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increasingly being done by LegalZoom,Rocket Lawyer, and other online services.In the brave new world of technology,even litigators are not safe. Barton pointsout that TurboTax-like programs allowpro se litigants seeking an uncontesteddivorce to generate the required plead-ings, which can then be filed with thedistrict clerk’s office. And there is amovement to do an end run around thejudicial system entirely and have dis-putes resolved through online disputeresolution systems such as Modria.

“Death from the state” comes pri-marily from the various tort reformsenacted through state and federal legis-lation. The “first wave” dates back tothe 1970s, when states began enactingmedical malpractice reforms aimed atcapping damages on pain and sufferingand limiting attorneys’ fees for plaintifflawyers. As examples of federal tortreform, Barton cites the Private Securi-ties Law Reform Act of 1995 and theSecurities Litigation Uniform StandardsAct of 1998, which “placed limits onshareholder securities-fraud lawsuits.”In addition, federally funded legal aidprograms have been reduced signifi-cantly since President Reagan cutfunding by 25 percent in 1982.

Finally, “death from the side” resultsfrom friendly fire—an oversupply oflawyers for the available legal work thatis driving down salaries in low- and mid-range law jobs. Barton cites a disturbingstatistic that “since 2010 more than 20percent of all law graduates have beenunable to get full-time work as a lawyer.”However, the good news for Big Lawattorneys is that salaries in the highend of the market remain unaffected.

Barton partially blames popularentertainment—including hit televisionshows like L.A. Law, Boston Legal, andThe Good Wife—for creating a falseimpression of lawyers doing excitingwork, making lots of money, and leadingglamorous lives—thus fueling excessive

law school matriculation. He also blames prospective students

for a lack of awareness of law school real-ities as well as many graduates’ belief inthe unlikely notion that they will all getBig Law jobs. Barton maintains that stu-dents generally do not think that it willbe difficult to get the top grades neededfor these positions, primarily becausethey earned strong grades as undergradu-ates. He expresses frustration that“[m]any of these same students went tolaw school because they were bad atmath, so the harsh reality of a manda-tory curve and class ranking only dawnson them after the first semester. ...” Helaments that law school, as the old say-ing goes, is the last refuge of the unde-cided, and he is especially critical of thetraditional influx of social science andhumanities majors to law school, whichis a natural home for them for at leasttwo reasons: (1) Jobs for these majors donot pay as well as jobs for more valuableand marketable majors; and (2) becauselaw school emphasizes their skills in“analysis, reading and writing.”

Surprisingly, after completing hisautopsy determining the causes of deathof the legal profession, Barton does notput away his scalpel, pull a sheet over thecadaver, and walk out the door. Instead,he maintains that there is still reason tobe optimistic about the “rebirth” of thelegal profession, though it will look muchdifferent from how we know it today.

Acknowledging that lawyers arenaturally conservative and resistant tochange, Barton states:

The turn of phrase “glass half full” iscommonly understood as being syn-onymous with optimism. Because thathopeful idiomatic expression is in thetitle of Benjamin H. Barton’s statistics-laden and densely written book, GlassHalf Full: The Decline and Rebirth of theLegal Profession (Oxford University Press,2015), one would suppose that the over-all tenor of his work would be encourag-ing. But for many lawyers, reading GlassHalf Full will be as disturbing as readingone’s own autopsy report. Like a forensicpathologist, Barton—a University ofTennessee College of Law professor—expertly examines the corpse of the legalprofession and precisely describes hisfindings on the cause of death—and that’snot hyperbole; Barton’s book is structuredaround the theme of death from allpossible angles: (1) death from above;(2) death from below; (3) death fromthe state; and (4) death from the side.

“Death from above” means that BigLaw, at the top of the profession’s hier-archy, is now having to adjust to a newreality. While the bread and butter ofBig Law is still hourly, “bespoke” legalservices, corporate clients are demandingfixed billing, and an increasingly largerpercentage of work is being done by in-house counsel or outsourced to smallerand less expensive firms. But there issome good news for Big Law. Corpora-tions are immune from sticker shock whenit comes to “bet-the-company” transac-tions and litigation that seem to requirethe most expensive talent. Accordingto Barton, “[t]his is consistent with thewinner-take-all economy: the most profit-able firms and most in-demand lawyersget richer doing the truly specializedwork and everyone else falls backwardtoward the pack.”

“Death from below” means that low-level, customized legal services, such aswills and incorporation documents, whichhave traditionally been done by solopractitioners and small firms, are now

BY MILES J. LEBLANC

Resistance Is Futile One author’s take on the death and rebirth of the legal profession.

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been complaining about licensed lawyersfor years, with very limited results.”

Barton believes that the oversupplyof lawyers will work itself out as collegegraduates begin to see that pursuing a lawdegree is not always worth the time andexpense and opt to pursue non-legalcareers more suited to their talents andinterests. The end result will be that “...only students who really want to be alawyer will come to law school. Thesewill be the students who always wantedto be a lawyer. ...” The upshot is that,going forward, lawyers will be happy forany work that they can get, which is asea change from the halcyon days of thepost-WWII era when attorney jobs werebountiful. Using a colorful analogy, Bar-ton compares this change in perspectiveto bronze and silver medalists:

Bronze medalists are happy to havemade it into the medal round. Theycompare themselves to all of thecompetitors below them. Silvermedalists fixate on the gold medal-

In most areas of the economy it is notacceptable to answer the question,“Why is it done this way?” with “We’vealways done it that way.” In law thatis not only an acceptable answer—it is the best and most basic answer.A lifetime of training in stare decisis,precedent, and the common law systemactually dictates that answer. [As aresult,] [c]hange has been very slow andfrequently dictated by outside forces.

One of those Borg-like, irresistible“outside forces” pressuring the legal pro-fession to change is technology. Ratherthan resist the inevitable, which Bartonsees as futile, he embraces a future wheremuch of the profession is assimilated intoa computerized regime of legal services.He dismisses objections made by someattorneys that online legal service providerspose a danger to consumers. He believesthat the Internet will expose such com-panies if they do shoddy work, muchlike websites such as Yelp do for restau-rants and car repair shops. “Clients have

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ist above them and dwell on theirfailure. The current market has madeall employed law students bronzemedalists, just happy to have made it.

In sum, Glass Half Full is a bracingdose of reality, much like being dousedby a cooler full of icy Gatorade, but it isworthwhile reading for Texas lawyerswho want to understand the historicaldevelopment of our profession and whatthe future could hold for us all. TBJ

MILES J. LEBLANC,a graduate of Dartmouth College and Har-vard Law School, is assistant general coun-sel to the Legal Services Department of theHouston Independent School District. Hispublic-sector law career includes servingas an assistant district attorney in TaylorCounty; a law clerk for Judge Jorge A. Solis

of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas; anassistant attorney general in the General Litigation, ConsumerProtection, and Administrative Law divisions of the Office of theTexas Attorney General; and in-house legal counsel to the Uni-versity of Houston and Houston Community College.