Maine denies F. Lee Bailey license to practice law in Maine.

[No Elephants]

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2013/01/01/No-Maine-law-license-for-F-Lee-Bailey/UPI-63791357083045/#ixzz2GncHWdNn

As has been portrayed on stage and screen, the "Scopes Monkey trial" was notable not only for its landmark outcome, but for its epic and iconic battle of two brilliant legal minds, William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow, with Darrow having the harder case to make. After that trial, Darrow was the Babe Ruth of lawyers.

Even non-lawyers said things like "He's no Clarence Darrow."

As Darrow began fading from the collective American memory, a brash Massachusetts criminal lawyer lit the sky.

He had dropped out of Harvard to join the Marines in 1952 (Korea).

After his return, he studied at Boston University School of Law, which had a bizarre, unspoken policy of not giving A's in its courses. Nonetheless, Bailey became first in the history of Boston University School of Law to be graduated with a cumlative A average, a record he shared for decades with only one other graduate.

The innocent wanted justice. The guilty wanted F. Lee Bailey.

Just ask O.J. Simpson, whose co-counsel, Shapiro, said that he had tried to dissuade Bailey from using the "race card" in Simpson's defense. If Shapiro told the truth, then Bailey and Cochrane seem to have overruled him, starting with jury selection.

http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/simpson/jurypage.html

And F. Lee Bailey got the L.A. police officer who had investigated the double murders to admit that he had used the "N word" 10 or 15 years earlier. Certainly that was A pivotal moment in the trial, if not THE pivotal moment. (Despite "if the glove don't fit, you must acquit," that trial had many pivotal moments, perhaps the most decisive having been jury selection.)

We may viscerally feel that Bailey was a bad guy because many of Bailey's clients were probably guilty. But, Bailey did exactly what a criminal lawyeris supposed to do in our criminal justice system.

Then, Bailey got into some messy money dealings while defending a drug dealer. Massachusetts disbarred him. So did Florida.

And now, Maine has turned up its nose, too.

Bailey can still work, as long as he works "under the supervision" of a lawyer licensed to practice in the relevant state. (A brand new law school graduate who has never passed the bar exam of a single state may do the same.)

It's like a Greek drama, during which we feel both vindicated, yet somehow deeply sad, when a hero with greatness and equally great flaws is greatly disgraced, especially at a time of life when it is likely too late for him ever to redeem his reputation.

Sophocles would get it.

[Enthusiast]

1. Wow! This nation is no longer a fan of due process.

Except where the wealthy are concerned.

[No Elephants]

2. Not sure I follow,