Právnický stav v USA – historie a současnost

The author of the article examines the development of the legal profession on the present territory of the United States in the historical context – since the earliest colonisation where the utopian belief in the harmonious coexistence of people led to the conviction about no need for lawyers – up to the present days where the lawyers exercise extraordinary influence upon what is going on in the country and upon the way the country reflects itself. The important role of the American lawyers is connected with the role of law and keeping the rules of game in general as well as the complexity of the legal circumstances in the country embracing fifty diverse law systems in its states and the fifty-first system of law on the federal level. The author deals with the lawyers role and position as it has evolved since the colonial era over establishment of independence (where in the courts decisions the application of the precedents coming from England was rejected but the very principle of the legal precedent was preserved) to the contemporary understanding of law and its rule. The article examines the development and exercise of the legal profession. It emphasises the contribution made by big legal firms to the lawyers – especially attorneys style of work. The author gives his historical outline with respect to special conditions of applying law in the Southern and in the Western states of the Union. He pays considerable attention to judges, especially the judges of the Supreme Court of the U.S.A.; he also looks at this institution in terms of its function of a guarantee of the constitutional principle. The major part of the study is concerned with the issue of education and legal instruction of the new members of the legal profession in the U.S.A. Development has arrived at a point where people become judges and performers of other legal professions on the basis of education acquired from the faculties of law, experience gathered in legal practice, and on the basis of general social recognition. In the legal instruction provided by the faculties of law, the reforms initiated by Christopher C. Langdell, the Dean of the Law School at Harvard University, are of fundamental importance. His methods and system of legal education are followed by other law schools, the total number of which is over 170 in the United States today. It is this type of qualified professional preparation of lawyers at the universities that is likely to preserve its place in the future.