OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, APRIL 8, 2016
Jokes aside, lawyers are part
of our communities’ fabric
)RUDQ$VWRULDODZ¿UP
to produce a governor
DQGWZRFRQJUHVVPHQ
is astonishing
W
hen my wife and I lived in
Washington, D.C., we knew
lots of lawyers. There is nothing
special about that.
It’s like a Capitol Hill resident know-
ing someone who works for the CIA. If you
live in D.C., the odds are that you will know
someone at the CIA.
The striking thing
about the lawyers we
knew in Washington
was their unhappiness.
So many of these law-
yers were looking for
something else to do.
That memory sur-
faced as Matt Winters
and I interviewed law-
yers for the April Coast
Steve
River Business Journal
Forrester
article on legal services. I
was struck by the enthu-
siasm of the lawyers we met: Steve Campbell,
Larry Popkin, Ben and Megan Lawrence.
The Lawrences described the lifestyle
advantage a lawyer in our region has over a
city-based lawyer. Popkin mentioned the dif-
ferential between the number of hours he must
bill per month, as opposed to someone in a
ODUJHFLW\¿UP
More than that, there is a relationship factor
that brings more satisfaction. Hal Snow spoke
of this during a conversation we had on Mon-
day. I told Hal my wife’s observation that a lot
of what he does could be called social work.
Describing what he does, Snow said “We
(a client and he) sit across the desk and have a
personal relationship.”
Matt Winters also recognizes this aspect
of small town lawyering. Matt, like his father,
was a lawyer in Wyoming. He remembers his
dad often said that at times he felt like he was
doing marriage counseling.
Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
A plaque reading Norblad and Norblad Attorneys is seen in the offices of Snow and Snow.
A.W. Norblad
Walter Norblad
blad & Norblad. Born in Sweden, A.W. Nor-
blad came to Astoria in 1909 and started a
he extraordinary thing about the Snow ODZ SUDFWLFH +H ZDV EULHÀ\ 2UHJRQ¶V JRY-
ODZ¿UPLVLWVH[WHQVLYHOLQHDJH,WVSUH- ernor (1929-1931). After attending Har-
GHFHVVRU ODZ ¿UPV ZHUH KRPH WR WZR FRQ- vard Law School, Walter Norblad joined his
gressmen and one governor. They were father’s practice in 1932. He represented our
Walter Norblad, Wendell Wyatt and A.W. district in Congress, 1946-1964.
Following World War II, Wendell Wyatt
Norblad.
Gathering research on a feature called “A MRLQHGWKH1RUEODG¿UP+HVXFFHHGHG:DOWHU
GD\ LQ WKH OLIH RI WKH $VWRULD 3RVW 2I¿FH´ Norblad in Congress and served 1964-1975.
,WLVUHPDUNDEOHWKDWDODZ¿UPLQDWRZQ
some 20 years ago, I saw graphic evidence of
WKH6QRZODZ¿UP¶VOHJDF\2QWKHRWKHUVLGH of 10,000 was such an incubator for state and
RIWKHSRVWRI¿FHER[HVZKHUHPDLOLVVRUWHG federal political leadership.
one may see how names are written beside
ER[HV 2Q WKH ER[ WKH 6QRZ ODZ ¿UP XVHV
hen you grow up in a small town — as
are names from decades ago, such as Wyatt
I did in Pendleton — you are conscious
and Norblad.
of the town’s lawyers. One of my best school
$WRQHSRLQWWKH¿UPZDVNQRZQDV1RU- chums’ fathers was a prosecutor when we
T
W
Wendell Wyatt
were young. I have a vivid memory of going
WR KLV RI¿FH XSVWDLUV LQ DQ RI¿FH EXLOGLQJ
and seeing him wearing a pistol in a shoulder
holster. That made an impression on a sixth-
grade boy.
The remnants of Pendleton’s early law
practices were evident in the 1950s. John
.LONHQQ\ZRXOGOHDYHWKH¿UPKHHVWDEOLVKHG
in 1925 when President Dwight Eisenhower
made him a federal judge in 1959.
When I returned to Pendleton on a visit
in about 1972, I was startled to learn that a
Native American lawyer, Doug Nash, had set
up a law practice. That signaled a dramatic
shift in the native culture around Pendleton.
L
ike every other profession, lawyering
is in the midst of technological change.
Lawyers we knew
in Washington, D.C.,
were an unhappy
lot. But not here.
At the same time, lawyers often see social
change coming before the rest of us do. Hal
Snow sounded the alarm that led to one of
Clatsop County’s early successful prosecu-
tions of an elder abuse case. Since then, Hal
has been appalled to see incidents of elder
abuse increase.
Upriver, Portland’s Tonkon Torp law
¿UPKDVIRUPHGDPDULMXDQDJURXSWRVHUYH
D EXVLQHVV JURXS WKDW GLG QRW H[LVW MXVW ¿YH
years ago. Another sign of the times.
— S.A.F.
