Today, in the midst of the broader discussion of the Arnold reading, Professor Moglen talked about “winning the lottery”. I’ve thought about this frequently – that the place where I am today, and indeed most of the places I’ve gone in my life, were predetermined by the time and place where I was born. Obviously there have been choices made along the way, but I’m not interested in addressing how frequently these choices were actually conscious decisions or to what extent a conscious decision can even be reached. Rather, I’d like to address the issues that arise for me when I presume that my privileged position in life is largely due to random chance.

The main difficulty, when I think about the circumstances that brought me to law school, is that I have trouble feeling that I’ve really earned my achievements. Granted, I succeeded at test-taking in college and then learned how to take a four-hour exam, but in doing so, I’ve felt like one of the multitude of ants following my prescribed role in building the anthill. With this sentiment, and with my experiences in other countries not as fortunate as our own, I find it exceedingly difficult to justify spending my life at a firm. My concept of justice may be subjective or insignificant, but that concept nonetheless makes me reluctant to see such a life stretching ahead of me.

I’m sure there are many people in the class who have traveled or lived outside of the “developed world”, and I’m curious to know how others feel about working as a part of structures that often seem to deepen existing inequities. If you accept that there is some abstract thing called justice (albeit defined differently for each of us), is it unjust for a law student, with a wealth of opportunities, to work within the structures in place in this country to make a comfortable life for herself and her family? I also wonder what kind of dialogue would follow if we consider the contention that the United States has won the lottery multiple times, and that this country’s prosperity is due more to chance than to any superior system of values or organization.

-- MichaelDignan - 05 Feb 2009

Why should you feel like you've "really earned" your achievements? I don't really consider it a "trouble" at all.

-- WalkerNewell - 05 Feb 2009

Like Walker, I was having a lot of trouble relating to the cognitive resistance to the idea that your achievements are partially, if not largely or entirely, a function of external conditions that aligned to create your birth, your personality, and your choices.

Although Michael, it seems like you are saying that you have a hard time with the thought of becoming a lawyer who works for a law firm and gets rich because, as a function of this whole, my-achievements-are-not-entirely-my-own thing, you didn't work hard enough to get to a position where you could live somewhat selfishly and take a job that didn't really pursue "justice." If free will was real, and if you had 100% control and responsibility for where you are today, would you feel better about going to a firm? I may be misunderstanding your point.

-- MolissaFarber - 06 Feb 2009

Michael, Professor Moglen's comment that recognition of the randomness of our position should make us think harder about our choices made me pause as well. I don't think that this acknowledgment dictates (or bars) any specific line of work – I do think that it means that we need to think harder about our choices and how those choices will enable us to help others.

If a given person will be able to impact the world in a more positive way by working at a large firm (and donating a significant chunk of their salary to worthwhile causes) than by working at a non-profit, wouldn’t the law firm be the more responsible choice? (I recognize that working for a large firm reinforces the economic structure of our profession. While I think we’re all capable of changing the world for the better, I don’t think we’re all capable of changing the very way in which the legal world operates.) In today’s world, money can accomplish a lot - and I think it would be wrong to ignore that.

Realizing that we owe our position in the world to a lot of luck (without forgetting that we’re also here because of our hard work) means that we ought to make less selfish choices – but that recognition, to me, doesn’t mean that choosing to work at a law firm would be selfish, or that choosing to work for a worthy social good would be selfless. I think it’s all about the net positive change in the world our choices will enable us to make.

-- MelissaMitgang - 06 Feb 2009