Then the lawyer had a profession which he
carried in his head. Law reports contained a few thousand, not a
million decisions, and there were no title insurance companies to make
a business of determining the ownership of real estate. Yet in those
days the legal adviser was not a very exalted person, ranking beneath
the soldier and standing hat in hand before the gentleman of property,
to whom he owed his living. The citizen who wished to learn whether he
or his landlord should clear away the snow on the sidewalk, went
gravely to a lawyer's office and paid a fee for the information. It is
obvious that lawyers do not make their living through small fees for
giving advice. As a matter of fact, those whose work is more
remunerative than a street-car conductor's or a carpenter's, make
their living through business and not in small litigation.
To-day lawyers complain that their profession is slipping from them.
But they have gained the prestige of business.
"I am a business man, not a lawyer," says the elderly leader at the
bar, and scarcely knows whether he is, on the whole, gratified or
regretful.
Their abilities are used in directing the conduct of business from a
legal standpoint and protecting it from those who are ready to prey
upon it.
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