  Justene over at urlLink Calblog has a problem with urlLink pro per plaintiffs who, despite the law not being on their side, still think they should prevail. Excerpt: What bothered me most was the conversation outside the courtroom when the pro per, despite the judge taking at least 20 minutes to explain why the matter would be dismissed, said "I don't understand why your client is paying legal fees on this when they should just let me have what I want. " I can't tell you what about this is more offensive -- the fact that the pro per not only thinks they are right but assumes I know it and am just opposing them to be difficult and unfair, or the fact that the pro per thinks that the legal fees are money that ought to go to them.
Notice how this penchant for "doing it yourself" doesn't apply to most other professions? You rarely see folks deciding to pull an appendix on their own. Rarely will they do their own taxes if they have an accountant friend to help. So why is American law different? I'd argue it comes from the supremely democratic nature of our legal system. Anyone (almost) can sue or be sued, and most laws are drafted and written in an English that, while certainly less than plain, is a good deal less proprietary than that of the medical profession. This kind of turns everyone into an instant expert since we all have generally accepted definitions of the words in the statutes/cases and figure figure that the definitions can't vary THAT much from their accepted norms. Further, so much of our history is filled with self-taught lawyers, Lincoln comes to mind first off (though I think Adams was as well)--and I think that ideal that any man can master the law and thereby defend his rights is deeply ingrained in the American spirit.
(but can you imagine someone just kind of winging it on the bar these days--now that's ballsy) Is this a good thing? I don't really have a problem with it--makes for some interesting reading in law school and I don't believe it happens often enough to explain why I don't have an internship (though if the latter proves false, then I will be very much against people representing themselves). 
