A photo blog depicting contemporary courthouses in the Western United States.
Sunday, September 28, 2025
Tone it down, senator. There is no fire in this theater.
Sunday, September 21, 2025
A Broken Profession
This is a follow-up to something I posted here just the other day, taking the blog away from its comfortable place of depicting courthouses, into the nature of the contemporary practice.
Courthouses of the West: Things in the air. Some observations with varying ...: This blog is supposed to be dedicated to architecture, basically, although matters pertaining to the law do show up here. Very rarely is th...
Here, I'm doing it again.
The CLEs above were on my mind to such an extent, and indeed they still are, that I've discussed them with several other lawyers I know. Turns out some of them are on meds for anxiety. I would never have guessed it.
There's something about this that really disturbs me,. although I don't fault them any one of them a darned bit. Some of them seem to love their careers and are really good at what they do. What bothers me, however, is that we seem to have developed a profession that has to heavily rely upon chemicals just to get by.
Just going back to the earliest of human mind altering chemicals, it's reported that between 21-36% of lawyers engage in problem drinking at hazardous, harmful, or potentially alcohol-dependent levels. That's pretty disturbing, as that's between 1/5th up to a little over 1/3d of all practicing lawyers. Some studies suggest that 36% of Minnesota's lawyers and judges drink at a dangerous level, and if that's not disturbing enough, some studies suggest that 41% of Canadian lawyers do. Around 10% of lawyers have a drug abuse problem, but that probably includes a lot of them who have an alcohol problem.
Not good.
There's really no way to know how many lawyers are on anti anxiety medications. Probably a bunch. It's obviously much, much, better that people dealing with anxiety inducing situations seek medical help than crack open a bottle of Henry McKenna and poor yourself several shots.* It's also better than smoking a joint or whatever else people are doing in the illegal drug categories, although obviously these days marijuana is sort of in a weird still illegal but not enforced much category.**
The laws approach to all of this has been to reach out to lawyers and offer "help". But perhaps what should be obvious, but doesn't seem to be, is the profession itself needs the help. If this percentage of its professionals, including its best and brightest, need chemical help just to get by each day, there's something existentially wrong in the profession. All the CLE's on mindfulness in the world aren't going to fix that.
Footnotes:
*Henry McKenna is an Irish Whiskey named after lawyer and distiller, Henry McKenna.
**Marijuana is still a scheduled illegal drug in Federal law and students imbibing in it can risk admission to their State bars. Likewise this can be true for people seeking a career in law enforcement.
Thursday, September 18, 2025
Things in the air. Some observations with varying degrees of introspection.
This blog is supposed to be dedicated to architecture, basically, although matters pertaining to the law do show up here. Very rarely is there anything on the practice of law.
This is an exception, but really not a cheerful one.
As noted, it's not cheerful. Perhaps its ironic, therefore, that the much longer post I took this from started off with:
Cheerfulness strengthens the heart and makes us persevere in a good life. Therefore the servant of God ought always to be in good spirits.St. Philip Neri.
Well, it's hard to see how we lawyers are Servants of God. Indeed, I fear out dedication to money has been such that we're getting to the point that's all we're the servants of.
Monday, September 15, 2025
Suit Up.
Dear Members of the Wyoming State Bar,
Suit Up is a student-led organization at the University of Wyoming College of Law that provides students with access to professional clothing and helps reduce financial barriers to academic and career opportunities.
With the State Bar Conference in Laramie this week, we invite you to support our mission by making a monetary contribution. We welcome donations of gently used professional clothing. Our Career Services Director, Kristin Lanouette would be happy to collect donations on Wednesday, September 17, at the College of Law Welcome Reception. Your support will directly help students participate in networking and career events with confidence.
Thank you for considering a donation and supporting the next generation of young lawyers.
For any monetary donations we kindly take cash, checks, or Venmo @junuenth (last four digits are: 2933).
Additionally, for any questions, please feel free to email our President – Junuenth Daniels jmorale5@uwyo.edu.
Sincerely,
Suit Up Leadership Team
University of Wyoming College of Law