Lawyer: Ms. Martinez, you just testified that the bank robber was wearing a Texas 

Rangers hat, didn’t you?

Martinez: Yes.

Lawyer: And you also said that one of the two bank robbers dropped his hat when you

chased him out of the bank, isn’t that right?

Martinez: That’s correct.

Lawyer: Ms. Martinez, the hat left there that day was a Texas Rangers hat, wasn’t it?

Martinez: Yes.

Lawyer: No further questions.

I knew I had won my case the moment Martinez answered “yes” to that final question. Nowhere in the facts before me was there ever a mention that the hat left at the scene was a Texas Rangers ball cap. I didn’t actually care whether it was. I just needed the witness to say it was so. As I prepared the defense case for my client on trial for bank robbery, I strategized about the most misleading and suggestive way I could phrase the questions just so I could get a “yes” out of this witness. And with these three craftily worded questions, I had led this witness into giving me what I wanted. The trial ended with a hung jury and my client was free and clear. Victory.

I recently completed three years of education and training to be able to do what I did that day in the courtroom. The exhilaration I felt was almost equal to what I would feel if my favorite football team won the national championship. I had outwitted that witness and led her to say something that may or may not have been true. But even if she tried to recant her answer later, I could just tell the jury she was now an unreliable witness. It has only been with time that I have questioned what kind of victory this actually was.

Thankfully, I was just trying to get a bank robber off for my Trial Advocacy class. No one’s freedom was on the line and there was no real need to seek justice. But, I ask myself now, “What would I have done in the real world?” My education has trained me to do just what I did. To think of every angle and every way I can pin a witness in a corner. This might just be good lawyering, but sometimes I am unsure.

One of my Christian friends recently said to me, “There were things before law school that if you had asked me about, I would have unequivocally said were unethical. But now, I find myself thinking maybe they aren’t so cut and dry.” I have not been able to stop thinking about this statement. After completing my course in Professional Responsibility, there seemed to be many instances where my pre-law school understanding of ethics would have led me to a different answer.

While I am taking a critical stance against lawyers, I am one, and I still tire of lawyer jokes where the punch line is always that we are to be distrusted. I do not believe that the rules we learn or the tactics we are taught to pursue are always wrong. Our goal is to defend the interests of our clients to the utmost of our ability. Our loyalty and duty of confidentiality to our clients trumps everything else. Perhaps in some ways this is not all too different from the advocacy we receive from our Lord Jesus Christ.

As I study for the bar exam this summer, and will begin working for a law firm this fall, I wonder how I should integrate practice of the law with following Jesus. I know that the law I am practicing governs for a very different purpose than God’s law. Our earthly laws are meant solely to act as a restraint on human nature and to enforce some sort of earthly order. God’s law, however, does much more than restrain. It reveals our human sinfulness and hopefully moves us to rely on God instead of our ever-lacking ability to be “good on our own.” I don’t yet know exactly how or even when I should operate differently when practicing this earthly law. This is something I will struggle with over time as I begin my legal practice. My sense is that there probably should be some significant differences in the way that I practice law as a Christian. But what does that look like, practically? How do I follow God’s law while abiding by my ethical duties as a lawyer?  Do I trust “the system” to deliver the justice that God delights in?  What does integrity look like for a Christian lawyer?