law firms’ profits per partner, the smallest percentage in the 1996-2005 time period.^[1].

The number of lawyers relative to the total population has more than doubled in the United States since 1970, from about one lawyer per 700 people to about one lawyer per 300 people, with the ratio continuing to rise. At the same time, the ABA and other organizations have fostered the rise of pro bono work, public service lawyering, and community lawyering, to try to extend the availability of legal services to all Americans. Government funding for public legal services at the federal and state levels has become significant. The ABA estimated in 2000 that about one third of the total demand for legal services in the United States was being met. At the same time, the demand for high-paying legal services, particularly by large corporations, which was already being well met before the dramatic expansion of the lawyer population, has grown much less quickly than the supply of lawyers. Partly as a consequence, many lawyers are still struggling to find jobs. There is an increasing trend towards off-shoring legal services, further exacerbating the problem. ^[2].

Specialization

Many American attorneys limit their practices to specialized fields of law. Often dichotomies are drawn between different types of attorneys, but these are neither fixed nor formal lines. Examples include:

Despite these descriptions, most states forbid or discourage claims of specialization in particular areas of law unless the attorney has been certified by his or her state bar[1] or state board of legal specialization. Other states allow indirect indications of specialization (in forms of advertisements such as "our practice is limited to . . .") but require that the lawyer state that he or she is not certified by a state board of legal specialization in the advertised practice area. Patent attorneys are allowed to advertise their specialization in all jurisdictions, since registration for patent law is administered by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) instead of a state-level body.

Some states grant formal certifications recognizing specialties. In California, for example, bar certification is offered in family law, appellate practice, criminal law, bankruptcy, estate planning, immigration, taxation and workmen's compensation. Any attorney meeting the bar requirements in one of these fields may represent himself as a specialist. Similarly, Texas formally grants certification of specialization in the following fields: administrative law; business bankruptcy law; civil appellate law; civil trial law; consumer bankruptcy law; consumer & commercial law; criminal law; estate planning & probate law; family law; health law; immigration & nationality law; juvenile law; labor & employment law; oil, gas & mineral law; personal injury trial law; real estate law; tax law; and workers' compensation law.[2]

The vast majority of lawyers practicing in a particular field may typically not be certified as specialists in that field (and state board certification is not generally required to practice law in any field). For example, the State Bar of Texas (as of mid 2006) reported 77,056 persons licensed as attorneys in that state (excluding inactive members of the Bar)^[3], while the Texas Board of Legal Specialization reported, at about the same time, only 8,303 Texas attorneys who were board certified in any specialty.[3] Indeed, of the 8,303 certified specialists in Texas, the highest number of attorneys certified in one specific field at that time was 1,775 (in personal injury trial law). Despite the relative large number of lawyers that presumably would handle divorce, adoption and child custody matters, Texas reported that of 77,056 attorneys, only 697 in the entire state were certified in family law (which is, arguably, the applicable specialty).

Specialization in patent law is administered by the Office of Enrollment and Discipline of the USPTO, which imposes stringent requirements for applicants to become registered as patent attorneys or patent agents.

About half of American attorneys work solo or in small firms^{[citation

needed]}. See law firm. There are also many midsize firms, with anywhere from 50 to 200 attorneys, and since the 1970s, some law firms have merged to form giant "megafirms" with 1,000 attorneys or more.

Control of cases

An American attorney licensed in each applicable court may in a few cases control and argue his or her case at each level of the judiciary through its entire lifecycle. A notable example of this is the Brown v. Board of Education litigation, where the same trial team handled the case from start to finish at the U.S. Supreme Court. However, cases which advance to the appellate level, particularly to the U.S. Supreme Court, are often re-assigned to experienced appellate practitioners or firms.

Education and training

Almost all U.S. jurisdictions require successful completion of a bar exam to be licensed as an attorney. All but a few of those states which require a bar exam also require the applicant to have taken a degree in professional law from an accredited law school. Most require it to be an American professional doctorate in law. A few states accept foreign law degrees. In addition to this formal education, attorneys in most jurisdictions must complete regular Continuing Legal Education (CLE) requirements.

The State of Washington has a separate Law Clerk program under Rule Six of the Washington Court Admission to Practice Rules. A college graduate of good moral character may be accepted into the four-year Rule Six Law Clerk program, obtain employment in a law firm or with a judge for at least 30 hours a week, and study a proscribed Course of Study under a tutor. After successful completion of the Rule Six Law Clerk program, a law clerk may take the Washington State Bar Exam and, upon passing, will be admitted as an attorney into the Washington State Bar Association.

