Colonial Fear Of Lawyers

In the columns of the New York Gazetteer of Sept. 8, 1786, there was a paragraph lainenting the increase of lawyers as threatening to the future prosperity of the comruunity and degrading to freemen. "An honest trade in former days," eaid the writer, "was all that people of common ability and edncation -were ambitious of, but now no profession is genteel but the lawyer and the merchant. The lawyers aie now creeping into every post of importance and thrusting themselves wherever there is a vacancy. Our congress, onr assembly, are crowded with thetn, and even in onr great commercial conven;ion there are five lawyers to one merchant."