The Atlanta Bar Association honored attorneys W. Seaborn Jones and W. Ray Persons with its annual Leadership Awards earlier today. Persons, a partner at King & Spalding, also was honored earlier this year by the State Bar of Georgia with its Tradition of Excellence award in defense law. Persons specializes in complex litigation, class action cases, and product liability.

Jones, a former president of both the Atlanta Bar Association and the National Conference of Bar Presidents, has been a leader in the professional reform movement. A partner at a partner at Owen, Gleaton, Egan, Jones & Sweeney, Jones is a product liability and personal injury attorney who is also active in alternative dispute resolution and as a mediator and court-appointed special master.

One of Persons’ partners sent a copy of Persons’ acceptance speech to us, finding it particularly touching. Here are some excerpts:

“I am honored to be recognized at the same time as Seaborn Jones, a person I have known and admired for decades. I owe the Atlanta legal community a tremendous debt, one that I can never repay. For I am a product of this legal community. The diligence with which I approach my craft I learned from you. Whatever talents I have in the art of advocacy, I gained by watching you.

“You have served as a role model for me in so many ways. Professionalism. Civic responsibility. Community service. Pro bono service. Civility. The list goes on. … We share a common bond, a common heritage, a common love of the profession. And we have a lot to be proud of. We lawyers have a lot to be proud of.

“When I was a youngster growing up in South Georgia, a common sight was a huge billboard that proclaimed, ‘Impeach Earl Warren.’

“Earl Warren presided over a Supreme Court that overturned Plessy vs. Ferguson, a decision which sanctioned separate but equal, and legitimized racial segregation. Brown vs. Board of Education marked the beginning of the end for Mister Jim Crow. No longer would segregated lunch counters, movie theaters, hospitals, schools, universities and other public facilities be the law of the land. But to give meaning to these laws, to breathe life into them, took the work of courageous lawyers.

“They became my heroes then, and they are my heroes today.

“Lawyers, members of our profession, through fearless and zealous representation of clients, regardless of a client’s station or the unpopularity of the client’s cause, have guaranteed and preserved our freedoms and liberties against those who would repress those freedoms.

“By making a reality of the guarantees of our Constitution, lawyers have leveled the playing field between rich and poor. Only in a court of law is Joe the Plumber the equal of Donald Trump.

“Our heroes are found not only among the ranks of defense lawyers like Atticus Finch, but also those courageous prosecutors who brought to justice those who murdered American citizens whose only crime was attempting to register to vote.

“Thanks to lawyers, the water we drink and the air we breathe is cleaner and fresher than at any time since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, some 200 years ago.

“Lawyers have always been and continue to be in the forefront of every worthwhile community activity and endeavor, serving community leaders in both the private and the public sectors, and improving the quality of the lives of their fellow citizens.

“Lawyers recognize that the price of freedom is, in truth, eternal vigilance, that one who trades freedom for security will have neither, that the war on crime must never be a war on the Constitution, and that if the Constitution no loner can protect the worst of us, it can never hope to protect the best of us.

“We have much to be proud of.

“In describing what made him proud to be lawyer, here’s what the late Justice Lewis F. Powell had to say about the profession: ‘Lawyers share with judges the privilege and responsibility of preserving the rule of law in our country. This includes the liberties and rights guaranteed by our Constitution. I know of no other calling with a greater opportunity to serve public good.”

Contributor: R. Robin McDonald in Legal Community | subscribe to rss |   share