Canadian Lawyer

16 A U G U S T 2 0 1 5 w w w . C A N A D I A N L a w y e r m a g . c o m Remember, you'd tell them, a well-draft- ed agreement is your best protection. Don't forget, you can't trust anyone. Then, one sunny day, I retired from legal practice. After messing about for a bit, I decided to become an author. Why not? (Although, it's easier said than done: as one literary friend said to me, "it's hard to write even a bad book.") In due course, a big publishing house pre- sented me with a book contract. With- out bothering to read it, I signed on the dotted line. I couldn't be bothered to wade through a bunch of complicated provisions. They didn't matter. I wanted to sell my book. And, I liked the person on the other side of the table. More than that: I trusted her. If there were any difficulties down the road (and occa- sionally there were), I was confident that good faith conversations would fix them (they did). I don't remember if we shook hands, but we might as well have done. I relied on trust. Ah hah, the reader of this column may be thinking, I get it! You believe that you're better off signing a contract without reading it, particularly if you're a little guy dealing with a big corporation which puts a "take it or leave it" standard form agreement on the table. You can always claim later you didn't know what you were doing, you didn't understand what was happening, the offensive provi- sion in question can't possibly be bind- ing, you didn't have a choice, you were being pushed around and you didn't even realize it, inequality of bargaining power, etc., etc. That sort of argument might work for some people — I'm not rust and law. The optimal relationship between the two is an ethical conundrum at the heart of legal practice. How much can we trust each other? How much law do we need? Do unnecessary legal rules replace trust to the detriment of a truly civil society? Does increasing legaliza- tion — turning every problem, no matter what it is really about, into a legal issue — damage the fabric of our community? When I practised law, I spent a lot of time drawing up contracts for my clients and reviewing draft agreements concocted by lawyers for the other side. There were endless meetings at which every word of lengthy docu- ments was anxiously analyzed and fought over by hyper-caffeinated attorneys. Clients, eager to get on with drilling for oil or developing real estate, often lost patience with this process, and gave instructions to "speed it up" and "get on with the job." You had to be tough with them, resolute, adamant, brook no non- sense, explain how important every word was, and how they had to be protected eight ways to Sunday from the unscrupulous folks across the table, and how this took time, effort, and skill (yours), damn the billable hours, full steam ahead. L E G A L E T H I C S O P I N I O N @philipslayton DARCY MUENCHRATH The more legalistic society becomes, the less cohesive it is. By Philip Slayton T MY CHANGE OF ATTITUDE ONCE I LEFT LEGAL PRACTICE GOT ME THINKING ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TRUST AND LAW. IT'S CLEARLY INVERSE. Trust is the crux of it all

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