Law students are told on every possible occasion that they must learn to think like a lawyer, and since they are eager to become lawyers and trust their teachers they are eager to lend their mind to legal thinking. But the problem, as briefly noted here, is that they are given no instruction as to the powers and pathologies associated with legal thinking, or to the possibility that clients may pursue. Law school provides a logic, a kind of thinking, and the mind willing to do it. But like Hippocrates, the law student, seems oblivious to how this Legal Mind might shape her character, or what might happen with the persistent use of such a mind. There are many translations of this early Socratic dialogue, Protagoras .
Law students are a varied lot, but even so, are rather easily reduced to caricature.
So much so, that caution is in order. Many students do, in fact, speak scripted parts in a drama that make them sound like legal caricatures, and many do it with relish. Caricature, in the world of legal education, is both a reality and dangerous. Whether lawyers are heroes or bums, our culture often views courtroom lawyers as deviously clever tricksters. Perhaps good lawyers have the ability to master mountains of evidence and the patience to prepare for trial by endlessly culling through depositions.