The Lawyer's Obligation as Public Citizen

It is an honor to participate in this symposium—at the Mercer Law School—which, to its great credit, is looking hard and thoughtfully at the lawyer’s professional role. I particularly admire the focus on the lawyer’s obligation as public citizen. Something we pay attention to, I’d guess, less frequently than other purported ethical charges. I’m grateful, too, that the Mercer Law Review would host this terrific conference. And I salute former American Bar Association (ABA) President Mary Smith’s leadership on these issues; especially her formation, in 2023, of the ABA’s Task Force for American Democracy, with Judge Michael Luttig and others, in these most challenging of times. It is great, too, to be in Georgia. I’m guessing no North Carolinian would easily describe Georgia as the promised land. Though one might during football season. But if you come from a state like mine, a state that has for fifteen years been engaged in an intense, and often losing battle, pathbreaking, but losing battle, to secure its democracy—Tar Heels could reasonably concede that over the last decade Georgia has been home to some of the most appalling and the most inspiring democratic work in the country. Maybe I should just say Georgia is obviously home to much heroism in the American democratic cause. It’s an honor to visit the scene of the struggle. The nation’s most important struggle. From our first day as a country until this very afternoon.