What makes for a great communicator in trial (or elsewhere when the person is trying to convince an audience)? To be a great communicator as a trial lawyer you should concentrate on three things:
1. Your WORDS
2. Your VISUALS – MEDIA
3. Your DELIVERY
This article focuses on the words that a persuasive trial lawyer uses. Later posts will discuss visuals and your delivery of the words and visuals.
There is no better place to start than with the three types of arguments categorized by Aristotle:
• Ethical Appeal - Ethos
• Emotional Appeal - Pathos
• Appeal to Reason – Logos
August of this year marked the 60th Anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech. Did Reverand King employing the Aristotlian arguemts when he gave that speech? Most people haven’t seen the speech in its entirety. Reverand King spoke for 17 minutes. The first 12 minutes were unremarkable because he was reading and he displayed hardly any emotion. Then famously Mahalia Jackson called out to him –“Tell them a about your dream Martin.”
Watch this video of King's "I have a dream speech" for content, and for the types of arguments made and the words he chose to compose a winning argument.
Ethos (ethical argument)
• “Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the emancipation proclamation.”
Pathos (emotional argument)
• “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but the content of their character.”
Logos (logical argument)
• “America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked ‘insufficient funds.’”
Reverand King picked the right words for his speech.
MARK TWAIN once said, “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter—it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”
A great communicator in trial utilizes speech devices. A great communicator picks persuasive language.
Reverand King picked the right words and used speech devises. He had a theme and picked the right words for it: “I have a dream.” He used the rule of three—repetition: "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!" Also, he used an analogy: “In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check.”
Karen Silkwood worked at the Kerr-McGee Fuel Fabrication plant near Crescent Oklahoma. Her job was making was to make plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor rods. Silkwood joined the union and became an activist on behalf of issues of health and safety at the plant as a member of the union's negotiating team. She was the first woman to have that position at Kerr-McGee. In the summer of 1974, she testified to before the Atomic Energy Commission about her concerns.
In November 1974, Silkwood was found to have high levels of contamination on her person and in her home. While driving to a meeting that month with a journalist and an official of her union's national office, she died in a car accident under mysterious circumstances.
Renowned trial lawyer and trial advocacy teacher Gerry Spence, used an analogy in his closing argument in Silkwood v. Kerr-McGee. The analogy was about an escaped lion:
"Well, we talked about 'strict liability' at the outset, and you’ll hear the court tell you about “strict liability,” and it simply means: “If the lion got away, Kerr-McGee has to pay.” It’s that simple – that’s the law.
"You remember what I told you in the opening statement about strict liability? It came out of the Old English common law. Some guy brought an old lion on his ground, and he put it in a cage – and lions are dangerous – and through no negligence of his own – through no fault of his own, the lion got away. Nobody knew how – like in this case, “nobody knew how.”
"And, the lion went out and he ate up some people – and they sued the man. And they said, you know: 'Pay. It was your lion, and he got away.' And, the man says: 'But I did everything in my power – I had a good cage – had a good lock on the door – I did everything that I could – I had security – I had trained people watching the lion – and it isn’t my fault that he got away.' Why should you punish him? They said: 'We have to punish him – we have to punish you – you have to pay. You have to pay because it was your lion – unless the person who was hurt let the lion out himself.' That’s the only defense in this case: unless in this case Karen Silkwood was the one who intentionally took the plutonium out, and 'let the lion out,' that is the only defense, and that is why we have heard so much about it.'
Spence used the analogy to explain the law and to argue that Kerr McGee was liable. Analogies are the trial lawyer’s most powerful argument speech device.
A metaphor is a speech device where the object or idea is substituted for another to show they are alike. For example: Frost’s “A Road Less Traveled.”
Rhetorical questions are a great speech devise, right? Rhetorical questions invite the listener to reach own conclusion. Did he take the time to take aim at the chest?
SILENCE in courtroom – valuable tool.
No comments:
Post a Comment