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>it's not as cut and dry as we think That line sums up the entirety of law. I say it all the time and it should be a saying every potential client should be f

>it's not as cut and dry as we think That line sums up the entirety of law. I say it all the time and it should be a saying every potential client should be familiar with...the correct answer to any legal question is always: maybe. If a lawyer tells you anything but, they are selling you on something/telling you what you want to hear/etc... The bar exam is not necessarily composed of 3 wrong choices and 1 correct answer. A bar exam question is typically comprised of 2 wrong answers and 2 right answers, then it becomes a question of what is the best answer out of 2 correct answers. It is not uncommon either for the bar to ultimately void a question and/or revise the scoring to reflect multiple answers as correct, and this is after countless lawyers vetted these questions...it is not easy.

mindslight 11y ago
Well as is the case for any decentralized system, perspectives can differ wildly. But a major purpose of written law is to attempt to get everyone on the same page ahead of time so that decisions are predictable (otherwise it would be a lot simpler to just have "judges" that resolved each dispute without regard for precedent). What you've said is very practical - a lawyer can't really guarantee some arbitrary action is fine but can only recommend the most prudent course of action. But this conservatism arises from the legal system's limits, not an ideal to strive for - a person deciding what to do really does want to know the individual merit of each action, so that they can choose according to their personal utility function.