The degree earned by prospective attorneys in the United States is generally a Juris Doctor (J.D.), or Doctor of Jurisprudence. Historically, law was an undergraduate subject in the United States, as it still is in most other Anglophone countries, for which the LL.B. (Bachelor of Laws) or other undergraduate degree (e.g., Cambridge awards the 'Bachelor of Arts in Law' or B.A.L.) was conferred. This undergraduate degree was followed by the LL.M. or Master of Laws and, where the LL.B. is still awarded, the highest degree is often still the LL.D. or Doctor of Laws. In the United States, however, the LL.B. was elevated to the graduate school curriculum starting in 1896 (Harvard), as a second Bachelor's degree; and then replaced by the professional doctorate in law - the J.D. or D.Jur. (when the degree is conferred in English) starting in 1902 (University of Chicago). By the end of the twentieth century, all ABA-accredited American law schools had replaced the LL.B. with the J.D./D.Jur.

The content of the J.D./D.Jur. curriculum is substantially the same as for a LL.B. curriculum, except that study for the doctoral level degree builds upon prior undergraduate education whereas the LL.B. is still an undergraduate degree, even in those few countries where it is conferred at graduate level as a second Bachelor's degree. As a professional doctorate, people who hold the J.D./D.Jur. are fully entitled to call themselves "Doctor," though most do not bother. The label "doctor" is an academic tradition, but the tradition in the American legal profession is to call all attorneys "Mr." or "Ms." regardless of their academic qualifications. A litigator with a Ph.D., a M.D., an Ed.D., a Psy.D., as well as a J.D. would still be addressed "Mr." or "Ms." while she or he was making an oral argument before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The LL.M., however, continues to be offered in the United States, sometimes as a post-doctoral degree and sometimes as a legal Master's degree for foreign attorneys with the LL.B. American law schools are very slowly beginning to remedy this idiosyncrasy by creating explicitly post-doctoral degrees, like the S.J.D. or J.S.D. (Scientiae Juris Doctor or Doctor of the Science of Law).

Many foreign educated attorneys who have LL.B. degrees come to the United States and obtain an LL.M. degree in comparative law, familiarizing themselves with American common law, from when they then take the bar exam in New York or California, which allows foreign attorneys with such degrees to sit for the test.

The highest law degree obtainable in the United States is the S.J.D., or Scientum Juris Doctor, literally "doctor of juridical science". This degree is also known by the abbreviation J.S.D. at some U.S. schools, e.g. NYU Law School and Columbia Law School. The degree should not be confused with the "doctor of laws" degree, or LL.D., which is usually, but not always, awarded for honorary purposes.

The S.J.D. or J.S.D. degree is very rarely awarded, and is generally only sought by attorneys holding exceptional credentials and a desire to enter legal academia. The degree is generally only offered at the very top law schools, which typically accept only 4 or 5 students into their program each year. Admission is limited to those who have achieved their J.D. and LL.M. degrees with distinction. Successful applicants usually have already published significant scholarly legal articles in their proposed area of study, and many have legal teaching experience prior to entering the program.

Law students in court

Some courts allow law students to act as "certified student attorneys" after the satisfactory completion of their first year of law school and the completion of particular second- and third-year courses with subjects such as evidence. Many states allow students to argue in front of a court as a certified legal intern (CLI), provided they meet certain prerequisites, such as requiring the student to have completed at least half of their law education, taken or is taking the law school's ethics class, and they are under the supervision of a qualified and licensed attorney.

This concept was somewhat misrepresented in the movie Legally Blonde, where the protagonist Elle argues before a jury. Although Elle was under the supervision of an attorney, no state would allow a student still completing the first year of law to argue a case in court. However, it is reminicsent of "teen court" programs that are expanding around the USA. In these programs, it is not law students, but high school students, that argue cases before a judge and sit on juries to decide penalties to other high school students who have agreed to be tried by the teen court in exchange for bypassing the regular court and having no criminal record created in the process, even if they are found responsible for a crime by the teen court. The punishment often includes community service, including sitting on juries in upcoming cases.

Illinois: The 711 license

In Illinois a student currently in good standing who has earned credits that represent at least three-fifths of the credits required for graduation may be eligible for a 711 license (based on Illinois Supreme Court Rule 711). A 711 license allows a student to: (1) Counsel with clients, negotiate in the settlement of claims, and engage in the preparation and drafting of legal instruments. (2) Appear in the trial courts and administrative tribunals subject to the following qualifications: (i) Appearances, pleadings, motions, and other documents to be filed with the court may be prepared by the student or graduate and may be signed by him with the accompanying designation "Senior Law Student" or "Law Graduate" but must also be signed by the supervising member of the bar. (ii) In criminal cases, in which the penalty may be imprisonment, in proceedings challenging sentences of imprisonment, and in civil or criminal contempt proceedings, the student or graduate may participate in pretrial, trial, and posttrial proceedings as an assistant of the supervising member of the bar, who shall be present and responsible for the conduct of the proceedings. (iii) In all other civil and criminal cases the student or graduate may conduct all pretrial, trial, and posttrial proceedings, and the supervising member of the bar need not be present. (3) He/She may prepare briefs, excerpts from the record, abstracts, and other documents filed in courts of review of the State, which may set forth the name of the student or graduate with the accompanying designation "Senior Law Student" or "Law Graduate" but must be filed in the name of the supervising member of the bar.

