Lincoln’s Legal Advice: Try Honesty Instead
Lincoln’s
Legal Advice: Try Honesty Instead
Abraham
Lincoln was honest in all walks of life—an inconvenient trait in a lawyer,
perhaps, but one he refused to abandon. While practising law, he was approached
by a man carrying a case he wanted Lincoln to take. Lincoln refused it
outright, having concluded that the man was a cheat. A poor widow, left with
six children to rear, had inherited $600 from a relative; this man proposed to
deprive her of the sum—a plan that was legally ambitious and morally about as
attractive as a mud bath.
Lincoln
looked at him severely—the sort of look that could make a dishonest client
reconsider his entire business model—and said: “Do you want me to help you make
that honest woman’s life miserable? Imagine her plight if you were to deprive
her of the little support she has got. Humanity is higher than law. I would
advise you to earn this amount in some more honest way.”
These
words had the desired effect. The man felt thoroughly ashamed of himself and
went away—presumably to seek employment less creative than robbing widows.
Lincoln, meanwhile, had once again proved that honesty is the best policy, even
when it costs a lawyer a fee and saves a client from himself.
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