In various earlier writings, we sought to convey the exotic, 1940s Ashkenazi immigrant ambience and singular ethnic milieu of Brooklyn’s East New York; the redolence of soup emanating from the ancient brick apartment buildings, the passing street vendors, some still using horses to pull their wagons, the young boys playing at marbles in the vacant lots, the shaky trolley cars, noisily moving on iron embedded tracks emitting large, noisy sparks from their overhead power lines, and of newly arrived USSR immigrants speaking exotic versions of the English language,
In this writing, we would recount a true and ultimately, telling event that took place in the 1960s, following our graduation from Law School, in the months following passage of the Bar Exam, during the period necessary to be officially admitted by the State as a New York Attorney.
It may be that the childhood ethnic stress imposed by family on the importance of being a good student motivated our subsequent success, viz., college, Phi Beta Kappa, and Law School Editor-in-Chief of the Law Review. At any rate, our recorded scholastic success presumably was the motivating basis for an unexpected solicitation from the Pentagon, shortly after graduation, regarding a position as Federal Attorney for the New York Office of the United States Corps of Engineers. The offer was immediately accepted for practical, notably finance-related reasons.
Pending the completion of the routine administrative process of our official registration as a New York Attorney, we were designated the temporary title of “Legal Assistant” and assigned tasks appropriate to such status. One such, ultimately eye-opening, assignment ultimately provided the theme and intended message of this writing.
A legal claim for substantial damages had been asserted against the U.S. Department of the Army, Corps of Engineers, by the Hunter Machine Company, North Adams, Massachusetts, for asserted, extensive damages to their factory, allegedly caused by the constructed flood control facilities, installed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. We, a civil engineer and a photographer, were assigned as an investigating team to evaluate the bona fides of the claim. [As an unrelated observation, this occasion was our first experience of traveling by airplane.]
To summarize the results of two days of work, the engineer noted the century-old construction and the obviously deteriorated structural wear of the building, a machine factory and most relevant, its ancient and defective dry sandstone foundation, and empirically determined that the undermining of the factory which was (the basis of the damage claim) was factually unrelated to the nearby flood control construction. The photographer took copious black and white illustrative photographs of such evident and non-disputable indications of the natural deterioration of the building, in visual confirmation of the engineer’s conclusion that the claim against the Army Corps of Engineers was indisputably contrived.
To put icing on the revelatory cake, we undertook to do some local research and excitedly, found an Official “Hold Harmless Agreement” between the City of North Adams, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and the U.S. Corps of Engineers, providing that in consideration of the beneficial construction of the locally needed flood control project, the Federal agency would be held entirely harmless from any claims relating to the relevant flood control facilities.
After returning to the office [by rail], we prepared a detailed report on the findings, including the engineering data, diagrams, pertinent photographs, and, most importantly, the official exculpating Agreement. Our determinative report was filed in the New York District Office of the U.S. Corps of Engineers, and a replica was sent to Washington, D.C.
At such time, we were obliged to leave regarding our six-month obligation of active duty in the Army, according to our participation in the RFA, a program of six years of National Guard Service, including such active duty period; the latter statutory procedure representing an permissible alternative to the then four-year draft.
Following the completion of our active service obligation, we returned (for a relatively short period) to our salaried federal position, as” Federal Attorney” (before entering the universe of private law practice). We thereupon learned to our shock and utter dismay that, notwithstanding the filed report, factually and conclusively demonstrating the spurious nature of the contrived claim, had been paid in full.
On later reflection, we evaluated the memorable experience as a utilitarian, principled lesson that rectitude and ultimate justice are empirically exotic and vulnerable phenomena.
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- Title borrowed from the Charles Dickens novel
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