Why I’m proud to be an American (and a trial lawyer)

I’m proud to be an American and I’m proud to be a trial lawyer.

Like many Americans, I can’t bear watching the talking heads on the 24 hour news networks.  I find their rhetoric divisive and shaped completely by their own worldview, no matter what they are debating, with no room for compromise.  They seem to be a reflection of the political situation in this country as well.  It can be frustrating and dispiriting.

However, one need only look across the oceans at what is going on in the rest of the world to realize just how lucky we have it here in the United States of America.  At present, there is chaos either erupting or brewing in several parts of the world.  The evening news and the front pages of the newspapers are full of depressing headlines about things we have never experienced on our shores:  Women being marginalized, kidnapped and raped throughout Syria and Iraq,  children being driven from their homes along with mothers and fathers desperately trying to protect them, and dying trying,  “justice” being doled out by the barrel of the gun by evil thugs with no concept of true justice, tolerance, reason or mercy.

For all of our problems, we as Americans should take time to stop and remember just how lucky we are to live in this country.  We have leaders who voluntarily leave office peacefully when they are voted out by the populace,  we allow religious expression of any kind, we have laws that protect minorities from discrimination based upon the color of their skin, we have freedom to openly criticize our leaders without fear of retribution, and we have a justice system that allows the public, not the powerful, to pass judgment on its fellow citizens through trial by jury and settle disputes peacefully as well as a system in place to enforce and carry out a jury’s decision.

Each day when I suit up to go to work, whether it is to meet an injured victim of someone’s negligence, to the office, or to the courtroom, I do so proudly and passionately, knowing that as an attorney, I am an important part of the greatest and fairest system of justice the world has ever known.

Is the United States perfect?  Of course not, but name a country that is.

I’m proud to be an American and I’m proud to be a trial lawyer.