Sunday, August 13, 2006

Arbitration Begins in the Home

Law students love to talk and write about how law school changes their classmates' personalities (But not their's of course - they're still the vibrant individualists that they always were). I have personally embraced this change as an often positive metamorphosis whose negative anti-social aspects will nevertheless find a way to increase my yearly salary. My brother just accepted Western as his law school of choice and is all set to join me there in September. He hasn't even had a chance to absorb that soul-altering culture shared by all law schools, but the story I'm about to recount demonstrates the results of the aformentioned Law School Influence perfectly.

As I mentioned my brother Gabe is entering his first year of Western Law as I enter my final year. Having another Flatt at Western gave me the perfect opportunity to ditch the bizarre and irritating roommate who was the subject of many of my annoyed rants on my personal blog, Flatt Like Me. Of course, as much as I clashed with my previous roommate, the nature of sibling rivalry and the basic laws of probability dicatated that it would only be a matter of time before the first clash of the Flatts. Here's an account of the dispute and its resolution. Lexis style:

Thornhill Registry No. 00004/06

DATE: 2006-08-03

INFERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE – ONTARIO

RE: FLATT, GABRIEL J plaintiff (moving party) v. FLATT, DANIEL A and STUDENTS IN LAW INC. defendants (responding party)


COUNSEL: Parties are self-represented

BEFORE: The Honourable Justices Momma and Poppa Flatt

HEARD: 03 August 2006, at Thornhill District Court

BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSION

[1] On 1 May 2006, the parties signed a lease as joint tenants in an apartment of the residential property at ******** in London, ON. At that time they agreed to split their rent and other sundry expenses equally as well as such apartment related duties as cleaning and organizing "sexy parties".
[2] They could not however agree on which one of them would inhabit which of the two bedrooms - in particular who would occupy the so-called 'good room' ("the good room.") The good room was distinguished from the 'crappy room' ("the other room") by the presence of a private balcony. Although neither party had any particular use for the balcony, neither could accept the prospect of the other receiving a superior domicile in exchange for admittedly equal compensation. After the parties rejected traditional negotiation methods such as Rock Paper Scissors (best two out of three), coin toss and 'roshambo' they agreed to enter arbitration before this tribunal.

[3] The plaintiff led his sole argument based on the "inertia principle" (), namely that as the eventual successor of the good room upon the defendant's departure in May 2007, he would experience a greater inconvenience by having to move his belongings from the other room to the good room. The tribunal was unconvinced by the strength of this argument which has been followed inconsistently in previous cases due to the varying ease of mitigation of damages. The defence posited that due to the close proximity of the rooms, it would be a simple matter to move the plaintiff's furniture into the freshly vacated room. The defendant offered to share the cost of mitigation by helping him move the furniture himself.

[4] The defendant countered with several compelling arguments such as the "older child" argument (Wally Cleaver v. The Beav) which was affirmed in the leading case of Brady v. Brady. The honourable arbitors held this to be good law and applicable to the present case.

[5] The defendant raised a further equitable argument, stating that since he had been forced to endure a two year cohabitation with a roommate (recognized by this tribunal as legally insane) he should be entitled to get his choice of bedroom in the new apartment. This principle of equity was followed in the so-called Perfect Strangers case (Cousin Larry v. Balki).

JUDGEMENTS:

Poppa Flatt, J. (Momma Flatt, J concurring)

[6] This board will follow its tradition of creative and "fitting" judgements. Following the tradition of my legal predecessor the right honourable King Solomon J. (Old Test.) I see it only fitting to split this coveted room in twain and granting half unto each party. We shall not follow the precedent of drawing a line down the middle of the room as was decided in the foundational property law case of Lucille Balle v. Desi Arnaz. Rather we shall divide the prize temporally by allowing the defendant to inhabit the room for the first 4 months of the academic year after which the plaintiff shall have the option to displace him if he so chooses.

[7] It is the will of this tribunal that the case be settled if both parties accept these terms. Furthermore the plaintiff shall take out the garbage after explaining his exorbitant cell phone bill and the defendant shall clean his room after putting some gas in my friggin car. If you're going to borrow it every night at least leave enough in the tank for me to get to the 7-11. You are now dismissed.