The Republicans’ coming train wreck in November
By CHARLES
KRAUTHAMMER
Washington Post Writers
Group
W
ASHINGTON
— Yes, the big
Wisconsin story is Ted
Cruz’s crushing 13-point
victory.
And yes, it greatly improves
his chances of denying Donald
7UXPS D ¿UVWEDOORW FRQYHQ-
tion victory, which may turn
out to be Trump’s only path to
the nomination.
Nonetheless, the most stun-
ning result of Wisconsin is the
solidity of Trump’s core constit-
uency. Fundamentalist Trump-
ism remains resistant to every
cosmic disturbance. He man-
aged to get a full 35 percent in a
state in which:
• He was opposed by a very
popular GOP governor (80 per-
cent approval among Republi-
cans) with a powerful state orga-
nization honed by winning three
campaigns within four years
(two gubernatorial, one recall).
• He was opposed by popu-
lar, local, well-informed radio
talk show hosts whose tough
interviews left him in shambles.
cans, facing a gen-
• Tons of money
eral-election choice
was dumped into
between
Hillary
negative ads not just
Clinton and Trump,
from the Cruz cam-
would either vote
paign and the pro-
Clinton, go third
Cruz super PACs but
party or stay home.
from two anti-Trump
Trump did not
super PACs as well.
exactly advance his
And if that
needed
outreach
doesn’t leave a can-
with
his
reaction
to
GLGDWHÀDWWHQHGFRQ-
Charles
the
Wisconsin
result:
sider that Trump
Krauthammer
a nuclear strike on
was coming off two
ZHHNVRIJULHYRXVVHOILQÀLFWHG “Lyin’ Ted,” as “a puppet” and
wounds — and still got more “a Trojan horse” illegally coor-
than a third of the vote. Which dinating with his super PACs
GH¿QLWLYHO\ YLQGLFDWHG7UXPS¶V (evidence?) “who totally control
boast that if he ever went out him.” Not quite the kind of thing
in the middle of Fifth Avenue that gets you from 35 percent to
and shot someone (most likely 50 percent.
Not needed, say the
because his Twitter went down
— he’d be apprehended in his Trumpites. If we come to Cleve-
pajamas), he wouldn’t lose any land with a mere plurality of
delegates, fairness demands that
voters.
The question for Trump has our man be nominated.
This is nonsense. If you can-
always been how far he could
reach beyond his solid core. not command or cobble together
His problem is that those who a majority, you haven’t earned
reject him are equally immov- the party leadership.
John Kasich makes the
able. In Wisconsin, 58 percent
of Republican voters said that opposite case. He’s hanging on
the prospect of a Trump pres- in case a deadlocked convention
idency left them concerned or eventually turns to him, posses-
sor of the best polling numbers
even scared.
Cruz scares a lot of people, against Clinton. After all, didn’t
too. But his fear number was Lincoln come to the 1860 con-
21 points lower. Moreover, 36 vention trailing?
Yes, and so what? The post-
percent of Wisconsin Republi-
Marisa Wojcik/The Eau Claire Leader-Telegram via AP
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump greets
supporters during a rally at Memorial High School in Eau
Claire, Wis., Saturday.
Fundamentalist Trumpism
remains resistant to every
cosmic disturbance.
1968 reforms abolished the
system whereby governors,
bosses and other party poo-bahs
decided things. In the modern
era, to reach down to the No. 3
candidate — a distant third who
loses 55 of 56 contests — or
to parachute in a party unicorn
who never entered the race in
WKH¿UVWSODFHZRXOGEHDUDGLFDO
affront to the democratic spirit
of the contemporary nominating
process.
A parachute maneuver
might be legal, but it would be
perceived as illegitimate and,
coming amid the most intense
anti-establishment sentiment in
memory, imprudent to the point
of suicide.
Yet even without this eventu-
ality, party suicide is a very real
possibility. The nominee will be
either Trump or Cruz. How do
they reconcile in the end?
It’s no longer business; it’s
personal. Cruz has essentially
declared that he couldn’t sup-
port someone who did what
Trump did to Heidi Cruz. He
might try to patch relations with
some Trump supporters — is
Chris Christie’s soul still for
sale? — but how many could
he peel away? Remember: Wis-
consin has just demonstrated
Trump’s unbreakable core.
And if Trump loses out, a
split is guaranteed. In Trump’s
mind, he is a winner. Always. If
he loses, it can only be because
he was cheated. He constantly
contends that he’s being treated
unfairly. He is certain to declare
any convention process that
leaves him without the nomi-
nation irredeemably unfair. No
need to go third party. A sim-
ple walkout with perhaps a
thousand followers behind will
doom the party in November.
In a country where only
25 percent feel we’re on the
right track and where the lead-
ing Democrat cannot shake the
challenge of a once-obscure
dairy-state socialist, you’d think
the Republicans cannot lose.
You’d be underestimating
how hard they are trying.
STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher • LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor
BETTY SMITH, Advertising Manager
• CARL EARL, Systems Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
• DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
HEATHER RAMSDELL, Circulation Manager
Founded in 1873