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CORPORATION LAWYER... SAINT OR SINNER? by Beryl Harold Levy

CORPORATION LAWYER... SAINT OR SINNER?

By

Publisher: Chilton

In a solid, tight brief, the author answers the question in favor of the Saint. How did the corporation lawyer develop in America? The answer- Industry and Big Business. Levy begins his brief with a description of the mid-19th century court lawyer-trial lawyer- Abe Lincoln. In the '80s and '90s, the genesis of the Big Tycoon, he, the Tycoon, did not need a lawyers he needed a counselor who could tell him what he could and what he could not do. So the office lawyer developed,- a George Stetson, a Nelson Cromwell, an Elihu Root, a Henry Stimson, a Francis Rangs. The counselor developed the law firm; the law firm developed into the Wall Street Law Factory and now- one step further- is the Departmentalized Law Factory. The author tells the story simply and interestingly. He gives a close-up picture of the slow growth of the law factories, and thumbnail sketches of the great ones and the big shots. The sketches lack the wit and charm that Felix Frankfurter could have put into them and lack too the colorful anecdotes that would have enlivened the factual text. The balance of the book moralizes or philosophizes on the duty of the lawyer to his client, to society and to the development of the law to meet the challenge of our complicated industrial life. A book primarily of interest to the Big Offices of the East and the small offices throughout the country.