Hello World

When you become an attorney, you sign on for a lifetime of responding to your family's and friends' "Is that legal?" questions. It may be a source of frustration for some attorneys, who either don't like to admit that they don't know an answer or just don't like to be put on the spot, but I actually don't mind it at all. The profession teaches its practitioners to see the world in terms of competing legal interests, and since I'm already thinking that way most of the time (though I usually try to hide it, because it doesn't make for very genial conversation), to be asked for my opinion on a question gives me a chance to let my thoughts go out loud.

Of course, my answer is almost always the same: "It Depends." This may not satisfy the person who has asked the question, but once we go at it from a few different angles, and come up with a bunch of different permutations that could lead to different results, the person has learned that when he asks a legal question--at least at first blush--there may not be a decisive answer. If he's never dealt with a lawyer before, it can be frustrating to learn that there might not be a clear-cut response. If he has dealt with attorneys, he might walk away from the conversation shaking his head and saying "They're all the same."

I'm a Big Firm attorney -- a litigator -- which means that most of my cases involve millions of dollars and there are often corporate interests behind one or both of the parties. But just because I'm focused on these cases for 40 hours a week (or 50. or 60. or, God forbid, 70), that doesn't mean I turn off my perspective when I come home. Living in Park Slope gives a lawyer all kinds of fat to chew on. It's an activist, political community that's teeming with interaction and opportunity to think about legal problems. So this blog is meant to be an outlet for me to think about some of those issues. Feel free to email me (parkslopelaw-at-gmail.com) and ask me "Is this legal?" I can tell you in advance, the answer will probably be "It Depends."