The prodigious American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in his ever inspiring poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ penned, ‘Lives of great men all remind us, we can make our lives sublime, and, departing, leave behind us, footprints on the sands of time’. Over the centuries, many great men in different parts of the world began their careers as lawyers but went on to follow other pursuits that ultimately made them leave their indelible footprints on the sands of time. The annals of some of these great men read like a veritable Roll of Honour :

Political Leaders

Abraham ‘Abe’ Lincoln : The towering sixteenth President of the United States, universally hailed as the father of modern democracy, was one of the greatest lawyers the world has ever known. Lincoln, who attended school for less than a year, became a lawyer under an Illinois law enacted in 1833 which stated that to be a lawyer someone had to ‘obtain a certificate procured from the court of an Illinois county certifying to the applicant’s good moral character.’ Lincoln actually went to the Illinois Supreme Court to get his certificate. On 9th September, 1836, a licence to practice law was issued to Lincoln by two of the Justices of the Illinois Supreme Court. Thereafter, he moved to Springfield, Illinois, and began to practice law under the tutelage of the eminent lawyer John Todd Stuart, the favourite cousin of his wife Mary. Lincoln went on to become a truly masterly and successful lawyer with the enviable reputation of being a redoubtable adversary. He partnered with Stephen Trigg Logan from 1841 until 1844. Then he began his practice with William Henry Herndon , who turned out to be a superb biographer of Lincoln after his tragic assassination on 15th April,1865. Standing a majestic 6 feet 4 inches tall, Lincoln was tall and ‘strong enough to intimidate any rival’ and he was literally a ‘jack-of-all-trades’ but a master of all when it came to his legal practice!

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi : Much has been written and talked about on the legal career of Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation, who is popularly known as ‘Bapu’ or ‘Father’. In September,1888, Gandhi sailed for London at the tender age of 18 for higher studies. After studying law and jurisprudence at the famed University College, London, he enrolled at the Inner Temple Inn with the intention of becoming a Barrister. He was called to the Bar in June, 1891. He returned to India to practise in Bombay, but his attempts at establishing his law practice in Bombay proved abortive as he was too shy by nature and had a soft and mellifluous voice. He eventually sailed for South Africa at the instance of a Muslim merchant named Dada Abdulla to work for his Durban based shipping firm Dada Abdulla and Co. as a lawyer. On 24th May, 1893, Gandhi arrived at the port of Durban to take up his new assignment. Shortly thereafter, Gandhi had to travel to Pretoria for an important court case. While travelling by train to Pretoria on 7th June,1893, Gandhi experienced his first taste of  racial discrimination. In spite of carrying a first class ticket, he was bodily thrown out of the train. The commemorative plaque at the station in Pietermaritzburg reads – ‘This incident changed the course of his life. He took up the fight against racial oppression. His active non-violence started from that date.’ Gandhi stayed in South Africa for over two decades – the formative period of a great and noble life – and valiantly led the oppressed immigrant Indian community against the tyranny of the ‘White Government’ in a peaceful movement.

Vallabhbhai Jhaverbhai Patel : Bharat Ratna Sardar Patel, the ‘Iron Man of  India’ or ‘Bismarck of India’, and one of the principal architects of the Republic of India and the ‘Patron Saint’ of the Indian civil and police services, was one of the most successful lawyers of India before he plunged himself  wholly into the votaries of India’s freedom struggle. From his early days, Patel aspired to become a Barrister. But his father was a poor landowner and did not have the means to give Patel a proper legal education in a law college. He took a short-cut route to become a District Pleader and passed the District Pleader’s Examination with distinction. He joined the Bar in 1900 and started his legal practice in Godhra, Gujarat. In July,1910, at the age of 36, Patel sailed for England and two months after his arrival in England enrolled himself at the Middle Temple Inn in London. He passed his Bar-at-Law examinations on 7th June,1912 obtaining a first class first that earned him the coveted prize of £50.On 27th January,1913,he was called to the Bar. Returning to India on 13th February,1913,Patel settled down in Ahmedabad and successfully rose to become one of the city’s most sought after barristers and during his golden years 1913-1917  earned a phenomenal average monthly income of Rs.40,000! When Mahatma Gandhi called upon Patel to join the Indian freedom struggle by leading the Kheda peasants movement, Patel volunteered without even batting an eyelid throwing his lucrative legal career literally to the winds.

Jawaharlal Nehru : Pandit Nehru, the first Prime Minister of independent India and the architect of modern India, was the son of Motilal Nehru, a wealthy Barrister and nationalist statesman who served twice as the President of the Indian National Congress. Nehru went to Trinity College, Cambridge, in October 1907 and graduated with an honours degree in natural science in 1910. Thereafter, Nehru went to London and stayed there for two years for law studies at the City Law School. In 1910, he joined the Inner Temple Inn and passed his Bar-at-Law examinations in 1912. He returned to India in August, 1912 and commenced his legal practice as an advocate of the Allahabad High Court. But, unlike his father, he had only a half-hearted interest in his profession and later wrote, ‘Decidedly the atmosphere was not intellectually stimulating and a sense of the utter insipidity of life grew upon me.’ He got irresistibly drawn into India’s freedom struggle under the inspiring stewardship of Mahatma Gandhi that brought to an abrupt close his legal practice.

