PAST ISSUES: November 2006

Editor's Note:  Lawyers in our lives
Despite being the butt of innumerable jokes, lawyers at some point or another become a part of our lives, and when we need them they become indispensable.

Cover Story:  Lawyers on the business of law: Increasing competition, finding good help
If you weren’t competitive, you wouldn’t have gone into the law in the first place.
A sharp edge is needed, from landing that first position, to winning over a jury, to keeping current as a veteran professional.

Cover Story:  Preserve your life’s work: The need for estate planning for businesses
When Wilfred L. “Jack” Sanders, Jr. sits down with a business to begin its estate planning, the Seacoast lawyer with four decades of legal experience in Maine and New Hampshire becomes the No. 1 collector of information.

Cover Story:  Before you see an attorney ...: Agencies offer advice -- sometimes for free
A small businessperson, particularly one who is just trying to get a business off the ground, has myriad questions – and many of them veer toward the legal.

Entrepreneur Watch:  What’s brewing?
When is a microbrewery no longer a microbrewery? In the case of Smuttynose Brewery the question isn’t academic because in December the brewery will pass the important annual benchmark of 15,000 barrels produced.

Featured Article:  Boardroom meets the courtroom: Panel recommends judicial branch function more like a business
The customer is always right – except in a court of law.
As the New Hampshire court system monitors its performance, the custodians of justice are re-examining customer service and turning increasingly to business models put to work every day in the private sector. In dealing with residents, families, businesses and, yes, lawyers, it is important to measure customer satisfaction as a way to establish benchmarks for success, said Eric Herr, a former president and chief executive officer of Autodesk.

Featured Article:  Lawyers should put expertise to work for public good
When I became chief justice in 2004, I announced my commitment to do all I could to make justice in New Hampshire more accessible, affordable and understandable for all of our citizens. With the cooperation of my judicial colleagues at the Supreme Court and throughout the system and with the help and encouragement of many of you, we are making real progress.

Featured Article:  Minding the patents: Protecting intellectual property is both a global and local process
In an ever-widening global economy fueled by the growth of World Wide Web, there is likely no hotter topic in legal circles than intellectual property.

Politics:  Legislature has not gone far enough in dealing with frivolous lawsuits
If the New Hampshire Legislature is nothing else, it is certainly myopic. It compartmentalizes issues rather than seeing the problem on a more global — and realistic — scale.
Take, for example, the issue of frivolous lawsuits.

Last Word:  Putting it all into perspective
Paul McEachern laughed when he told me he hopes I wasn’t writing his “epilogue.”
Not even close. After more than decades as an attorney-at-law and one of Portsmouth’s favorite sons, McEachern isn’t ready to retire anytime soon.