Demise of the pit bull

by Carla Lewis

Family lawyers have a bit of a reputation for feuding. I’ve written acidic letters, hung up on a learned friend who was incoherent with fury, been hung up on in mid-rant. But in my personal life, I’m polite. I’d rather throw myself over a land mine than hurt someone’s feelings. I am impressed with my colleagues’ hard work, intelligence, wardrobes. Why do I fall into the slough of rudeness and aggression? Here are some 4:00 a.m. thoughts on collegiality or lack thereof.

He started it. I asked Lawyer X when I might expect his client’s financial information. He shouted, “Go to hell.” A terse exchange followed. “He started it,” is an excuse I refuse to accept from my five year old, and yet sometimes I react the way she would, whacking away with my little plastic shovel. As someone will always be “starting it,” a preferable response would be to use my (polite) words to tell X that I didn’t appreciate his attitude.

Who started this? Y needed an order immediately. I had two motions and an overdue factum to deal with. Sighing, I phoned my client, listened while he vented and got instructions. I called Y to say we consented, and if she wanted me to sign her draft, I would be in courtrooms 30 and 32, and then at my office. Didn‘t see her at court. Half an hour later, as I struggled with the factum, Y called: “You’re a liar. You weren’t at court.” A terse exchange followed. If I hadn’t been panicking about the factum, I could have waited for Y at court. At the very least, I might have avoided yelling at Y, who already wasn’t having a good day.

You are now entering the Twilight Zone. After we argued a motion, Z was to prepare the order. Ten days went by, no word from Z. On Day 11, an articling student from Z’s firm appeared, bearing a draft order. The articling student said she would wait until I signed it. Was there a letter from Z explaining the urgency? No. Did the student know what was urgent? No. I asked the student to find out what was urgent, and get back to me. The student said she would wait until I signed the order. I said I would not be able to sign it that day. The student sat in our lobby until we went home. Day 12 was a repeat of day 11, except it was a male articling student.

An acquaintance, observing a toupee resembling a jute roof, asked, “What could explain a thing like that?” What could explain Z’s actions? I never discovered the reason for this sour moment in the history of collegiality.

The pit bull thing. I’m sharing these anecdotes because they make me laugh. (Stories in which I really acted like a jerk will be saved for another occasion.) Some lapses of collegiality are nothing to laugh about.

Lawyers and clients are influenced by the contentiousness built into the court system, which is reinforced by what we read and watch. On television, lawyers are always skewering one another with rapier-like comments. Clients conclude they need an aggressive lawyer: a pit bull. (“Think of me as a basset hound,” I told one potential client, who looked bummed out.) But whether we, our clients or the media are ready, change is on the way.

When I studied family law in 1982, the curriculum didn’t include alternative dispute resolution. Lawyers now use mediation, four-way meetings and collaborative law. Provincial and Supreme Court programs divert family matters from litigation. That these approaches produce better, faster, cheaper results than court skirmishes is obvious to the least analytical member of the family bar (i.e., me). It’s also obvious that collegiality contributes to success in ADR, it derails when lawyers skewer one another with rapier-like comments.

Writers will suffer most from the demise of the pit bull thing. People discussing a problem is not gripping drama. But my clients are happier, and now that my insomnia is driven by fear of the CCRA and cellulite encroachment instead of flameouts with colleagues, I’m happier too.

Carla Lewis practises family law in Vancouver.

This article was published in the December 2002 issue of BarTalk. © 2002 The Canadian Bar Association. All rights reserved.