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz  : The lofty Cuban revolutionary, politician and dictator, who ruled Cuba with an iron hand as Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976 and then as President from 1976 to 2008, was admitted to the Bar in 1950 after studying law at the University of Havana. He then joined the law firm Azpiazo, Castro & Resende that primarily catered to poor Cubans. Historians have described Castro as a ‘young lawyer without clients’ and according to one of his biographers, Castro handled only ‘a couple of obscure cases’ and had little interest in the profession. Consequently, his legal practice ‘languished’ and he moved steadily onto the centre-stage of Cuban politics.

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela : The monumental South African anti-apartheid revolutionary, politician and philanthropist, who served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999,was his country’s first black African head of state and the first elected in a fully representative democratic election. He studied law at the University of Fort Hare and the University of the Witwatersrand before working as a lawyer in Johannesburg. There he became involved in anti-colonial and African nationalist politics, joining the African National Congress (ANC) in 1943 and co-founding its Youth League in 1944. After the National Party’s white-only government established the draconian ‘Apartheid’, he and the ANC committed themselves to its overthrow. Significantly, the iconic three-storied building called ‘Chancellor House’ situated at 25 Fox Street, Ferreirasdorp, Johannesburg, where Nelson Mandela and his partner Oliver Tambo shared a law office has been fully restored and is in the process of  being converted into a national museum for posterity.

Authors

Washington Irving : The fascinating American writer, essayist, biographer, historian and diplomat, who is best known for his short stories ‘Rip Van Winkle’ and ‘The Legend of Sleepy Hollow’, studied law with his legal mentor Judge Josiah Ogden Hoffman in New York City. He once humbly confessed that he ‘just barely squeaked by the bar exam’. Still, he was able to combine his legal knowledge with his famous writing skills in 1807, when Aaron Burr was tried for the fatal shooting of Alexander Hamilton at a duel, and Irving served as a trial spectator. He wrote hilarious descriptions of the trial, such as when Burr ‘turned his head, looked him full in the face with one of his piercing regards, swept his eye over the whole person from head to foot, as if to scan his dimensions, and then coolly resumed his former position.’

John Ray Grisham :  The honorific American bestselling writer, politician, and activist has carved a niche for himself as an author of legal thrillers. He graduated from Mississippi State University in 1977, receiving a BS degree in accounting. He later enrolled in the University of  Mississippi School of Law, also known as ‘Ole Miss Law’. In 1981, he earned a Juris Doctor (JD) degree. Though his original goal was to become a tax lawyer, he discovered that the thrill of being a trial lawyer was more up his street. He practised criminal law for about a decade and served in the House of Representatives in Mississippi from January, 1984 to September,1990. Grisham has written several novels which have sold nearly 300 million copies worldwide. The inspiration for his maiden ever popular novel ‘A Time to Kill’ came from the heart rending case of  Harris v. State involving the brutal rape and assault of 12 year old Marcie Scott and her 16 year old sister Julie.

Henry Cecil Leon : He was a prolific writer of fiction about the British legal system and wrote under the pseudonyms Henry Cecil and Clifford Maxwell interchangeably. He was called to the Bar in 1923. Later in 1949, he was appointed a County Court Judge, a position he held until 1967. These experiences served as an inspiration for his many novels and short stories. He developed his writing skills while serving with the British Army during the Second World War, telling stories to officers to keep their minds off alcohol while sailing on ‘dry’ ships.  His novels such as ‘Full Circle’, ‘No Way for the Judge’, ‘Brothers-in-Law’, ‘Friends At Court’, ‘According to the Evidence’ and “Natural Causes’ are replete with humour and satire and feature educated and genteel fraudsters and blackmailers who hatch preposterously ingenious plots exploiting loopholes in the legal system. 

Actors/Celebrities

John Marwood Cleese : He is an English actor, screenwriter, producer, and comedian who is considered to be one of the funniest men in the history of comedy. He studied at Downing College, Cambridge University, and obtained a degree in law.But he never really practiced law.

Benjamin Jeremy Stein : This well known American writer, actor and commentator on political and economic issues started his professional life as a lawyer. A graduate of Columbia University, Stein began his career in law, graduating as valedictorian from Yale Law School in 1970. He attained distinction as a speechwriter for American Presidents Richard Milhous Nixon and Gerald Rudolph Ford. In 2017, Stein has come out in open support for President Trump for ‘outperforming expectations in a big way’.

Gerard James Butler :  He is a versatile Scottish actor who has appeared on film, stage and television. After studying law in the  University of Glasgow School of Law, Butler worked as a trainee lawyer for a couple of years with the Edinburgh law firm Morton Fraser and was fired one week before he qualified as a lawyer because of his unrestrained lifestyle and partying habits. Butler turned to acting in the mid-1990s after being approached in a London coffee shop by the reputed English character actor Steven Berkoff and took on small roles in productions such as ‘Mrs Brown’, ‘Tomorrow Never Dies’, ‘Atilla’, ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ and ‘Tale of the Mummy’.

ANOOP BOSE

Advocate, Supreme Court of India E-mail : [email protected]