Lawyer joke
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Lawyer jokes make up a species of professional humor. Most of the jokes are based on the humourous conceit that lawyers, like many other professionals, arrange the system more for their own benefit than for the common good which they are supposed to serve.
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[edit] Anecdotal history
Humor about the legal profession includes many classic tales which may have been humorous to the original audience:
- Shakespeare
- In his depiction of Cade's rebellion in Henry VI, Part 2 is the line: "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Although this is usually interpreted as being antagonistic to lawyers, others have seen that the text of the play makes clear that precisely the opposite meaning is intended. Cade seeks to cement his revolution by destroying the justice system.
There are many colloquial synonyms for lawyers:
- Ambulance chaser: a derisive term that refers to an unethical lawyer, who "chases" accident victims for their business.
- Mouthpiece: referring to the practice of lawyers speaking for their clients.
Lawyers themselves frequently write humorously about their profession:
- A list of such articles is here.
- Rumpole of the Bailey is a series of humorous works by British lawyer Sir John Mortimer.
- Supernatural Law is a humorous comic concerning "Wolff and Byrd, Counselors of the Macabre".
[edit] Examples
This type of joke relies for its humor on some characteristic of lawyers other than simple dislike for them, or some terminology associated with that profession:
- A priest, a lawyer and a rabbi are marooned on a desert island surrounded by man-eating sharks. After a while their food and water run out and they are in danger of death. Just then an otherwise empty rowboat containing a large barrel of water comes floating by. The three castaways are in agony — they must have the water, but to swim through the hungry sharks is certain death. The lawyer says he will try it — the others beg him not to, saying "It's hopeless".
- The lawyer swims out to the boat, grasps the painter rope in his teeth and tows it back to shore. The sharks completely ignore him. When he gets back to shore they all begin talking at once:
- Priest: It's a miracle! It's a miracle!.
- Lawyer: That was no miracle.
- Rabbi: Well, what DO you call it?.
- Lawyer: Where I come from, we call that "professional courtesy".
Variation: A lawyer falls overboard from a cruise ship in shark infested waters. As the passengers watch in horror, he is immediately encircled but a large school of sharks. Just as they expect the worst, the sharks form two lines providing a path for the man to swim back to the ship; "professional courtesy".
Q: What do you call a male lawyer with an IQ of 60 who is wearing a black dress? A: Your honor.
A man who died was supposed to go to Heaven, instead ended up in Hell. So, God called Satan, protesting to have that man returned to Heaven where he belonged. When Satan rejected, God claimed he would go to court to get the man back, to which Satan replied. "Where are you going to get a lawyer, they are all down here!"
