Choosing a Career in Law

Matthew Eppard
Ms. Martin
English 10 Pre-AP – Period 1
2-22-13
Lawyers
According to my parents I have always been the kind of person who argues…a lot. Ever since I was little, I’ve always been the kind of person who will try to argue a point regardless of how I think it will turn out. That’s why my parents have been telling me to become a lawyer. Because of this, I have always considered being a lawyer and it is an occupation that I have enjoyed researching about. The career of being a lawyer, which has a progressive history, is a field that has many satisfying characteristics, which include a few negative aspects.
There is a lot of history to the occupation of a lawyer that stretches back many years. “The earliest lawyers documented were in Ancient Greece and in Ancient Rome. Early Roman advocates were trained in rhetoric, not law, and the judges before whom they argued were also not law-trained” (Lawyer. Wikipedia). The history of this profession goes back centuries and centuries to a world where law was a completely different thing. Back in these times I bet that they had hardly any laws compared to how many we have now. I have a feeling that court is much harder now than it was back then also. “During the Roman Empire and the early Roman Empire, jurisconsults and advocates were unregulated, since the former were amateurs and the latter were technically illegal” (Lawyer. Wikipedia). This shows that back in its earliest form, there was no real way to tell if someone was actually a lawyer or not. To me this shows how far the profession has gone. Everyone knows who a lawyer is now and there are so many of them, but back during these times anyone could claim that they were one. However now a days lawyers have to go through so much school in order to become a lawyer. As shown above, there is a huge history to the lawyer profession that leads back many centuries.
There are many different work tasks of a Lawyer. “Lawyers must be able to represent clients in court and present evidence on behalf of a client that they are defending in either a criminal or civil case” (Lawyer Job). This means that a lawyer is entrusted with many jobs they have to do successfully in order to fulfill the job requirements. It is a lot of work, but after the schooling it should be pretty easy. The lawyer will just have to make sure that they know about the evidence enough to argue it in court. “A lawyer must be able to interpret laws, rules, and regulations to a client in court” (Lawyer Job). After being in schooling the laws and rules should already be known and known well so doing this should be a piece of cake. However getting the client to fully understand the laws is a different story. Especially when the lawyer in question don’t know the client fully and even though they know the laws and rules, they still may not follow them. As shown above, there are many work tasks involved with being a lawyer.
Education and training is a very important part of becoming a lawyer and becoming successful as a lawyer. “Most lawyers obtain bachelor's degrees and law school degrees” (Lawyer Job). A bachelor’s degree is a degree earned through four years of a major course. Through these years of schooling, lawyers learn many things about their profession and the things they must know in order to successfully commit to the job. The classes they will take to learn these are in contracts, property law, criminal law, and constitutional law. “Good scores on the Law School Aptitude Test are required for admission. In the last two years of law school, students specialize in the areas of law in which they hope to work” (Lawyer Job). The Law School Aptitude Test is a test that is supposed to measure the student’s success in law school based on reading comprehension of texts, the ability to think critically, the evaluation of the arguments and reasoning of other people. After the test, if it is successfully passed, the student will then be able to go into the field of work that they have been studying for their last two years of schooling. As shown above, education and training are two necessary things needed in becoming a lawyer.
Many personal qualities are asked of lawyers including being able to adapt to changes and trustworthiness. “A lawyer needs to always be in search of new knowledge and willing to adapt to changes in the laws and procedures that they will work with every day. The practice of law, no matter what area, requires great focus and hard work” (Guide). These qualities are important to lawyers because in the world we live in today, things are constantly changing, rules and laws are always changing throughout time, and lawyers have to be able to pick up on and adapt to the changing things. If this cannot be done, then they will not have all of the qualities necessary to perform their job adequately causing there to be many problems with being able to keep a steady job in the industry. “Lawyers need to be trustworthy individuals, as they will often be entrusted with people's property, money, or legal rights. Therefore, lawyers must keep a clean record or face disbarment from the profession” (Guide). If someone cannot trust their lawyer then they might as well not hire them. The lawyer representing them will be handling a lot of their personal information. No one wants an untrustworthy person holding their money. Honesty is a very valuable quality that could be looked for in hiring a lawyer. As shown above, personal qualities can highly affect someone’s success in the lawyer job field. The average salary for being a lawyer is actually quite manageable. “Attorneys earned a median annual salary of $113,240 in 2009 (U.S.)” (Attorney). This salary is quite a good intake for the average person in America. As long as the person in question is living in the average middle class house with a decent sized family, they should be fine. “The best-paid lawyers earned more than $187,199 on average per year, while the lowest-paid made approximately $54,120 per year on average” (Lawyer: Salary). On the higher side of that average, there is a lot of money involved, enough to have someone living really good, family and all, for a good while. If someone has a family and is on the lower side of that average, it could pose as a real problem when trying to provide for that family. As shown above, the average salary for being a lawyer is actually quite manageable. The job outlook for lawyers is a very important thing to consider when looking into the profession. “Employment of lawyers is expected to grow by 10 percent from 2010 to 2020, about as fast as the average for all occupations” (Occupation). With this amount of growing in the profession it puts off a very hopeful vibe for people hoping to join the profession. It allows people to feel more comfortable in trying to go through with working towards the job because it is possible to get a successful job. “The job outlook for lawyers has become an issue of debate, as recent economic realities have lessened the legal work that is available” (Occupation). With this development in the profession, it could easily cause someone to become more hesitant in going for the job. There are many people trying to get into this profession and many don’t because there are more graduates from law school then there are positions open. This could cause some problems in considering going to law school. If this lessening of jobs continues, it could really hurt the amount of people who continue to try to join the profession. As shown above, the job outlook for lawyers is a very important thing to consider when looking into the profession.
There are some negative aspects of becoming a lawyer. “Government funding has also been slashed, creating hiring freezes for government agencies that hire lawyers. All of these factors have lowered the available jobs for lawyers, their salaries, while increasing hours and decreasing job satisfaction” (Guide). The list of things above can severely damage the possibility of someone joining the profession. These negative aspects seem very severe with the lowered pay, lowered amount of jobs, and more hours. “Many people may become upset and could either stop training for the profession or even quit if they are already in the profession” (Guide). Many lawyers also find it difficult to fight for something that they don’t believe in. This could become a problem in many cases especially things like criminal cases. A lawyer may know that their client is quite possibly guilty but they still have to fight for their freedom. This could become a real problem if someone knows that they’re the reason why someone got away with something because of their actions. As shown above, there are many negative aspects of being a lawyer.
After collecting all of this research I’m having mixed feelings about the job. It seems like it is a lot of work and a lot of schooling to do for a job that I might not be happy doing. With all of the hours and the majority of people not being happy with the job really does hurt my wanting to be in the profession. But there are some good things including the salary. Becoming a lawyer something that I’ve been thinking about doing for my entire life. I might continue to look into this profession but I might not go through with actually doing it. As shown throughout this paper, the career of being a lawyer, which has a progressive history, is a field that has many satisfying characteristics, which include a few negative aspects.

Works cited
"Guide to Lawyer Job Description." Laws. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2013.
"Lawyer Job Description, Career as a Lawyer, Salary, Employment - Definition and Nature of the Work, Education and Training Requirements, Getting the Job." State University. State University. Web. 22 Jan 2013.
"Occupation Outlook Handbook - Lawyers." Bureau of Labor Statistics. N.p., 26 Apr 2012. Web. 7 Mar 2013.
"Lawyer." Wikipedia. N.p., 11 Mar 2013. Web. 12 Mar 2013.
"Lawyer: Salary." US News Money. N.p.. Web. 12 Mar 2013.