Q: If We the People, Elected to place a governing body over us and together WE created LAW. Why are WE charged at all????

A: People do not want to be taken advantage of by other people who provide substandard services (including legal services) that they are not qualified or able to deliver properly. So people have passed laws for certain services, including legal services but also including plumbing services, health care services, cosmetology services, etc., that require those who provide such services to meet certain education, training, experience, and skill requirements in order to offer those services to members of the public. Those laws often prescribe penalties on others who do not meet those requirements but attempt to offer those services to the public anyway. With respect to legal services, this is often colloquially known as "practicing law without a license."

Because of the complexity of the law (and of other services like health care services), the requirements to demonstrate that you have the education, training, experience, and skill to properly perform such services are quite onerous. Some people even obtain an undergraduate degree and successfully complete three years of law school to earn a law degree, but are unable to pass the bar exam or satisfy the required background check to secure a license to practice law.

People peripherally involved in the field of law like court clerks, police officers, government bureaucrats, law firm receptionists, etc., may through their job experience know certain aspects of the law. But few have met the same requirements a lawyer must meet in order to offer legal services to the public. They may know enough to answer a certain questions but not enough to ask important other questions which might impact a member of the public in other ways. By analogy, take for example someone who says a particular drug could help with your headaches who does not ask whether you are taking another drug that might negatively interact with the one recommended or who does know enough to ask about other symptoms that might suggest your headaches are a symptom of a more serious health problem that requires further testing or a different more aggressive treatment.

Because a relatively small number of people can and do meet these requirements--which for lawyers traditionally requires the dedication of seven years of sustained effort to the pursuit of that law license--just to be able to offer legal services to the public as a "baby lawyer", we expect to be compensated commensurate with the investment of our time, talent, and effort, just like other licensed professionals do. I personally often find myself working for other similarly highly trained individuals including plumbers, architects, doctors, real estate brokers, staff leasing providers, etc. all of whom charge far more for their services and earn far more income than I do.

Our criminal justice system is somewhat unique because we guarantee every individual charged with a serious crime the legal services of a qualified lawyer who has satisfied all of those onerous requirements even if they cannot afford such services. "If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you by a court of law." That's not true in many other countries.

Outside of the criminal justice system, we fund various legal aid clinics that provide the legal services of a qualified lawyer who has satisfied all of those onerous requirements in other areas of law to individuals who cannot afford an attorney. We fund that, in part, by diverting the interest earned on funds deposited in attorneys' trust accounts by clients to fund those legal aid clinics. That's right, attorneys don't earn the interest paid by banks on those accounts (called IOLTA).

Of course, tsome individuals who can afford an attorney want legal services provided by a qualified lawyer for free, like Southern plantation owners wanted the services of strong farm workers for fee before the Civil War.