Arthur Kinoy, People's Lawyer Did he Succeed in Combining Law & Essay

Arthur Kinoy, People's Lawyer Did he Succeed in Combining Law & Conscience - Essay Example And he was quite active in behalf f the Southern civil-rights movement f the 1960s. Together with partners William and Michael Kunstler, he helped form what they called the "people's KKK." In fact, his book Rights on Trial, a memoir f his exciting and turbulent career, is subtitled The Odyssey f a People's Lawyer. Kinoy argued before the Supreme Court six times, winning five f those appeals. The case he considered most significant was United States v. United States District Court, in which the Nixon Administration tried to defend Justice Department wiretapping f antiwar protesters without a warrant, on the grounds that the President had the "inherent power" to ignore individual constitutional rights if he thought national security was at stake. Kinoy helped establish the now-extinct Citizen's Party, and ran on its ticket for a New Jersey State Senate seat in 1981. He didn't come close to winning, but says the campaign was a successful organizing tool. Kinoy believed people's movements had made a lethal tactical error by not talking about "the conspiracy f the power elite" to eviscerate the Constitution. Whether in the courtroom or in a debate, Kinoy was a feisty and brilliant thinker who was as relentless as he was ingenious. Most f his autobiography makes it appear that he went through his life as lawyer never pretending to e objective, never less than totally convinced about the justness f the causes he represented and the innocence f his clients. That posture, however, gives rise to some other questions. Most f Kinoy's important cases - Dennis v. United States, the White Panthers case, the Julian and Anna Rosenberg case, the Adam Clayton Powell case, the Chicago Seven case - involved some f the most significant political events f this country's 20th century history. The causes represented some f the most serious rifts in the democracy f the United States. Given Kinoy's frank admission that he was not detached from the causes in which he was involved, one might wonder how good the lawyering is when the lawyer and the client are equally passionate about the political cause that gives rise to the case. How clearly can a passionately involved lawyer describe the workings f the judicial system when the judges and opposing layers are by definition part f a conspiracy against justice and truth Kinoy indeed dealt with some troublesome players - Roy Cohn f the McCarthy era, Judge Julius Hoffman in the Chicago Seven case and Judge Harold Medina in the Dennis case - but he also presented many cases to the Supreme Court and to other tribunals, and even he finds it hard to write off all his judges and opponents as enemies in the class struggle. So the book wavers between condemnation f a legal system that is a stocked deck and an enthusiasm for the judicial process that ultimately led to the vindication f Kinoy's clients (and position) in the Chicago Seven case f in the Adam Clayton Powell case. There is apparently no such wavering about the lawyering that stems from deep commitment to the "cause". It is passing strange that with all those high intensity cases, not once does Kinoy reflect on the legal tactics his side used. Perhaps that is asking too much,