by Joe Wilhelm Jr.
Staff Writer
The American Inns of Court decided to honor Abraham Lincoln’s 200th birthday by printing three submissions from its members recognizing the accomplishments of his life and a Jacksonville attorney was among the chosen few.
Gunster shareholder Michael Cavendish’s fourth published article in “The Bencher,” the organization’s bimonthly magazine, saluted how Lincoln used plain language that the public could relate to in explaining the complexities of the law. His previous submissions to the magazine include: “Civility in Written Advocacy,” The Bencher, July/Aug. 2005; “Ad Fontes, Ad Astra, Ad Clementia,” The Bencher, July/Aug. 2006; and “The Iconoclast Ethic,” The Bencher, Nov./Dec. 2006.
As the country celebrates president’s weekend, Cavendish took time to explain why he chose to put pen to paper to recognize the 16th President of the United States:
How did you become interested in Lincoln?
Lincoln was someone of moderate interest to me until I read “Team of Rivals” by Doris Kearns Goodwin, maybe a year, year-and-a-half ago. That book tells how he accomplished a major political victory through sheer force of will. His winning of his first presidency was as momentous as when Washington defined what the presidency was. Except Washington was an aristocrat and had an enormous advantage over Lincoln. People assumed Washington should be deferred to regardless of what his office was. With Lincoln, until he won, it was the opposite. People would meet him and those that did not take a close look would think, ‘What is this, amateur hour?,’ because he was lanky and odd and talked like a common man. And he fought through that and ended up on quite a few historians’ lists as the best President of all time. He was so fully multifaceted. We don’t really coin patron saints in America, but if we did, Lincoln would be the patron saint of lawyers, and the patron saint of kids growing up in the country that want to enter high politics, and if you are following Obama, he seems to regard Lincoln as the patron saint of U.S. presidents.
How many articles have you published on him?
Just the one, The Lus and the Lex, which appeared in the January/February edition of The Bencher, the magazine of the American Inns of Court Foundation. Writing on him is intimidating because he has attracted so many famous writers and historians as a subject. The field of writing on Lincoln is beyond crowded, and the crowd is scary good.
Were you always interested in writing?
I didn’t write, didn’t try to write, until I turned 28. But like most lawyers, I was always interested in ideas, and even more so in the connections between things. Lincoln is a good example of a high-connectivity subject; his tenure connected the Colonial and Antebellum eras with the more modern, railroad and Industrial Revolution half of the 19th century. He connected the U.S. politics of the time and all the reverence for the original 13 colonies with the Midwest. We could just go on and on.
How do you find the time to write with your work and volunteer commitments?
The short answer is that I don’t. The trick for me is to commit with an editor to a writing project and a deadline and to let the fear of failure and blacklisting siphon the article out of me somehow.
Have you ever dressed up as Lincoln or participated in any historical reenactments?
No. If I ever dress up, it will be as Elvis.
The American Inns of Court (AIC) is designed to improve the skills, professionalism and ethics of the bench and bar and Cavendish is a member of the Chester Bedell Inn of Court.
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