THE

HE shyster lawyer has existed so long, and has been so generally referred to as "shyster," that it is a matter of some surprise to learn that the word itself is of comparatively recent origin. The shyster has lived in all ages and countries, yet the word is of United States origin, and even classed by the lexicographers as slang. The word, while not found in the older dictionaries, now has its place in the English language in this country to such an extent that it can no longer be regarded as slang, but must be classed as a legitimate, expressive word.

The origin of the word "shyster" is obscure and doubtful. Some authorities state that it is made from the word "shy," meaning sly, sharp; but as that meaning of "shy" does not obtain in the United States, Webster's suggestion that the word is from the German word meaning excrement, is more likely correct, and certainly more aptly and fully describes the reptile that lives among us. The shyster is indeed the excrement, the

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filthiness, of the legal profession. Sportsare familiar with a long, lanky, crane-like bird, popularly known and named for its nasty habits as "shyspook." It doubtless occupies the same place among birds as the jackall among brutes, the shyster among lawyers.

The Century Dictionary rather awkwardly defines "shyster" as "one who does business without professional honor, used chiefly of lawyers."

The word appears in the late law dictionaries, and is defined in two reported cases, in both of which it was held to be libelous per se.

Bailey v. Kalamazoo Pub. Co., 40 Mich. 251, 256, was decided in 1879, when the word was very young in the language, though the vermin was then very old in the human race. A man named Bailey was a candidate for Congress on the Prohibition ticket. A Kalamazoo newspaper, apparently opposed to his candidacy, published an article to the effect that the candidate had been

convicted of stealing whisky fines while a justice of the peace, had lost his position as a minister on the charge of adultery, and was "a pettifogging shyster"; the article article concluding with, "Pshaw, these reformers are pretty much alike." The court held that to call one a pettifogging shyster was libelous per se, saying:

"We think, also, that the term 'pettifogging shyster' needed no definition by witnesses before the jury. The combination of epithets every lawyer and citizen know belongs to none but unscrupulous practitioners, who disgrace their profession by doing mean work, and resort to sharp practice to do it. The defendant successfully justified the charge by proof that such was plaintiff's general reputation."

In Gribble v. Pioneer Press Co., 34 Minn. 342, 25 N. W. 710, a St. Paul newspaper called one "a half imbecile shyster." The court said:

"The word 'shyster' defined in Webster to mean 'a trickish knave, one who carries on any business, especially a legal business, in a dishonest way,' is evidently capable of having reference to the professional character and standing of a lawyer."

We have already suggested that the word is new, but the thing itself very old. Dickens portrayed him, but did not call him shyster. "Pettifogger," the nearest real English word, is defined to be a lawyer dealing only with petty cases. The shyster of to-day hunts big game, and often scorns the little business of the pettifogger.

Thomas Fuller, the attractive English moralist of the seventeenth century, thus scolded the shyster of his time, known as the "common barrator":

"A barrator is a horse leech that only sucks the corrupted blood of the law. He trades in tricks and quirks; his

highway is in by-paths, and he loveth a cavil better than an argument, and evasion better than an answer. There are two kinds of them; either such as fight themselves, or are trumpeters in a battle to set on others. Had he been a scholar, he would have maintained all paradoxes; if a chirurgeon, he would never have cured a wound, but always kept it raw; if a soldier, he would have been excellent at a siege; nothing but ejectio firma would out him. * As for the trumpeter barrator, he falls in with his neighbors that fall out, and spurs them on to go to law. A gentleman, who, in a duel, was rather scratched than wounded, sent for a chirurgeon, who, having opened the wound, charged the man with all speed to fetch such a salve from such a place in his study. 'Why,' said the gentleman, 'is the hurt so dangerous?' 'Oh, yes,' answered the chirurgeon, 'if he return not in post haste the wound will cure itself, and so I shall lose my fee.' Thus the barrator posts to the house of his neighbors, lest the sparks of their small discords should go out before he bring them fuel, and so he be broken by their making up. Surely, he loves not to have the bells rung in a peal; but he likes it rather when they are jangled backward, himself having kindled the fire of dissension amongst his neighbors."

And then this great moralist utters a truth that has been proved up to this good day:

"He lives till his clothes have as many rents as himself hath made dissensions.

sensions. I wonder any should be of this trade when none ever thrived on it."

It is a fact beyond dispute that no shyster, barrator, or ambulance chaser, by whatever name called, ever thrived long. long. He has made progress for a

while, has amassed snug fortunes at times, but in the end dies a failure and disgrace, having not only ruined his own life, but brought reproach and dishonor upon the profession of the law.

It is the shyster who has made the legal profession the butt of so many puns and sallies, such as Ben Johnson's proposed epitaph of,

"God works wonders now and then;

Here lies a lawyer-an honest man." Thought of the shyster prompted Lord Brougham to define a lawyer as "a learned gentleman who rescues your estate from your enemies, and keeps it himself."

It is the shyster who was responsible for the riots of 1780 in England, where siege was laid to the Inns of Court, with the intention of exterminating the whole race of lawyers, that "the skin of an innocent lamb might no longer be converted into an indictment."

It is the shyster to whom we largely owe the popular prejudice against lawyers of this day that is exhibited in the flings and alleged jokes of the press and stage. The shyster, with his pursuit of "skinning" friend and foe, adversary and client, with his effort to stir up litigation rather than to avoid it, to lengthen instead of end it, to hunt in place of shunning it, is largely responsible for the present ever-increasing misguided clamor of the people for the recall of judges.

The shyster of the present day is not always the product of dishonesty and viciousness. He is not confined to the breed of ignoramuses and rascals. He develops frequently with the law student, who starts out with good intentions and honest motives, but who fails to learn, observe, and cultivate the ethics of the profession.

The shyster of to-day appears in many varied forms and phases. We

have the stupid, lazy shyster, whose chief offense is lack of knowledge and industry. He merely ekes out a living in the scums of the law. He is a disgrace, but not so dangerous as the smart, energetic shyster, who is able to hide his true character and keen enough to succeed.

We have the "ambulance chaser," who hangs around the house of the dead and injured, seeking employment as a tinker does trade. He preys upon corporations, and succeeds, not only in doing great injury to the defendant, but also his other victim, his client, whom he so frequently deprives of any share of the loot. Indeed, the most dangerous of shysters is not the man who himself seeks out his own cases, and stirs up his own litigation without fear or concealment, but it is the one who pretends to respectability and secures his business secretively and furtively through the means of runners and hirelings. That shyster, by means of his apparent decency, is able to deceive and dupe the people, juries, and courts, where the common, open shyster would fail. Every community is infested with the shyster in all its forms and kinds, and every community has been infested with it since the beginning of the profession.

It is an easy matter for a young lawyer, who starts out in the pursuit of the law as a practice rather than a profession, who has always in mind fees and money as a first consideration, to slip into bad practices and little by little develop into a genuine shyster.

A disbarment proceeding in a local court recently developed a scheme concocted and worked, which showed great ingenuity and cunning.