RABBIS AND LAWYERS: THE JOURNEY FROM TORAH TO CONSTITUTION. By Jerold S. Auerbach, Bloomington and Indianapolis, Ind.: Indiana University Press 1990, Pp. xix, 249 (Out of print.) ISBN: 0-253-31085-7.
THE PURSUIT OF JUSTICE AND JEWISH LAW: HALAKHIC PERSPECTIVES ON THE LEGAL PROFESSION. By Michael J. Broyde. New York and Hoboken, N.J.: The Michael Scharf Publication Trust of the Yshive University Press in association with Ktav Publishing House, Inc. 1996, Pp. xii, 184 (Out of print.) ISBN: 0-881-25559-9
REFLECTIONS ON THE AMERICAN JEWISH LAWYER
Reviewed by Russel G. Pearce[*]
These two books help identify and unlock two of the puzzles of Jewish lawyering. One puzzle is why a disproportionate number of American Jews have become lawyers[1] despite the Jewish tradition's antipathy toward being a lawyer. Another puzzle is why Jewish lawyers appear to be unconfortable with the notion that their religion should have anything to do with their work.
Although quite helpful in explaining these puzzles, Auerbach and Broyde are less successful in providing guidance for American Jewish lawyers. Auerbach's hostility to participation in the American legal system relies on a narrow, and ultimately unpersuasive, account of Judaism. Broyde, in contrast, provides an extremely valuable guide to navigating the tensions between the practice of law and halakba (Jewish law).
[*] Professor of Law and Faculty Moderator, Institute on Religion, Law, and Lawyer's Work at the Louis Stein Center on Law and Ethics, Fordham University School of Law. I would like to thank Joe Allegretti, Israel Greissman, Solomon Klein, Avi Schlick, and Amy Uelmen for their valuable comments and suggestions.
[1] For example, "by the late 1960s 20% of America's 350,000 lawyers were Jewish," Lawyers, 10, Ency. Judaica, Lawyers 1490,1505, while the Jewish population in the United States was approximately 3.0%. I. Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1970, Part I 8, 391 (U.S. Dept. of Commerce 1975).