University of Utah law graduates should use their education to bring about needed and beneficial change in society, said the country's first American Indian state attorney general.
"You are not combatants in a courtroom, but you all have the ability to be problem solvers," said Larry EchoHawk during commencement exercises for 141 graduates of the U. College of Law.EchoHawk, a U. law school alumnus who is now Idaho's attorney general, related how his grandfather was one of 25,000 Pawnee Indians whose numbers were reduced to 750 in his lifetime.
"That's a painful history to remember. But out of that pain was born promise, the promise of America," EchoHawk said, referring to the chance he got to gain an education and rise to a statewide political office. "I believe in America. I believe that America must stand as a land of opportunity for all people."
As long as there exists racism, discrimination, child abuse, drug abuse, and lack of employment and educational opportunity, "the pain goes on and the promise is unfulfilled," EchoHawk said.
One way the U. graduates can help, he said, is to follow a tradition held by most American Indian cultures. It's called a "giveaway," in which an individual's character is measured by his willingness to give something of value to someone else.
"In law," EchoHawk said, "we have a similar tradition. It's called `pro bono,' " a Latin word that suggests a lawyer's responsibility to provide legal help for those who need it but don't have the means to pay for it.
Helping a troubled world was a recurrent theme with the other commencement speakers too.
U. President Arthur K. Smith told the graduates, "You are embarking in a world that is undergoing rapid and fundamental change" and urged them to help bring about positive change in a just way. "Now, more than ever, there is a need for justice tempered by mercy."
And Lee E. Teitelbaum, dean of the law school, told the nascent lawyers not to write off their high ambitions - like preserving the environment, providing resources for the homeless or prosecuting the guilty - as naive.
He also reminded them to impose upon themselves high standards of ethical and professional conduct.
In other commencement activities, U. law professor Scott M. Matheson Jr. was honored with the Burlington Resources Foundation Faculty Achievement Award for excellence in teaching.