National Trends

The Bar in the Dock

The morning papers the lawyers read took advantage of on-the-spot leverage and had their editorial guns booming. “Friends of the World Court,” the Washington Post said flatfootedly, “hope to crush that backward-looking movement by such a heavy vote that Congress will be encouraged to renew its timid repeal efforts.” The New York Times played the inverse psychology, but to the same end: “It does seem strange . . . that men . . . who are properly shocked when anyone commits contempt of court should be reluctant to commit their country to an agency . . . whose only purpose is peace through justice.” By afternoon the delegates were listening to similar sentiments from a man whose sense of propriety, many of them had assumed, would preclude an intrusion on their professional deliberations: “. . . it strikes me,” Mr. Eisenhower said, “that of all the people who should work for the rule of law, lawyers should be among the forefront . . . how are we ever going to travel [the road to peace] unless we are ready to make some concessions . . .?”

LB

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L. Brent Bozell Jr.

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The Bar in the Dock

The morning papers the lawyers read took advantage of on-the-spot leverage and had their editorial guns booming. “Friends of the World Court,” the Washington Post said flatfootedly, “hope to crush that backward-looking movement by such a heavy vote that Congress will be encouraged to renew its timid repeal efforts.” The New York Times played the inverse psychology, but to the same end: “It does seem strange . . . that men . . . who are properly shocked when anyone commits contempt of court should be reluctant to commit their country to an agency . . . whose only purpose is peace through justice.” By afternoon the delegates were listening to similar sentiments from a man whose sense of propriety, many of them had assumed, would preclude an intrusion on their professional deliberations: “. . . it strikes me,” Mr. Eisenhower said, “that of all the people who should work for the rule of law, lawyers should be among the forefront . . . how are we ever going to travel [the road to peace] unless we are ready to make some concessions . . .?”