Free Legal Advice
Navigating your way through the legal system of the United States is no easy matter, whether your concerns lie within the realm of civil law, that which deals with the realm of litigation and can incur substantial losses to the individuals involved in the form of financial setbacks or other damages to one's quality of life, or in the area of bringing or being made the subject of criminal charges, which can carry even stiffer penalties and may change a person's life irrevocably. Though some people prefer as a matter of course to forgo the advice of others and rely on their own self-acquired knowledge and native ingenuity, the legal system with its network of rules and procedures is one area of life that even the most capable and self-assured person is not recommended to try to navigate without the benefit of guidance and help received from others. For this reason the United States is filled with legal professionals whose specialty consists of helping other people with requirements for dealing with the legal system. Fortunately for the "consumer" faced with the challenge of figuring out his or her different needs in regard to the legal "market" of lawyers and other trained professionals, a central concept exists in the legal profession of work which is performed under the rubric of "pro bono," or "for good," a phrase derived from the lengthier Latin "pro bono publico," which is to say, "for the public good." Under this concept, an attempt has been made to infuse the legal profession, one which is potentially highly lucrative and aggressive in pushing an individual's initiative in terms of business, with a sense of commitment to public service.
A primary form that can be taken by the practice of "pro bono" work consists of the dispensing of free legal advice for people who do not otherwise have the financial ability to pay for such services in the conventional manner. This concept partly comes out of the regrettable fact that often those people whose fortunes in life make them most needy for legal assistance in regards to dealing with a criminal or a civil case are also those who are least well equipped by the path of their life for the task of paying for such potentially expensive and crucial services. Thus the encouragement to lawyers, particularly those from top law firms who are perceived to have the best chance for doing well financially from their involvement with companies or individuals with deep pockets, to render the service of free legal advice to those in need proceeds from a desire to put the legal profession to work in remedying systemic and social injustices and to improve the overall fabric of life in the United States in terms of regard for fairness and the rule of law. For people who are "in the market" for free legal advice due to the exigencies of their lives a particularly important aspect of the search for such services in the modern, digitally-driven world is the increasing availability of free legal advice online, which is provided through a variety of websites set up by law firms or other kinds of legal service businesses. Seeking out free legal advice online can be a particularly wise course of action for people who need to gain a sense of their options for navigating the minefield of the modern legal system or to quickly make a legal document ready and acceptable for submission. Having a sense of your options for securing free legal advice, whether in the form of finding attorneys committed to rendering pro bono services or through the avenue of finding free legal advice online, is a necessary step for having a relationship to the modern legal system based on the model of the informed and responsible consumer.
A number of different initiatives and organizations have been organized through the United States legal system and professional establishment that are aimed at maintaining the efficacy of the "pro bono" model for encouraging the rendering of free legal advice to individuals confused about or unaware of their options in the legal system. The basic safeguard for maintaining the availability of free legal advice as a workable concept in the practical day-to-day system of American law is the recommendation put in place by the American Bar Association (ABA) recommending that lawyers practicing in the United States furnish at least fifty hours of such service to those in need each year. In this strong recommendation, however, the ABA is not unanimously supported by other large associations for legal professionals in the United States, which may be a factor in the reluctance on the part of some legal professionals and law firms to live up to such potentially tall orders. For instance, the New York State Bar Association gives a far more measured recommendation for rates of legal service rendered, advising attorneys practicing within the state of New York that it is their duty only to provide twenty hours worth of free legal advice on an annual basis. According to an activist law student organization called Building a Better Legal Network, most law firms fall short of the nationally accepted standards for levels of free legal advice rendered. The organization aims to provide market-based measures for maintaining the sense of social responsibility expressed through such measures as the "pro bono" concept in the legal profession, and is thus an important stop-gap measure for ensuring the availability to people dealing with legal problems of free legal advice online or on a face-to-face basis. Due to the flaws and observed insufficiency that exists in the system for providing free legal advice directly on the part of attorneys, people who anticipate or find that they will be facing legal problems without possessing the means to secure the guidance of legal professionals should be aware of the free legal advice online which can be easily found through a Google search and provide a variety of legal services.