Each year I use my messages in Law Quadrangle Notes to examine a
quality that helps to define an outstanding attorney. I have discussed how great lawyers pursue intellectual
growth and renewal, maintain integrity, teach others about the law, serve as
community citizens, bolster our profession’s image, exhibit patience, and
sustain a form of optimism.
In the coming year, I would like to explore the quality of voice.
The famous English preacher Charles
Haddon Spurgeon once published “Hints on the Voice for Young Preachers” in
1875. Most of his guidance
had to do with diction – with qualities such as articulation, cadence, and
volume. And while that is not the
kind of “voice” I am speaking of here, I nonetheless expect most lawyers would
find his recommendations entertaining at least. Consider, for example, the following advice:
· “[A]void the use of the nose as an organ
of speech, for the best authorities are agreed that it is intended to smell
with.”
· “It is impossible to hear a man who crawls along at
a mile an hour. One word to-day and one tomorrow is a kind of slow-fire which
martyrs only could enjoy.
Excessively rapid speaking, tearing and raving into utter rant, is quite
as inexcusable; it is not, and never can be powerful, except with idiots.”
In referring to the “voice” of a great
attorney, however, I am speaking of more than diction. I am referring to qualities of
personality – to the ways that we can shape the nature of our relationship with
our listeners through choices about timing, syntax, tone, and word
selection. And we can read some of
Spurgeon’s observations differently from the way he wrote them, in ways that
prompt reflection about what substantive attributes of voice might characterize
the best lawyers. Let me note a
few examples:
“[O]pen your mouths when you speak, for
much of inarticulate mumbling is the result of keeping the mouth half
closed.” The best lawyers always seem to know when
and how to speak up. Never too
soon, never too late, never in ways that leave their listeners wondering why
they chose to speak at all.
“Always speak so as to be heard. … Adapt your voice to your
audience.” These lawyers share an unerring sense of
audience and context. They know
which clients should be patiently walked through each step of a complex
analysis, and which clients become confused and impatient with anything beyond
a summary conclusion.
“Do not as a rule exert your voice to the
utmost. … Vary the force of your voice.”
Persuasion often
requires restraint. The lawyer who
tries to steamroll listeners, overwhelming them with an avalanche of argument,
often elicits suspicion and resistance more than acquiescence.
“Get a friend to tell you your faults,
or, better still, welcome an enemy who will watch you keenly and sting you
savagely.” Important moments of advocacy or
negotiation require preparation.
The best attorneys appreciate the limits to their ability to imagine the
reactions of others, and they make effective use of third parties to unearth
the dangerous unintended reactions that a presentation might provoke.
During the coming year, I hope to explore in greater depth the ways in which a great lawyer’s voice can influence a situation or a relationship. Like Spurgeon, I believe that we may profitably analyze, debate, and teach the subject of “voice.” In doing so, we can better prepare our students for careers in which the voices they use are often as important as the substantive ideas they express.
