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    Wisconsin Lawyer
    July 01, 2000

    Wisconsin Lawyer July 2000: Book Reviews

    Wisconsin Lawyer
    Vol. 73, No. 7, July 2000

    Book Reviews

    This Month's Featured Selections


    Transforming Transforming Practices: Finding Joy
    and Satisfaction in the Legal Life

    By Steven Keeva
    (Chicago, IL: Contemporary Books, 1999).
    226 pgs. $17.47.

    Reviewed by Jason T. Studinski

    This book is an epiphany. I recommend it without hesitation. Transforming Practices offers a long overdue integrated approach to the practice of law. As Keeva notes, "If the goal of law school is to teach you to think like a lawyer, the goal of this book is to enhance the experience of being a lawyer by reminding you of how you can cultivate your innate ability to think, feel, and be exactly what you are - a human being."

    Keeva accomplishes this task by profiling individual lawyers who demonstrate an aspect of his all-encompassing approach to law practice. The reader delves into the lives of the featured lawyers and watches them hone their skills and regularly summon and apply them with razor-like precision. Along the way, these lawyers search for meaning in what they do. Keeva expounds upon the lessons they have learned and enunciates a practical and unified approach to practicing law.

    In each chapter, the author employs lively prose and offers unique insights that deepen and enrich the practice of law. For example, in "The Listening Practice," the author exposes our common deficiencies in listening and recommends exercises to improve our comprehension. As part of becoming a better listener, Keeva helps us identify our prejudices and take corrective action so that they do not interfere with understanding what must be understood. Each chapter offers equally important building blocks that complement one another.

    The author forces readers to embark on a journey of self-discovery, leading to greater awareness, and hopefully culminating in happiness. Lawyers often are fixated on a particular goal, to the detriment of achieving true satisfaction. The lesson of this book is to leave behind such narrowmindedness to fully appreciate the wonder that surrounds us every day.

    Jason T. Studinski, U.W. 1998, is the founding member of Studinski Legal Group LLC, Madison. He practices plaintiff's employment, civil rights, and personal injury law.

    The Appearance of Equality

    By Christopher M. Burke
    (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999).
    224 pgs. $59.95. Order, (800) 225-5800.

    Reviewed by Charles Crueger

    The U.S. Supreme Court's redistricting cases dealing with attempts to benefit a specific minority group through "racial gerrymandering" under the Voting Rights Act are among the most controversial on its docket today. One reason for the controversy is that these cases are so theoretically complex - they address issues of racial equality and what fair representation means in a liberal democracy - that people are bound to disagree no matter what the result. Another reason is that these cases touch a raw nerve in our society because they reflect our lingering racial divisions and tensions and remind us that only recently the law denied some citizens the liberties enjoyed by others on the basis of race.

    The Appearance of Equality attempts to "describe and undo" (the author's term) various theories about fair representation justifying Supreme Court redistricting opinions. On this, the author does a good job. First, Burke describes the various liberal and communitarian conceptions of fair representation (communitarian conceptions focus on the social nature of life and emphasize the embodied status of the individual person in society, while liberal conceptions focus on the abstract civil and political rights of individuals). Burke then explains how these conceptions need not be mutually exclusive or antagonistic, and shows how the Justices rely on both conceptions to argue their respective positions. In short, Burke lays out an interesting analysis of the Court's redistricting opinions.

    Yet for all this, Burke never steps beyond dissecting the Court's opinions to develop a legal theory on fair representation and equality. He never expresses a firm opinion on how the law, and therefore the Court, ought to approach the redistricting cases. Instead, he simply states at the outset that there is no such thing as fair representation, and apparently, as the title suggests, concludes that there is no "correct" outcome in these cases. This is an untenable position, for legal argument in all hard cases turns on contested conceptions of abstract rights and principles; and it is the judge's duty to discover what the rights of the parties are in our constitutional scheme of government. But, by avoiding the issue of what conception of fair representation is a more satisfactory elaboration of the general idea of equality - the hard issue at the heart of the redistricting cases - Burke does not challenge readers to evaluate their own views about the issue, and thus the book adds little to the fair representation debate.

    This is a pity. Burke obviously has read widely and thought deeply about the redistricting cases. One cannot help but conclude that, if he so chose, Burke could have constructed a rigorous theory of fair representation that would at least challenge readers to think harder about their own conceptions on equality and racial gerrymandering.

    Charles Crueger, U.W. 1997, is a trial attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C.

    Stewards Stewards of Democracy:
    Law as a Public Profession

    By Paul D. Carrington
    (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999).
    306 pgs. $22.40.

    Reviewed by Kevin L. Keeler

    Fans of the Warren court, particularly those who claim Justice Brennan as one of their judicial heroes, will not like this book. Yet it would be a mistake to conclude that Paul Carrington, a professor at Duke University Law School, is necessarily in disagreement with many of the substantive values that Brennan and his colleagues imposed on the nation by their decisions.

