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they knew to be brought only for a wrong purpose and without any just
foundation, or if in a civil cause they were retained to make a defence
which they were advised was false and wrong, then it might be that
advocacy under such freedom from limitation would not aid the judges in
avoiding wrong conclusions and unjust judgments. But there are
limitations upon the duty of counsel to their clients. There are also
limitations upon a lawyer's action which he cannot violate without a
breach of his duty to the court of which he is an officer and to the
public interest in the maintenance of the proper administration of
justice. We find, therefore, that the goal to be reached in reference to
the ethical duty of an attorney in the discharge of the functions
assigned to him by the law, is the reconciliation of his duty to his
client, with his duty to the court. To mark out this line in advance is
easier than to determine each special duty in a concrete way, yet
neither is free from difficulty and each requires a calm and clear
understanding of the function of counsel as an instrument in the
machinery of justice. This is the main object of legal ethics. It covers
other fields and is important in those fields, but no other is of such
primary importance.

Courts sit to hear controversies between parties over facts and law.
Rules of procedure are for the purpose of reducing the issues of fact
and law in such controversies to a form as narrow and concrete as
possible. Men who are able to present a clear statement of the evidence
and who are learned in the principles of the law and their application
to the facts as they are developed are in a position to assist the judge
to a quick and thorough understanding of the exact question which he is
to decide. The real enthusiasm of advocacy which is necessarily
developed by the relation of attorney and client would doubtless have a
tendency to mislead the court if exerted in behalf of one side only, but
where both sides are represented, where the same earnestness in the
proceeding of each side is present, it is the best method within human
ken to reach a sound conclusion both as to the facts and as to the law.
No one who has had experience on the Bench in reaching judicial
conclusions and who has thereafter been obliged in an executive position
to reach important, and it may be final, conclusions upon questions
involving both fact and law, can fail to recognize and acknowledge the
powerfu