Let's Not Kill All The Lawyers
By Steven H. Kruis, Esq.
North County Lawyer (San Diego), October 2012
Did William Shakespeare really mean to criticize the legal profession? The line that has rankled lawyers for over four centuries is found in Act IV, Scene II, of King Henry the Sixth, Part II.
It is Dick the Butcher who says, "the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers." He is part of a rabble that gravitates around Jack Cade. Dick is purely fictional, but Cade was a real person, and the play depicts historical events that occurred in the previous century.
During those earlier and troubled times, England was ruled by Henry VI, who could do little to reverse the erosion of English influence in France. In an attempt to symbolize the truce between the two kingdoms, the English traded away two French provinces they controlled to acquire a French princess as a wife for Henry VI. This arrangement was to remain secret but, as with many political scandals, it did not.
The growing discontent in England was shown by the rising of the men of Kent led by Jack Cade, a rough and crass soldier home at the end of the Hundred Years War. In the summer of 1450, Cade and five thousand of his men occupied London for three days to force their reforms on the government. Cade beheaded Lord Say, the Treasurer (who is memorialized as a character in the play). The rebellion was ultimately put down, and Cade executed.
Not only was Jack Cade a ruthless traitor, but he was also an ignoramus. So in the play, Shakespeare sets up Dick the Butcher, or other members of the mob, to mock him. When Cade brags of his ancestry and abilities, Dick or another character, sets the record straight. Cade says he was born of an honorable house (Dick, aside: "Aye, by my faith, the field is honourable; and there was he born under a hedge; for his father had never a house, but a cage"). Cade says he fears neither sword nor fire (Dick, aside: "But methinks he should stand in fear of fire, being burnt i’ the hand for stealing sheep").
Oblivious to the continuing mockery, Cade finally says he will become king, eliminate money, and dress everyone the same so they will be brothers and worship only him. That is when Dick replies, "the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers." Cade says he plans to do just that, and promptly orders the death of the Clerk of Chatham for the crime of being educated enough to write his own name.
Shakespeare was not suggesting that lawyers should be killed. He had Dick say that to orchestrate Cade’s command to kill the clerk and demonstrate that this absurd rebel was more than ridiculous – he was a murderous criminal and a genuine threat to society. Taken to its logical conclusion, the irony of the scene suggests that the law and its practitioners, guaranteeing the rights of the government and the common man, cannot exist in Cade’s law-despising tyranny.
The converse is clear: without law (and lawyers) tyranny will result. In that light it can be argued that Shakespeare really saw lawyers as the guardians of justice. He did not want to kill them.
What does all of this have to do with mediation? The irony of Act IV, Scene II, of King Henry the Sixth, Part II, is that tyranny cannot exist with law and its practitioners guaranteeing the rights of all.
The same holds true today. In a modern and democratic society, the legal system provides a peaceful and principled way to insure those rights. Mediation has rapidly become one of the most cost-efficient ways to achieve that goal by resolving disputes when the rights of individuals collide. And the legal profession’s practitioners (lawyers) have become an integral part of the mediation process.
The Master Bard did not wish to end the honored and noble profession of law of which mediation plays a central role. Let’s not kill all the lawyers.
Steven H. Kruis, Esq. has mediated and litigated thousands of cases for the past 32 years. A former managing partner of a major San Diego law firm, he began mediating in 1993, and handles real property, business, probate, employment, and injury matters. He is a full-time mediator with Kruis Mediation (www.kruismediation.com).
Reprinted in part from North County Lawyer (San Diego), October 2012