There has been a lot of hype around AI and its potential impact on the legal profession. Certainly, a technology like AI and its current darling, ChatGPT could impact the legal profession, but that impact is likely to be very positive, not negative.
Look at how tech has impacted the legal profession so far. You may be familiar with the typewriter (it was kind of an analog keyboard). All complaints, briefs, motions, orders, contracts, and documents of every kind were prepared using a typewriter before the advent of the computer-based word processor, most of which were done by legal assistants and paralegals. Are there still legal assistants and paralegals? Absolutely.
What about Shepards and Keycite? Did you know that before LexisNexis and Westlaw created these case citation software systems that a lawyer, or more likely a law clerk, would spend hours or days in the physical law library using reference books to track the history of a case and its holding to make sure that it was still valid case law. But we still have law clerks and new lawyers doing legal research. They are just doing it faster and more efficiently, and probably more effectively thanks to these technologies.
What about email? Instead of endless letter writing and physical mailing, we can now send messages and documents in real time anywhere in the world with the click of a button for free. Each of the above technologies probably reduced a lawyer’s time on any given task by upwards of 90%, but there are still 1.3 million lawyers in the US working and billing as much as ever.
Let’s take a more salient example – Legal Zoom and the internet generally. When I first started practicing law, I formed several entities each month. Within a few years, that number was reduced to almost zero because people were forming their own entities using Legal Zoom and other online platforms. As a result, my work shifted from forming entities to fixing entities. Inevitably people made mistakes, sometimes big ones. As a result, Legal Zoom actually made me more money because it enabled people to make mistakes that they then paid me to fix.
The same is true for people attempting to draft their own contracts using forms off the internet. It is far more likely that those contracts will be the subject of a dispute than ones drafted by actual lawyers because they do not take into account specific facts, preferences and nuances that are part of every agreement. However, that could change.
ChatGPT is artificial intelligence that uses large language models to produce writing that is quite good. As you may have heard, a lawyer used ChatGPT to draft a complaint, which cited non-existent cases. He was later sanctioned by the court for doing so. Clearly, ChatGPT cannot replace lawyers, yet. But what about AI generally? It can pass the bar exam, but can AI actually make lawyers obsolete? I think not. Though it will likely change the legal profession for the better.
First, AI is a tool, just like any other technology. It is something to be used and leveraged for the benefit of its user. It may analyze cases faster, it may do more extensive legal research, it may write better briefs and contracts, it may predict the probability of certain outcomes in certain matters. Yes, it is possible that AI could do a lot of legal work better and faster than most lawyers.
As a lawyer, I would want to use AI since in theory it could make me a better and more efficient lawyer. Many falsely frame this as “if AI can do it better, then why do we need lawyers.” On the contrary, it should be framed as “if a lawyer can use a tool that produces better results in less time, then I would prefer to hire that lawyer.”
Second, the practice of law is well regulated. Each jurisdiction has significant barriers to entry, meaning that regardless of the product that could be produced by AI, it may not practice law or hold itself out as a substitute for a lawyer. Therefore, anyone wanting legal services must use a licensed lawyer. So, for now lawyers are the only source for legal services.
Third, even if people simply bypass lawyers and do the work themselves using AI, just like with Legal Zoom, this would likely shift legal work from routine tasks to fixing mistakes created by individuals using AI. But imagine a non-lawyer trying to navigate civil procedure, or attempting to get evidence admitted at trial, or negotiating indemnification provisions in a contract. These tasks are hard even for experienced lawyers and there is always another person on the other side of these tasks who is challenging you at every turn. For the foreseeable future, these more sophisticated tasks are better performed by humans and preferably by humans who have direct experience rather than those who don’t.
Lastly, the law is nothing more than a framework and medium by which humans relate to one another. Every aspect of the law involves a person – the making of the law, the interpretation of the law, the enforcement of the law, and the modification of the law. Laws are meaningless without humans. So long as there are humans, AI will merely be a tool used by humans to do human stuff, which in part is to complain about other humans, assert and deny rights, engage in disputes, make deals and attempt to control other humans through the law. The only scenario where lawyers will not be needed is one in which there are no humans or there are no laws. If that happens, we will have more serious things to worry about than the legal profession.
AI may be a threat to humanity at large, but it is not a threat to the legal profession. The lawyer who embraces AI as a tool to be leveraged is likely to be the lawyer with the best clients and best outcomes. So don’t fear it. Embrace it, adapt to it, and use it for your benefit. If you don’t, another lawyer will, and they will probably use it against you.