posted by DFlatt @ 10:45 PM 2 comments

Monday, July 31, 2006

Of Legal Bondage

This evening I have an audition to teach a GMAT course for Kaplan Test Prep. That's right. An audition. They told me to speak for 10 minutes on any non-academic subject of my choice. Basically, to prove that behind my impressive performance on standardized testing is a person who can speak English in front of a room full of people. I toyed with several ideas for how to exploit this rare captive audience: Like a hot-headed and deeply politicizing rant in support of a particular side of a certain Middle Eastern conflict or a deliberately erroroneous history lesson intended to demonstrate the hillarious errors found on Wikipedia. In the end I decided to talk about the subject that is closest to my mind these days - the ridiculous ordeals of the articling application process. Here is the speech I will be presenting tonight entitled "Of Legal Bondage." Wish me luck:

Of Legal Bondage

When the Emancipation Act of 1833 ended slavery in all British colonies, it solidified the trend towards abolition started in Canada over 30 years before. As slavery persisted south of the border in the United States, Canada became a refuge for slaves in the movement known as the Underground Railroad. Despite this country’s honorable distinction of being one of the first nations to abandon a slavery-based economy, a modern brand of indentured servitude has once again taken hold in the Canadian workplace. The individuals whose plight you shall soon learn share many of the deplorable working conditions experienced by previously oppressed groups such as 80 hour work weeks, malnourishment and forced servitude to cruel masters. However, the features of these individuals that distinguish them from their predecessors are far more surprising. You will be surprised to learn that members of the group to which I am referring are enslaved based on their choice of education and career rather than their race or nationality. Not only do they enter the shackles of servitude voluntarily, but they actually compete with each other to achieve this diminished status in an often violent and cut-throat manner. This system is operated and regulated in complete accordance with the laws of this democratic nation and in fact the task-masters include some of Canada’s most prominent lawyers. Next year I, Daniel Flatt shall join the ranks of the oppressed and trade my freedom for the promise of a rewarding career, a competitive salary, and perhaps even a free gym membership. Next year I shall join thousands of my brothers and sisters in the ordeal endured by all Canadian law graduates known as… the articling year.

I would qualify the analogy I have chosen by explaining that it is just that – an analogy. As a descendant of a people who endured centuries of bitter slavery, I would certainly not suggest that the experiences of Canadian articling students are remotely similar to the suffering of colonial slaves. I extend a sincere apology to any listeners who may have taken offence to my satirical parallelism. That being said, the articling year of intensive instructional work experience required of graduated Canadian law students in order to become licensed professionals remains one of the most grueling and demanding experiences in the modern workplace.

Although some would say that the experience begins on the first day of classes, for most law students the intense articling application process starts in the autumn of second year. Students applying to major Toronto law firms for second year summer jobs must endure an intensive day of On Campus Interviews or “OCIs”. Although the prospect of job interviews held on one’s own familiar territory may sound far less stressful than those held in the lavishly furnished and often intimidating offices of major law firms, the reality does not follow that logic. On OCI day, students can have as many as 20 back-to-back interviews, with each one lasting a carefully timed and strictly enforced 17 minutes. A student may be in the middle of answering an important question or describing an impressive achievement, but when that bell rings – the interview is over and the next one will begin after a 2-minute break. My personal experience on OCI day felt like speed-dating: Students rotate around the booths to briefly meet firm representatives, quickly make a good first impression and hope that the firms who impressed them will feel the same way and call them to arrange another date.

When that brief meeting is enough to make a lasting impression, students may be invited for second or third interviews after which they may be hired for a summer position. For the small fraction of students who actually secure a position at that point, the journey into voluntary servitude is complete. The majority of summer students will be hired back to the same firm as articling students after they complete their third and final year of law school. However for the multitudes who are left without a “guaranteed hire back” the ordeal must be repeated the next summer when they send out applications to an even greater pool of employers.

The first challenge is now to discover which firms to send applications to. This seemingly simple question is complicated by the law schools themselves. Every major law school has a Career Services Office whose only job is to find every student an articling position. Rewarding the disproportionate generosity of larger firms seeking to recruit the cream of every law legal crop, law schools will generally draw students attentions to the opportunities with those firms and neglect to inform them of opportunities with smaller and more specialized firms. In order to find those more elusive positions, law students must conduct a lot of their own research to determine where to send their applications. I noted this deficiency while preparing my own applications and organized a grass roots student effort to call every law firm in Toronto to determine their hiring status and recorded our findings in an online database for all students to use.

The applications themselves present a further challenge. A standard application package is usually comprised of a cover letter, resume, list of references, undergraduate and law school transcripts, reference letters and possibly a further writing sample. While these applications might already sound very elaborate, applicants are further harassed by the famously demanding scrutiny of legal employers. Simple typos, grammatical errors or inappropriate brevity or verbosity are all valid reasons for the articling committees to reject an application. This rejection usually takes the form of a letter or email, offering an insincere apology for the firm’s inability to offer the applicant an interview and an even more insincere wish for them to have good luck in their search for a position. At my law school such a letter is affectionately known by the acronym PFO which stands for “Please Fuck Off.”

