James May-June 2023 web - Flipbook - Page 54
This occurrence evolved despite the intentions and
drafting of our original founders.
If our politics are not overwhelmed with lawyers,
where do they align?
As noted above, legislators who make our laws need
not be attorneys or even educated or trained in the law, as
the majority are not. Typically, legislators hire and utilize
legislative counsel (lawyers) to draft appropriate proposed legislation when they perceive a need for proposed
legislation/laws. And, within the legislative and executive
branch are created a plethora of administrative branches, agencies, departments, divisions, cabinet positions,
authorities and the like. Accompanying this are reams of
regulations, rules, orders, directives and administrative
law bureaucracies to enable staffing, functioning, and enforcement. Each department or agency requires or utilizes
numerous individuals educated in law to ascertain needs
and distill those needs into enabling legislation, as well
as rules and regulations for enforcement and review. And,
most executive branches have an entire staff under an attorney general to enforce enactments passed for execution
by the executive branch.
Following the passage of lawyer-drafted legislation,
the judiciary then, at whatever level, interprets laws
through the observation, interpretation and input of
legally-trained and educated counsel for private litigants,
as well as attorneys employed by federal and state departments, agencies, authorities, etc. The vast majority of
those judges who are legally educated and trained interpret those laws as presented by litigants with the aid and
input of the parties, their counsel and the legally educated
and trained staff of the members of the judiciary.
Finally, even the interagency or intra-agency disputes
that do not qualify for resolution by the judiciary are heard
and resolved via rules, regulations and procedures developed by staff trained in the law. And those rules, regulations and procedures are then presented and argued by
similarly trained individuals. Many of those disputes may
then qualify for resolution by a level of the judicial branch
after proper presentation by legally trained personnel.
For the many citizens who are skeptical of the legislative delegation of powers to an excess of agencies,
bureaucracies and so-called “experts” (the unelected,
unaccountable elite), there is a growing mass of legally-educated and trained professionals developing with a stated
purpose— that is, to avail aggrieved citizens of some
meaningful review to thwart a tyranny of rules by un-democratically anointed powers.
They, hopefully, will serve to preserve the power to
govern by the people elected through our constitutional
process. Arguably, an optimal mix of the law, lawyers and
politics will occur when two goals are reached. First, when
conditions exist that permit citizens of any occupation
or profession to serve in politics, bringing their common
sense, aided by people educated in the law. Second, when
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legally educated professionals enter the arena, it shouldn’t
be to just become a career politician who abdicates their
duties to unelected/unaccountable elites. It shouldn’t be
by way of seeking elected status in perpetuity by simply
delegating their true work to the chosen.
It is from this vast legally educated pool that James
has “spotlighted” some individuals in the accompanying
article below on “politically-connected” attorneys and their
current activities. These are the professionals who intersect and interface with politics to facilitate a system that
still values the political input of businesspeople, farmers,
tradesmen and women, artisans, artists, teachers, soldiers
and professionals in all branches of government. That is
our melting pot of government: our diversity.
Without these spotlighted people, there would be no
Justice James F. Byrnes or Justice Stanley F. Reed (Associate Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court) and many of the
distinguished legislators and executives of the states and
the federal government. Please remember this point as you
read in James about Legislative Counsel, Executive and
Governor’s Counsel, staff and Special Assistant Attorneys
General and the private professionals who present legal
issues and arguments within the structure of our political
and legal system. We should be grateful for all their contributions to a still functioning system of laws, not men.
Mark V. Spix is trial attorney based in Atlanta who has actively
practiced law throughout the United States since 1977. He is enjoying
semi-retirement by limiting his practice to select cases.
O N T H E M O V E I N G E O R G I A’S
P O L I T I C A L & L AW A R E NA
The James staff decided to provide a current snapshot of
prominent politically-connected attorneys among the many
who walk in the hallways of power around our state.
Stacey Abrams— Still a player even after her second gubernatorial defeat, she’s busy as an attorney and a lecturer
at Howard University. …Sally Akins— The president
of the State Bar has her hands full overseeing more than
37,000 Georgia attorneys. …Roy Barnes— The former
governor can’t stay out of a courtroom, currently suing
Cobb County after a rezoning request to build homes on his
farmland was denied. …Bob Barr— The one-time Georgia
congressman remains engaged on the investigative committee for the Judicial Qualifications Commission. …David
Emadi— The executive director at the Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission
keeps issuing fines to law violators. …David Dove— The
executive counsel for Gov. Brian Kemp made news when
his memo outlining Buckhead cityhood problems helped
sink the cityhood legislation. … Randy Evans— The
former U.S. Ambassador to Luxembourg and GOP
bigwig is back stateside with Squire Patton Boggs. …