The Inaccessibility of the Law and its Impact on Representation
People make mistakes representing themselves unaided because the law is not easily accessible or understandable. If the vast majority of people who have a legal problem get no help, and lawyers make mistakes when helping, then is it reasonable for lawyers to decry the people who represent themselves?
Cat Moon
'Be ignited, or be gone.' - #MaryOliver I provoke change to #makelawbetter. 5th gen lawyer. I learn. I teach @vanderbiltlaw. #humblecuriosity #DoubleDore
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If the vast majority of people who have a legal problem get no help,
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
and, if lawyers are not perfect and make mistakes (we do) when helping the relatively few people we actually help
and, if people can represent themselves — and must, because lawyers simply don't help them — -
and people certainly will make mistakes representing themselves unaided
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
because
the law is not easily accessible or understandable (arguably intentionally so, since it was systemically designed for and by lawyers) -
then is it reasonable for us lawyers to decry the use of generative AI until it is 100% perfect in all applications for helping people with their legal problems?
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
Because this is what I am hearing lawyers say. -
With respect to *lawyers'* use of any tool, we have an obligation to use it in a way that comports with the rules that govern our conduct.
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
We also say that no one but a licensed lawyer can provide legal help. -
Is an AI tool "legal help" when it isn't designed specifically for this purpose?
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
Does it become so if a pro se litigant, helping only themselves, uses it in a way to gain legal understanding?
And, if lawyers maintain control over how people can gain legal understanding, -
at what point do we no longer deserve this control?
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
When 95% of people get no legal help?
99%? -
I'm also curious to know this: when lawyers delegate chunks of their work exclusively to AI (because AI will do the work better and more efficiently), is that work still considered the practice of law?
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
Because I see this convergence:
Lawyers get to use AI to "do" legal work. -
And we will go after anyone else using it on UPL grounds.
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
We'll charge our lawyerly rates to be the intermediaries.
Even when there is no evidence that our intermediation has any impact whatsoever on the outcome of the AI's use. -
Y'all, @ghadfield just made this very point at CodeX. We're making the tools and putting them in the hands of lawyers and their corporate clients.
— Cat Moon (@inspiredcat) April 13, 2023
But not people. Who otherwise get no help from lawyers.