I often hear that there are too many young lawyers or lawyers today.  I recently got a reminder on how old this issue is when I fell down a rabbit hole of internet research on senior lawyers’ outlook on the number of young lawyers.

The 1898 Michiganensian, Volume 2 published a Symposium on the Selection of a Location for the Practice of Law with letters from a number of state supreme court justices responding to a question regarding a recommended place for a young lawyer to practice and whether there were good opportunities in that state.  The justices were overwhelmingly pessimistic.  Excerpts from the letters appear below and may be an interesting read for young lawyers today.

• The Chief Justice of the Indiana Supreme Court wrote, “Wherever the young practitioner may go, he is pretty sure to find, or at least to imagine, that the place is ‘crowded with lawyers.’“
• “The profession in Ohio may be said to be full to overflowing,” according to that state’s Chief Justice.
• The Chief Justice in Wisconsin Supreme Court wrote, “the profession in this State is over-crowded and it is very difficult for a young lawyer fresh from a law school to get a paying business.”
• According to the Chief Justice in New Mexico, “the legal profession is so numerously represented in this Territory now that I do not regard it as eligible for further accessions.”
• Connecticut’s Chief Justice vividly suggested another career choice when he wrote, “here as in most other states the profession of law is found to be overcrowded… Professor Sumner, of Yale – Hill professor of political economy – has sometimes said to his class that a man would better be a good cook than a poor lawyer.”

More of the responses are viewable on Google Books.

Chief Justice R. Fenwick Taylor of Florida appeared optimistic in comparison when he wrote, noting that there is an “unusually full crop of licensed lawyers” but still recommended Pensacola, Jacksonville, Tampa, Key West, Gainesville, and Ocala as places where there might be room to practice.

It is hard to find an exact number, but the predecessor to The Florida Bar, the Florida State Bar Association, never had more than 2,500 members.  Chief Justice Taylor was writing before there were any formal law schools in the state – Stetson University established its law school in 1900, and the University of Florida established its law school in 1909.  The number of lawyers has grown exponentially in the 119 years since the Michiganensian published its symposium.  And perhaps the concern about the number of lawyers has grown as well.

As for me, I disagree with the 1898 supreme court justices and the naysayers today too.  I believe that as long as lawyers are good, smart, interested in meeting the unmet legal needs of the public, and creative, then we don’t have too many lawyers.

Katherine Hurst Miller is an attorney with the law firm of Wright & Casey in New Smyrna Beach.  She is the President of The Florida Bar Young Lawyers Division.