Elizabeth, this draft is almost 1250 words, 25% over the maximum. You have to cut it to within 1,000 words before I can accept it. There is plenty of slack you can remove, and you might want to consider the relationship of time and space in language as you do so; it's really the implicit subject of the essay.

Time (and Waiting) in Legal Practice

-- By ElizabethHuh - 11 Mar 2022

Introduction

A closer look at the way time and waiting operate in the criminal justice system, which is where I will limit my discussion, reveals the real costs of losing time in the form of waiting. Crook County: Racism and Injustice in America’s Largest Court by Nicole Gonzalez Van Cleve is an especially devastating look into the way time is used to consolidate a socially patterned distribution of power and reify racial and economic inequality. At the Cook County jail, defendants are expected to convene sharply at 9 AM to wait for their turn in the docket, and their final hearing times are left to the mercy of the judge. They have no discretion: losing their place means more waiting, and waiting comes at a great economic loss. Plainly put, they are missing work and paying for daycare and parking. Waiting means anxiously rearranging one’s itinerary to line up with public transportation schedules, errands, jobs, and care.

The role of lawyers creates a sharp divide between those who have private attorneys and those who do not, which is a difference that occurs along racial and economic lines. The attorneys approach the bench and have their client’s cases heard first whereas clients without private attorneys wait indefinitely in the public gallery. In even grosser inequity, many poor people of color choose to plead guilty even if they are innocent because it means they can return to work and resume taking care of family. The irony is that a criminal record hinders these very activities.

In the criminal justice system, someone is setting the condition of waiting and has the ability to control the other’s own expenditure of time. It is clear that this discretion does not fall to poor defendants of color. Empirical experience is key to not only navigating the justice system but being a good—or, more accurately, an effective—lawyer. Therefore, I think we should begin by realizing that time, despite its exterior as a neutral, mechanical concept that is measurable and inflexible, is not a neutral nor equitable resource.

Is Time on Our Side in Law School?

It is even stranger is when time is catered to us. My Legal Methods II class was taught by a judge on Zoom, so he arranged for the students to get a chance to chat with him when he was briefly on campus. While grateful for the opportunity, I could not help but feel that this privilege was perverse. To defendants, the opportunity to be in front of a judge is a make or break, a sliver of time when they can make their case. Here, we were listening to a judge who had made the time for us and catered to our schedule by holding the meeting in the afternoon after our classes had finished.

At law school, time becomes a neutral feature. We don’t think about its effect on our potential clients, especially indigent clients, and its lasting impact on the clients’ communities. We think about it in terms of classes and opportunities, a mere Tetris piece in our academic and professional careers. Sure, I always complain about not having enough time to socialize, study, and get rest all at the same time. I guess in that sense time is not on our side in law school, but its scarcity is in stark contrast to how its loss translates to particular economic and social costs to people at the other end of the criminal justice system.

Time in Practice

Granted, that time is a medium doesn’t mean that lawyers are constantly chased by it. Legal practice is often imminent deadlines, a flurry of paperwork, and a rush to file motions. Yet, the tangible effects of time are different. If we are to truly understand the social forces behind decisions and their consequences, we have to look at the way deploying time as a strategic means sweeps its effects under the rug.

Making Things Happen

Our legal education necessitates that we think in sequence, following the straightforward trajectory from law school to practice. This class is a full-throttle disruption of that sequence, an opportunity for us to ponder about the lawyers we want to be and the lawyering we want to practice in an institution that actively prevents such reflection before we hold jobs in the real world. But, as Professor Moglen says, we are already engaged in legal practice. Dissociation generates discomfort. The next question is how we should respond to this discomfort. One that we will trade-off for security, or one that becomes an impetus for courage?

A Small Caveat

• #Set ALLOWTOPICVIEW = TWikiAdminGroup, ElizabethHuh
• #Set DENYTOPICVIEW = TWikiGuest