{"id":10501,"date":"2009-01-17T13:25:14","date_gmt":"2009-01-17T18:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/?p=10501"},"modified":"2011-08-05T14:53:12","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T18:53:12","slug":"mortimer-morden-and-miracles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/2009\/01\/17\/mortimer-morden-and-miracles\/","title":{"rendered":"mortimer, morden, and miracles"},"content":{"rendered":"

A<\/strong><\/em> few “quickies” that took too long to write this Saturday morning<\/span> afternoon:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Thank you, John Mortimer, for creating Rumpole<\/strong><\/em>:\u00a0 As today’s New York Times<\/em> reports, “John Mortimer, Barrister and Writer Who Created Rumpole, Dies at 85<\/a>” (Jan. 17, 2009).\u00a0 The famous “champagne Socialist” will be much-praised and discussed in the media.\u00a0 I want to thank him for creating, Horace Rumpole, who Bloomberg<\/a>‘s appropriately describes as “the curmudgeonly London trial lawyer renowned for his roguish way with the law, his love of small cigars and cheap claret, and his fear of just one person, his wife Hilda, a.k.a<\/em>. ‘She Who Must Be Obeyed’.\u201d No other fictitious character has given me so much enjoyment over the decades as Rumpole, on television and in novels.<\/p>\n

As a lawyer and observer of the legal profession, I particularly appreciate Rumpole’s battles with the folks we call the Dignity Police.\u00a0 As we said here<\/a> three years ago, after listening to the audiobook of John Mortimer\u2019s novel Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Throughout this enjoyable memoir of Rumpole\u2019s first big case, he is chided by Queen\u2019s Inns and Equity Court versions of the bar\u2019s dignity police \u2013 pompous Heads of Chamber, like Wynset and Ballard, worried more about their own perquisites and appearing in \u201cthe finest traditions of our great profession\u201d than in working diligently to keep a client from the death sentence or in helping to nurture the career of a young \u201cwhite wig\u201d lawyer.<\/p>\n

\"\" Rumpole, of course, refuses to see his role as being \u201ca safe pair of hands\u201d wearing the correct color of pants.\u00a0\u00a0 Yes, he never does become rich or famous, or even Head of Chambers, but he serves his clients and profession with his zeal and his soul intact.<\/p>\n

As for Mortimer, I particularly enjoyed Clive Davis’ remembrance<\/a> yesterday in The Spectator<\/em>, which includes this passage from his autobiography “The Summer of a Dormouse”<\/a> (which Davis calls a “beautiful, slender book about the tribulations – and occasional – rewards of old age”):<\/p>\n

\n
After this encounter with various religious beliefs, I remember that C.M. Bowra wrote, “A people gets the gods it deserves. The grinning, gloating ogress of the Aztecs mirrors a race brutalized by incessant war.” So the Greek gods are as louche, and often as charming, as their worshippers. The God of Israel is extremely nationalistic and frequently cross. The Scotch God is prim and meticulous and the American God, at any rate on the Networks, wishes to be taken literally, lacks a sense of irony and prefers large financial contributions to burnt offerings. When I was at school I was introduced, in the Chapel, to the Church of England God, a well-intentioned old gent who doesn’t care too much for religion.<\/em><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

A<\/em><\/strong> final thought from Prof. Yabut: If you’re thinking of giving me a lifetime achievement award, please don’t wait until I’m 85.\u00a0 If I don’t deserve one before then, I don’t deserve one.\u00a0 Googling about John Mortimer today, I discovered that the mystery magazine The Strand<\/em> announced<\/a> it was giving John Mortimer a Lifetime Achievement Award on January 14, 2009, two days before the author died.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a> Flight 1549’s Landing Was Not a Miracle<\/em><\/strong>:\u00a0 As we wrote two days ago, the f\/k\/a<\/em> Gang was grateful and impressed<\/a> by the outcome of the collision of US Airways Flight 1549with a flock of geese.\u00a0\u00a0 But, in response to the verbal reaction of America’s politicians, press and public, we voice a hearty “no!” to the headline in Rex Huppke’s Chicago Tribune<\/em> article “Have we set the bar too low for miracles?<\/a>” (January 16, 2009).\u00a0 Huppke notes:<\/p>\n

“The safe Hudson River landing of US Airways Flight 1549 was remarkable enough to push passengers and public officials, headline writers and talking heads straight into the realm of the supernatural. . . .\u00a0 It was a tragedy narrowly averted, but was it really a miracle?<\/p>\n

“The pilot, we now know, is highly trained and has years of experience. From a pragmatic standpoint, with an expert at the helm, the result was just what it should have been.”<\/p>\n

Using the word more precisely in a religious context, John C. Cavadini, chair of the theology department at the University of Notre Dame, told the Tribune<\/em>: “Strictly speaking, the term ‘miracle’ would be reserved for an event for which there is no natural explanation.”\u00a0\u00a0 And, Loyola University theology professor Dennis Martin noted that the Latin root from which “miracle” is derived merely means “a marvelous thing.”\u00a0 He adds:<\/p>\n

“I think it comes down to whether you believe in God’s activity in the world or not. Those who do would say that even with the skill of the pilot, if just a little something goes the wrong way it could all turn out quite differently. When a person of faith says it was miraculous, really what he’s saying is, ‘I believe God was involved.’ “<\/p>\n

In response, Ruppke asks a very logical question: “[W]hat of the Canada geese officials think flew into the jet’s engines, causing the plane to go down? If there were divine intervention in the safe landing, why were the geese there in the first place?” And, Prof. Martin replies:<\/p>\n

“No mainstream theologian would say God either directed those geese into those engines or that God didn’t act to stop them. God permits this to happen. The birds did what they did. The pilots did what they did.”<\/p>\n

The skeptics here at f\/k\/a<\/em> do not believe in divine intervention in human affairs. (If we did, we would have quite a few bones to pick with a supposedly all-loving but demonstrably arbitrary and capricious Supreme Being.)\u00a0 For us, the safe landing of Flight 1549 was a “miracle” using the meaning of “an unexpectedly marvelous thing”.\u00a0 It was not the result of divine intervention — nor angelic assistance.\u00a0 We’ll leave you with two points to ponder:<\/p>\n