Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Duty to advocate clients interests as zealously as possible within the bounds of the
law.Let the chips fall where they may
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Responsible Lawyer (Officer of the court and trustee of the legal system):
Lawyers ethics governed by role of facilitating the public administration of justice
according to law in the public interest
Duties of advocacy are tempered by duty to ensure integrity of and compliance with the
spirit of the law; to ensure that issues are not decided on purely procedural or formal
grounds but substantive merits. Lawyer is responsible to make law work as fairly and
justly as possible.
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Moral Activist (Agent for justice through law reform, public interest lawyering and
client counselling):
General ethics, particularly social and political conceptions of justice, moral philosophy
and promotion of substantive justice define lawyers, responsibilities
Lawyers should take advantage of their position to improve justice in two ways (1) Public
interests and law reform activities and (2) Client counselling to seek to persuade clients of
the moral thing to do or withdraw if client wants something else
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ought to do.
An acts moral worth depends on the reason its done, its not enough that an act conformed duty, it
must also be done for the sake of duty, out of a concern of what is morally right not out of some
self-serving motive
What gives an action a moral worth, self-interest as a standard, Kantian focuses on duty, it
challenges an egotists precision
A second principle centres on the universality of genuine morality. Henmum states on page 182
that one of our basic intuitions centres on the belief that what is fair for one is fair for all. But
there are exceptions e.g. an ambulance driver is allowed to disobey traffic lights in the matter of
an emergency although with proper caution and is applicable to anyone with that role
Hemen the formulating of maxims: Actions begin with motivating actions that promise to act in a
particular way. Whether the maxim is one that it would be possible for everyone to consistently
and rationally accept. If it is the action is morally permissible. Morality consists of what any
rational being would do in the situation, involves setting aside our own personal preferences and
potential gains in order to do the right thing