    One of the main themes running through this book is that the effective and lasting transformation of society can occur only with the moral support of the people and an approach to law and legal institutions that respects the "common thoughts of men." On this basis, Carrington criticizes earlier U.S. Supreme Court decisions dismantling legislation intended to protect workers' rights, and more recent decisions such as those invalidating laws restricting abortion, flag burning, and commercial advertising. He views such cases as instances of the "national class" of meritocrats imposing their values on society by constitutionalizing issues in order to bypass the democratic process.

    As an important example, Carrington cites the First Amendment cases invalidating limits on campaign contributions and limiting defamation claims by public persons. These cases combine to degrade the political process by making political campaigns cost-prohibitive for many who are interested in running for legislative or judicial office, and by diminishing the ability of candidates and elected officials to maintain their integrity in the face of disinformative, high-cost, high-tech campaigns. This very result is then used by the national elite to justify more court oversight in the political arena.

    To illustrate a more democratic approach to law, the first half of the book is a panegyric of the professional life of Thomas McIntyre Cooley, a 19th century lawyer, law professor, Michigan Supreme Court justice, and the founding chair of the Interstate Commerce Commission. This is followed by shorter encomiums of Louis Brandeis, Ernst Freund, Learned Hand, and Byron White. According to Carrington, all these lawyers shared important moral traits. They were committed to the ideal of popular self-government and distrusted government by a ruling elite; they subordinated their personal idiosyncratic morality to values shared by the public; they were independent and disinterested; they had the patience to attend to factual details; and they had an eye for compromise and accommodation.

    Unfortunately, law schools do not foster these traits. Instead of devoting their time to writing secondary source treatises useful to practicing lawyers, full-time law professors pursue theoretical issues having little relevance to practical affairs. Additionally, the cost of a legal education is unnecessarily high, causing students to expect high incomes to justify their investment in a law degree. Carrington suggests that these problems could be remedied by reducing the required years of study and hiring part-time faculty.

    Whether or not one agrees with Carrington's diagnosis or treatment, I recommend this book to anyone concerned about the legal profession. It offers by way of example and analysis the conception of a model legal career dedicated to serving the public. In this age of cynicism, when many lawyers find themselves dissatisfied with the practice of law, such a model is welcome.

    Kevin L. Keeler, U.W. 1985, is a shareholder in the Milwaukee office of Beck, Chaet, Molony & Bamberger S.C.

    Train Stopping the Train: The Landmark Victory Over Same-Sex Sexual Harassment in the Workplace

    By Edwin B. Martin Jr.
    (Mt. Pleasant, S.C.: Corinthian Books, 2000).
    173 pgs. $24.95.

    Reviewed by Andrea F. Hoeschen

    Stopping the Train is a personal account of same-sex sexual harassment and the indignities of being a plaintiff in sexual harassment litigation. The author had a well-established career with Norfolk Southern Railroad when he was transferred from South Carolina to a terminal in Birmingham, Ala. Once there, his coworkers, including his immediate supervisor, greeted him with lewd comments and teasing. Over the next few months, the teasing escalated to mind games, indecent exposure, and groping. After becoming nearly incapacitated by stress and panic attacks, Martin retained an attorney and filed suit under the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and various state law tort theories.

    This book is not a legal text. Martin writes simply about his personal experience, explaining the legal technicalities only as necessary to move the story forward. The account of his litigation will be unsatisfying to attorneys who are looking for discussion of the development of employment discrimination law, or the legal strategy involved in a sexual harassment claim. There is no explanation, for example, of the trial judge's reasons for dismissing the Title VII claims on Norfolk Southern's pre-trial motion. There is likewise little discussion of the significance of Oncale v. Sundowner Offshore Services Inc., 523 U.S. 75 (1998), in which the U.S. Supreme Court recognized a cause of action for same-sex sexual harassment, other than to note that the decision precipitated the ultimate settlement of Martin's suit. But Martin obviously did not set out to write a legal treatise. He set out to explain the extreme emotional toll of being a male sexual harassment victim in a male-dominated industry, and the indignities that result from pursuing a sexual harassment claim to trial.

    Stopping the Train is an excellent weekend read for employment discrimination attorneys who may find themselves wondering why they chose their field, or those who have become detached from the anxiety that discrimination litigants endure. The book also is enlightening for potential litigants, both because it helps dispel a victim's feelings of isolation and self-blame, and because it presents a very real picture - or warning - of the potential frustrations and rewards of litigation. As Martin observes, "There isn't an hour that goes by on television, it seems, without a court-driven plot. I, like thousands of other viewers, was duped into believing that what I saw on television was an accurate depiction of the real thing. I was wrong."

    Andrea Friedenauer Hoeschen, Tulane 1995, practices labor and employment law with Previant, Goldberg, Uelmen, Gratz, Miller & Brueggeman S.C., Milwaukee.

    Wisconsin Lawyer


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