ETHICS IN SERVICE
by
William Howard Taft
Addresses Delivered in the Page Lecture Series, 1914, before the Senior Class of the Sheffield Scientific School, Yale University
NEW HAVEN: YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS
LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
MDCCCCXV
Copyright, 1915
By Yale University Press
First printed October, 1915, 1000 copies
PREFACE
The legal profession discharges a most important function in a civilized community, and it seems to me that a discussion of the ethics and ideals of that profession would come within the purpose of the Page foundation, which is described by the donor as intended to promote "the ethical side of business life, including the morals and ethics of public service." I shall first ask your attention to the history of the profession, which shows that a paid advocacy is the only practical system, and to the rules of conduct to which lawyers must be held in order that such a system shall promote justice. I cannot claim to have any peculiar knowledge upon this subject other than that derived from a somewhat brief practice of five years at the Bar, from an experience of eleven years on the Bench of trial and appellate courts, from a somewhat varied experience in the responsibility of government, not only in this country, but in those far-distant isles of the Pacific in which the United States has been grafting the principles of free government upon a civilization inherited from Spain.