Attack on Lawyers and updating "They Came for Me"

First came Deputy Assistant Secretary Stimson's remarks suggesting that Corporations should cease to patronize law firms which did pro bono work for suspects held at Guantanamo. This was followed by the administration's firing of U.S. attorneys who, in some cases, have pursued corruption cases too successfully.

These attacks on lawyers must be resisted. The situation today is all too reminiscent of the situation described in the poem Martin Niemöller is said to have written in 1946:

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak out for me.

The attack on lawyers is just one more chapter in the overall attack on civil liberties by the Bush administration which can be reflected in an update of the poem:

"First they came for the enemy combatants, and I did not speak out -- because I was neither an enemy nor a combatant;

Then they came for those seeking or providing abortions, and I did not speak out -- because I neither sought nor provided abortions;

Then they came for the Muslims, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Muslim;

Then they came for the gays and lesbians, and I did not speak out -- because I was neither a gay nor a lesbian;

Then they came for the buyers and borrowers of books, and I did not speak out - because I neither bought nor borrowed a book;

Then they came for the remaining non-Christians; and I did not speak out because I was not a non-Christian;

Then they came for the non-Evangelicals, and I did not speak out -- because I was not a non-Evangelical;

Then they came for the lawyers, and I did not speak out - because I was not a lawyer.

Then they came for me -- and there was no one left to speak out for me."

Really civil liberties are inseparable -- an attack on any of these groups is an attack on us all.

Sent to Boston Globe