The Problem with Legal Experts in the American Social Imagination...

John Brigham of the University of Amherst, wrote a book called - Civil Liberties and American Democracy. It was published in 1984 by the Congressional Quarterly, Inc. In the final chapter, Democracy, he writes about threats to constitutional democracy with regard to the future of civil liberties in America. 

I have blogged about this before, pointing Brigham's book. There are a few threats that we should be aware of: the threat coming from the elites, from the people, and from experts - lawyers and judges. Before getting into the meat of what Brigham writes, let's consider the legal system today in the social imagination. It looks like a kind of circus. 

Why is that? Likely, its because legal experts have become the law unto themselves and by doing so, they do not actually defend the law of the people who are held together by that law (s). They defend themselves and their positions. Thus, they end up destroying the law (for the people and by the people) by establishing and or creating a theater of law out of the court system for personal gain, for their own advantages. 

Moreover, they write laws that they favor and favors them. They interpret the law and the laws are not about the people. Laws benefit lawyers and the more complicated the laws are the more they favor the lawyers. Its a myth that lawyers are favorable or noble people. Look at the Nazi party, many were 'legal' experts with law backgrounds.

In Brigham's book, on page 259, he writes that ultimately, the most sinister threat to constitutional democracy is the domination of civil liberties by legal experts, the professionalization of the capacity to deal with fundamental rights.  All one has to do is review the history of law and legal experts in this country and you will likely observe what Brigham did and one can still witness. 

Which is that the power of the judicial in this country has morphed beyond the people's social imagination; as it is no longer based on their idea of it but rather on the idea that the ultimate reading of the Constitution should be left to a legal elite has transformed constitutional law into a form of judge-made (lawyer defended) professionally crafted legal discourse. Now, many would agree with that... especially the legal experts.

The law, especially constitutional law, is no longer serving the people but serving 'deals' to be made for political and personal gain. Deals made have come to characterize the criminal process. No longer do we have the tradition of due process promised to every citizen whereby they could respect the institution of law and government because of the high level of respect that they themselves would receive; and hence, the basis for legitimacy has shifted to claims of legal expertise -the Intercessor.