‘Last Jury Trial’ funny, But Truth of It Is Not
I was thoroughly enjoying Bill Haltom’s article “The Last Tennessee Jury Trial,” which appeared in the March issue of the Journal. Indeed, I was chuckling to myself most all the way through. But then after I finished reading it, I was hit with a stark realization. I believe that he may actually be correct. Perhaps, the thought of judges abdicating their responsibilities to “mediators, conflict resolution facilitators and holistic creative alternative dispute resolution consultants” is not so funny after all but is indeed quite troubling. Food for thought at any rate.

— Stephen K. Garrett, Knoxville

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My perception that we are letting the practice of law slip away causes me to modify a well-known poem about speaking up (with apologies to Pastor Martin Niemoller):

They came first for the real estate attorneys
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a real estate attorney

Then they came for the workers’ compensation attorneys
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a workers’ compensaton attorney

Then they came for the divorce attorneys
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a divorce attorney

Then they came for me
And by that time no one was left to speak up

— Dent Morriss, Springfield