I agree with Alicorn. Even if you pass the law, there’s no practical way to stop people from getting private advice secretly, especially in advance of the court date. If you try real hard, private lawyers will go underground (and as the saying goes, only criminals will have lawyers :-) People will pass along illegal samizdat manuals of how to behave in court, half of them actually presenting harmful advice and none of them properly attributed. Congratulations: you have just forced lawyering to become a secret Dark Art.
Do you think this is an improvement? As described, it looks like it’s a repeat of a similar system with similar problems. (And how much of that is because we already know those failings and are best at describing them?)
Consider how much easier it becomes to get a good professional support for the poor side in Eliezer’s setup. There is just too much trouble with “underground” professional representation. A significant portion of expensive lawyers may simply not like the idea of going “underground”, because it hurts their self-image and lowers their status within the community of “white-book” lawyers.
You’re right, I was deliberately playing devil’s advocate. I should reconsider how likely the failure mode I described is, although I do believe its probability isn’t very small.
I agree with Alicorn. Even if you pass the law, there’s no practical way to stop people from getting private advice secretly, especially in advance of the court date. If you try real hard, private lawyers will go underground (and as the saying goes, only criminals will have lawyers :-) People will pass along illegal samizdat manuals of how to behave in court, half of them actually presenting harmful advice and none of them properly attributed. Congratulations: you have just forced lawyering to become a secret Dark Art.
And this is not an improvement over the current status quo because...?
Do you think this is an improvement? As described, it looks like it’s a repeat of a similar system with similar problems. (And how much of that is because we already know those failings and are best at describing them?)
How would you have legal advice outside of a court case (to ensure predictability) handled?
You seem to be engaging in motivated skepticism.
Consider how much easier it becomes to get a good professional support for the poor side in Eliezer’s setup. There is just too much trouble with “underground” professional representation. A significant portion of expensive lawyers may simply not like the idea of going “underground”, because it hurts their self-image and lowers their status within the community of “white-book” lawyers.
Respect trivial inconveniences.
You’re right, I was deliberately playing devil’s advocate. I should reconsider how likely the failure mode I described is, although I do believe its probability isn’t very small.