For every 10 to 15 PFOs a law student will receive they may be lucky enough to get one interview. The next stressful date on the aspiring articling student’s calendar is known as Call Day. According to the guidelines set by the Law Society of Upper Canada, law firms may not offer an applicant an interview until a specified morning two weeks before the interviews begin. On the morning of Call Day, applicants wait by their telephones for the clock to strike 8AM after which they are barraged (if they are lucky) with law firms competing for their 2-hour time slots on the two days designated for interviews. In a brief and rare inversion of power, law students who are offered more interviews than they are able to schedule may be forced to make split second decisions of whom to meet and whom to reject. Having been in that position myself, I can attest to the brief sadistic thrill that came with deciding another’s fate. And people wonder how lawyers get their reputation for evil.

For me personally, the interviews themselves are an unexplored frontier that I will discover in two weeks. However, I can recount some of my colleagues’ anecdotes which include mid-interview walk-ins and trick questions which are used to test applicants’ quick wits and mental reflexes. Articling applicants have also described the games played by some firm representatives indicating their interest in the applicant by inviting them back for a second interview with a wink and a tempting but ultimately non-committal assurance, only to pass them over for another applicant the next day. This atmosphere of uncertainty is illustrated best by the lavish receptions and dinners hosted by law firms for their applicants designed to watch the students squirm like ants underneath a social magnifying glass.

After all that, students are again faced with a call day and must once again make a hasty decision of which job offer to accept if they are lucky enough to receive multiple offers. Once students sign the carefully drafted employment contract they can expect a year of long and intense days with ambitious billable hour targets in the office and a Blackberry that could ring any time of day or night that they are needed. These experiences vary from office to office with some law firms earning particularly severe reputations such as law firm of Davies Ward Phillips and Vineberg LLP which is known affectionately by its law students as “Slavies.”

So why, you may ask, do we law students put ourselves through all of this? Perhaps we are indoctrinated by our law schools to strive for this hard-won trophy even as we hear the horror stories of our upperclassmen, in an Orwellian double-think illustrated by yet another law school expression – “the golden handcuffs.” However the truth of the articling year is that it is the crucible in which all great Canadian lawyers are forged. The cocoon from which the highest flying legal butterflies will spring forth. To return to my previous analogy, articling students are able to endure their year of slavery with one thought in their developing lawyer minds. That one day they will cast off their shackles to become partners and hold their own whip over a generation of idealistic future lawyers who are only now entering high school.

posted by DFlatt @ 3:30 PM 1 comments

Monday, May 29, 2006

The Lexorcist: The Beginning

Welcome to a brand new blog. This will be the easiest way to host content for what will one day become a web and print magazine sensation. Well... maybe not - but at least I think that the title is witty.

As a law student and future legal professional, the free magazine racks that dot my daily path are full of publications that could only find a place in a lawyer's black heart. I have clicked and paged my way through some of the most uninspiring publications since Sports Illustrated's "Women of Pro-Golf: Swimsuit Edition."

The content of certain prominent legal industry rags who shall remain nameless (except through this publication's merciless spoofing of their titles) breaks down something like this:

10% - Gossip about which industry professionals have switched firms, started their own practices or beat their sexual harrasment raps (ie "Who's Hot"), and who's been disbarred, disciplined and divorced (Who's Not").

10% - Discussion of the big deals being brokered by Canadian lawyers. Conspicuously absent are articles about many of the smaller but more interesting transactions with titles like "Competition Lawyers Unite to Combat Rising Cocaine Prices" and "Bay Street's New Hobby: Wifeswapping!"

15% - Page after page of arbitrary and heavily politicized industry rankings such as "Best Intellectual Property Firm", "Most Articling Students Worked to Death," and of course the "Top 40 (Heart Attacks) under 40".

65 % - Advertisements by major law firms declaring themselves to be different than every other law firm that offers exactly the same services.

Of course the legal profession can occasionally be stressful, tedious and soul-crushing. At least that's the legal profession that the current publications put before our eyes as they slowly crust shut in boredom. But there is another side of law that has personality, and a sense of humour which deserves a far stronger voice. That voice is now growing in the independent web-rants of some of my talented colleagues. The Lexorcist hopes to join their ranks, to inform and most of all to entertain. Enjoy the blog and most of all enjoy you careers.

posted by DFlatt @ 3:15 PM 1 comments