19 of 19

Yes

Write now Article Tools

I believe that lawyers should be required to provide pro bono services. However, there are some stumbling blocks on the way to this ideal end. One of these problems is a lack of incentive. Why provide free services when there is no immediate gain from it? Another problem is a lack of time. How can a lawyer who has a fifty to seventy hour work week provide any other sort of service to the community? Finally,the big question, why is it that lawyers should be required to provide pro bono services?

As stated earlier, how do you provide incentives for somebody to work for free whenever they make a decent amount of money regularly? I believe the best option to entice lawyers to provide pro bono services is to offer them a tax break. The best way to reach someone is through their wallet. After all, aren't all lawyers greedy? I do not believe this, but most anyone who is offered a tax break for a service/task will do the work and take a tax break over the option of being taxed heavier. This is especially true with lawyers, who tend to lean conservative. This means that they would not like to be taxed heavily in the first place. Also, one cannot offer negative incentives, such as being taxed heavier, for this move will stem a negative backlash.

What of the lawyers who work massive work weeks? Obviously they would be physically incapable of taking on any more cases than they already have. This push towards providing pro bono services should be aimed at those lawyers who have a much lighter work load. Also, this work should not just be foisted upon public defenders. This would be an example of what economics calls the "problem of the free rider." Lawyers who do not do much or any pro bono work should be required to do some so that the "dirty work" is not left to the district attorneys and public defenders.

Finally, why is that lawyers should provide pro bono services? This work should be done as a service to the community. It should be an act which lifts the lowest of the community up, for as a great supreme court justice once said "that which is done to the least of us affects the greatest of us." This is an idealistic position to be sure, that lawyers should be required to provide pro bono services as a charitable act towards a community. However, the ideal must be stated so that we may move towards it.

Learn more about this author, Jarrod Pawlak.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.

Add your voice

Know something about Should lawyers be required to provide pro bono services??
We want to hear your view. Write now!