Systemic Inadequacies
This letter is in response to the Lee Wm. Atkinson letter in the October 15 News. I disagree with Mr. Atkinson’s assertion that a prosecutorial system cannot be seen as broken.

He needs to look into the Texas justice system that is a bifurcated structure housing separate civil and criminal court structures. As a result, prosecutors often run for criminal judge posts and this inbreeds the penchant for prosecutor-leaning systems. The United States Supreme Court has openly chastised this system.

Recently, the Dallas Morning News reported that the UT-Arlington Innocence Network and UT-Austin Actual Innocence Clinic student volunteers undertook a three-year effort to look into the 1997 prosecutions and convictions of Chris Scott and Claude Simmons in Dallas. This research had nothing to do with faulty DNA technology.

After combing through mountains of documents and prison interviews, the conclusion reached was that the convictions were based on the “faulty identification procedures by Dallas police.”

The crimes that they were convicted for were capital offenses of robbery-murder. They were given life sentences instead of the death penalty in these cases. What would have happened had they gone to death row instead and their sentences were carried out?

That the Dallas police and the Dallas County district attorney’s office agreed to re-open the case and thereafter address their own inadequacies is commendable. That is the way to improve systems and organizations.

Pointing the finger at one person does not create an environment to address systemic inadequacies.

Martin N. Goldsmith
Southlake, Texas

Mentoring and Experience
A letter writer in the October 15 News suggested graduates from lower-tier law schools were more interested in opening their own law firm rather than working for others thereby getting mentored and gaining valuable experience. Since good decision-making comes from proper training and mentoring, new lawyers who hang their shingles deprive themselves of this necessary professional development.

Unfortunately, the writer ignores the reality that many rookie lawyers, especially ones from lower-tier schools, are forced to open their own firms because they can’t find jobs as they drown in student loan debt. Additionally, new grads lucky enough to find jobs don’t get needed experience because many firms have no real interest in mentoring young lawyers. Consequently, new lawyers don’t learn how to make good decisions or get cost-effective results for their clients.

Long term, this lack of mentoring reduces the quality of legal services, leading to clients’ decreased confidence in our profession; unhappy, disenfranchised lawyers; and increased time and expense for everyone.

Unfortunately, the trend of rookie lawyers opening their own firms will continue as long as there are more lawyers than available jobs, or until firms begin meaningful mentoring programs to help new lawyers develop their skills. Until then, our clients, the courts, and society will bear the expense of rookies learning “on the fly.”

Shane Fischer
Winter Park

Gay Adoption
In his October 15 letter arguing that gay people should not be allowed to adopt, George L. Metcalfe states that it is “God’s will” that homosexuals should be “cut off from” society and that we must have laws to keep “children and homosexual adults separated” because Leviticus 18:22, 29, and 30 say so.

I’m always amazed at how people are able to cite selected biblical passages as immutable truth, and yet disregard other passages from the same part of the Bible when it is convenient to do so.

If the Bible, specifically Leviticus, contains “godly wisdom” that we humans are not free to disregard and are required to enact into law, then why pick only the passages that condemn homosexuality? To cite just a few examples, Leviticus also condemns letting cattle interbreed and sowing fields with mingled seed, and commands that no one should wear a garment made of a blend of linen and wool (19:19); condemns tattoos and piercings (19:28); commands that the Sabbath be kept (19:30); commands that a child who curses his father or mother “shall be surely put to death” (20:9); commands that anyone committing adultery “shall be surely put to death” (20:10); commands that no one shall shave his head or shave off the corner of his beard (21:5); and approves of slavery and provides rules regarding how to treat a female slave after her master has had sex with her (19:20); and the inheritance of slaves by the master’s children (25:45-46).

I’m certain that all decent people, including Mr. Metcalfe, would agree that, at best, society and its members are free to disregard these proscriptions, and, at worst, that any law enacting some of these provisions would be not just wrong but immoral. Mr. Metcalfe is free to oppose gay adoption, but to argue, as Mr. Metcalfe does, that society is required to regard homosexuality as an “abomination” and that we must have laws to “keep children and those practicing homosexuality apart” because the Bible says so, while ignoring neighboring passages which may be on the very same page of the Bible, is the height of hypocrisy.

James A. Altman
Orlando

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Jonathan S. Coleman’s November l letter favoring gay adoption categorizes moral and health laws of Judaism in Leviticus as “inanities.” Coleman assaults and insults both Christians and Jews.