A JD graduate of the College of Law may qualify for a 711 license if s/he (1) has not yet had an opportunity to take the first Bar examination scheduled after s/he graduates, or (2) has taken the Bar exam but has not received the results, or (3) has taken and passed the Bar examination but has not yet been sworn in as a member of the Illinois bar.

A 711 license is not available for a student working for a private law firm. The license is available for work with (1) a legal aid bureau, legal assistance program, organization or clinic chartered by the State of Illinois or approved by a law school approved by the American Bar Association. (2) the Office of the Public Defender, or (3) a law office of the State or any of its subdivisions.

Unlicensed practice of law

Some states provide criminal penalties for (1) falsely holding oneself out to the public as a lawyer, and (2) the unauthorized practice of law by a non-lawyer.

A person who has a J.D. degree but is not admitted to a state bar is not a lawyer, and cannot legally engage in the practice of law. In most states, even the practice of law by an "out-of-state" lawyer is considered the unauthorized practice of law within that state. Exceptions are sometimes made when the out-of-state lawyer is permitted temporarily to practice within the state pro hac vice or in some cases as in-house counsel for corporations.

In addition, a few areas of law, such as patent law, are mandated by the U.S. Constitution to be strictly under federal jurisdiction. In this case, state courts and bar associations are not allowed to restrict the practice of that field of law, and a patent attorney may freely advise clients as to patent matters anywhere in the jurisdiction of the United States with impunity, without regard to state court or bar association rules. Furthermore, prior to November 15, 1938, individuals could become registered as “patent attorneys” with the PTO without ever passing a state bar exam or going to law school. That status was grandfathered for patent attorneys registered prior to that date. This represents a holdover to the traditional meaning of the term “attorney” as “agent” or “attorney-in-fact”. There are still some living patent attorneys who became registered as patent attorneys before that date, as far back as 1934. Today, a non-lawyer can take and pass the patent bar, but he or she would be considered a patent agent.

In some jurisdictions, the definition of the practice of law is quite strict; persons have been successfully prosecuted for publishing do-it-yourself will forms and for representing special education children in federal proceedings as specifically allowed by federal law.

Paradoxically, some jurisdictions will allow a non-attorney to sit as a judge, usually in lower courts or in hearings by governmental agencies, even though a non-attorney may not practice before these same courts. This extends to the U.S. Constitution itself, which does not mention any requirement that a U.S. Supreme Court justice or other federal judge be a lawyer, although it appears that no non-lawyer has ever been appointed as a federal judge.

American attorneys' attire

Unlike their counterparts in other common law jurisdictions, American attorneys are not required to wear wigs, robes or any other items of court dress when they appear in court. They are expected to wear contemporary business suits.

Attorneys in the United States do not usually have to adhere to a strict color code garb and can argue their cases wearing business suits. However, judges in the United States and Canada have occasionally been reported, even very recently, to order that a lawyer is not dressed appropriately and must return at a later date in proper attire – and to issue the lawyer a fine as if the lawyer had failed to show up for the hearing.^[4]

Alternatives to the practice of law

Because an accredited legal education generally provides a strong understanding of not only the substance of the law, but also an advanced analytical approach to the use and ramifications of the law, many professions, other than the practice of law, promote or require those with legal educations. As a result of overcrowding in the legal profession, the desire to achieve better work/life balance, and disenchantment with the legal profession, many attorneys are leaving the Bar to pursue these other professions that take advantage of the attorney's legal education. In some instances, graduates of law school who either cannot be admitted or who decide not to bother to be admitted to a state bar, enter these various professions.

In these fields, law degrees are useful (and sometimes mandatory, such as in the case of policy analysts and legislative drafters) qualifications for a job.

Notes

^ Pay Gap: Top Firm Associates Fall Behind Partners - A Critical Trend! published by The Wall Street Journal
^ Legal Services Going Offshore - A Critical Trend! published by Law Practice Today
^ See factsheet entitled "State Bar of Texas Facts," from www.texasbar.com.
^ While this is true, from ancedotal evidence, a citation is needed from the CPR.

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