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4.2.12
WC: 191694

Conclusion—Closing Argument:

Looking back at my 50 year career and forward to the laws next 50 years.

As I begin my second half century of law practice and teaching, I look back with fondness,
nostalgia and a heavy dose of surprise on my interesting life and career, as I look forward to my
remaining years. Since I try to prepare my students to be lawyers over their entire careers, and
since the career of a lawyer now extends to a full half century, I must always think ahead to what
our legal system will look like when my current students end their careers.

I could not have asked more or better from my first half century. I have accomplished far more
than I could ever have anticipated, especially in light of my undistinguished elementary and high
school performance, and I have lived a more interesting life than I could ever have dreamed. I
have surely lived the passion of my times and I’ve been very lucky, at least so far. (I don’t want
to give myself a “kneina hura.”109) Like the fictional Zelig in Woody Allen’s great film of that
name, I was privileged to have been present—literally or virtually—at many of the most important
legal and political events that transpired during my adult life. For some I volunteered, for others I
was solicited. Sometimes I was a direct participant, other times an active observer and reporter.
In this “closing argument” I will try to summarize my role in the important legal and political
developments in which I participated. I will also speculate about what the future may hold for our
system of laws and justice.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. viewed the role of the lawyer as a predictor of future legal decisions
and trends.110 But the Talmud cautioned that prophecy ended with the destruction of the second
temple and that he/she who tries to prophecy the future is either a fool or a naïve. Or as a
contemporary sage—Yogi Berra—put it: “Prediction is very hard, especially about the future.” I
certainly agree that prognosticating the future is a daunting challenge, but lawyers and law
professors must confront that challenge, because one of the most important jobs we have is to
identify trends and to anticipate significant developments, I will try, therefore, with these cautions
in mind, to extrapolate about what a lawyer writing an autobiography 50 years from now might
look back at and write about.

Before I summarize my past and speculate about the future, let me say a word about my present
life. I remain extremely active in every phase of my career. Here is a summary of the week
during which I wrote these words. The week of November 13 through November 20, 2011 was
fairly typical of my life during my 74th year.111

On Sunday morning I was picked up by limo and taken to Bedford airport where I boarded a
private 747 jet owned by Sheldon Adelson, reputed to be the richest Jew in history and among the
handful of wealthiest Americans. The son of a Boston cab driver, Adelson has accumulated
billions of dollars by building and running casinos in Las Vegas, Micow and Singapore. His jet,

109 Yiddish corruption of the Hebrew for “evil eye.”
110 [CITE]
111 More typical of spring than fall, when I teach.

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