Synonyms of “inanity” include: stupidity, silliness, ridiculousness, absurdity, idiocy, and senselessness. Coleman misinforms that Leviticus “justifies the use of slavery” and completely misses the foundational point that the Bible and Torah were written to broad audiences who find themselves trapped in slavery. The Jewish nation itself became slaves to Egyptians for about 400 years. Law which accurately contemplated this eventuality for the Jewish people (and the fact that slavery continues even today) is perfect God-given law. Time is no factor. God is unchanging and immutable, meaning He is absolute, unchallengeable, unassailable, indisputable, incontrovertible, and undeniable.

Coleman never understood that laws of Leviticus are health laws. Skin and blood infections abound when laws of adultery are broken (hence STDs and AIDS), and when garments of mixed animal materials are interwoven and worn in direct contact with human skin without sanitary lining. Harnessing horses and donkeys together results in uneven pulls on both animals, and greater injury risk to the farmer and his animals. Coleman should notice that serious health law violations which imperil people have greater legal remedies. Today’s research confirms great health benefits of those today who obey God’s law.

God’s laws condemning homosexual practices (Lev. 18:22) as an abomination remain consistent with all other health laws. As remedy for violating this law, God’s will separates those who defile themselves with homosexuality from the community (Lev. 18:29-30). Nowhere in 66 books of the Bible are children permitted to live with practicing homosexuals.

Separating children from practicing homosexuals helps children mature into healthy character and avoids influences and proximities to serious health problems cited by Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (ULMA) in “Ten Things Gay Men Should Discuss with Their Health Care Providers” (July 17, 2002), which include significantly higher frequencies of: HIV/AIDS, substance abuse, depression/anxiety, hepatitis; STDs, prostate/testicular/colon cancer, alcohol abuse, increased tobacco use, dietary disorders like bulimia/anorexia nervosa, and anal papillioma.

For children, what’s so gay about any of this?

George L. Metcalfe
Leesburg

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I recently read the letter from George L. Metcalfe concerning the gay adoption issue. While we, as attorneys, have a right to our own opinions, we have restraints based on our position.

What stuck me most was the reference to God’s laws and Judeo-Christian precepts as reason to prevent children from the right to a loving parent and to deny gays the right to adopt. I reviewed the Oath of Admission and found no reference to either God’s law or this imagined Judeo-Christian precepts, but rather only the United States Constitution and the Florida Constitution.

With regard to the notion that we are somehow a “Christian nation” and subject to God’s law, this is simply not true. The U.S. Senate in 1797 took the first opportunity in the Treaty of Tripoli to make it clear that the United States is not a “Christian nation.” Article 11 of said treaty states: “As the government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility . . . .”

Further, our first president, George Washington, in a letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island, in 1790, wrote: “The citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy — a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.”

The withholding of rights to a group or class of citizens based on sexual preference or orientation is simply not supported by the U.S. Constitution or Florida Constitution. As an attorney, I have taken an oath to uphold those laws, not God’s laws.

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged.” (Matthew 7:1)

Thomas H. Dougherty
Palm Beach Gardens

Promoting the General Welfare
I read Stephen Schoeman’s October 15 letter on promoting the general welfare with great interest. Several things may be said about it.

First, whose idea of what is in the “general welfare” is to be adopted? Schoeman includes such things as “universal health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, environmental protection.” I am sure quite a few people would take exception to that list; or, indeed, practically any list that some third party might devise. It may be that many lawyers consider the scope of their practices to be consistent with their view of the general welfare, but not Schoeman’s.

Second, the adversarial system itself is something that is good for the general welfare. This is one reason why the same constitution Schoeman relies upon also protects trial by jury. Allowing neutral arbiters to listen to both sides put forward their best case and let the jury determine who should “win” in a particular case is a good thing. It’s a lot better than guns and hand grenades, as in some countries.

Third, however, I must agree that a “win at all costs” approach is deleterious. This is why we have codes of ethics, as well as procedural rules, which determine the parameters of advocacy which must be maintained to make the system work as it should. Straying outside those lines to secure a “win” does adversely affect the practice of law, the proper functioning of dispute resolution, the public perception of lawyers, civility, the enjoyment of legal practice, and — promoting the general welfare.

Thomas F. Harkins, Jr.
Fort Worth, Texas