Among the many hats that George S. Miller has donned during his long career are those of teacher, lawyer, judge, bar leader, and advocate for the safety of court personnel.

Miller, a retired 6th Circuit judge, will be honored in December as an ISBA Senior Counsellor. His interest in courtroom security followed his first-hand experience of the violence that can be spawned by a judicial decision.

He dismissed a slip-and-fall case against Jewel Food Stores in 1994. Three years later, the displeased plaintiff, a diagnosed schizophrenic, walked into Miller's courtroom and hurled a Molotov cocktail at him during a trial.

He escaped with a cut on his head, and no one else suffered serious injury. But the resulting fire gutted the courtroom.

“After that incident, security was installed in the courthouse, where there had been none,” Miller recalled. Still, he doesn't believe that such safeguards can guard against every incident.

“All of this security cannot prevent people who are unbalanced from going after you at home or work,” he said. He would like to see more tightened security in smaller Illinois counties, and regular reviews of effectiveness.

Miller added that some of the most dangerous segments of the population are probably those who are going through divorce and custody battles.

“Sometimes these individuals become some entrenched in their beliefs in their own causes that they become a little unbalanced, even for a short time,” he said.

A 1955 graduate of Harvard Law School who was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1956, he served in the Army in Korea from until 1957. He began his legal career as a staff attorney and resident counsel at Liberty Mutual Insurance Company in Chicago for four years.

Miller was a partner at Hubbard, Hubbard, O'Brian & Hall, Chicago, for 10 years before moving to Champaign in 1971 as a partner and trial attorney at Thomas, Mamer & Haughey for another 10 years.

“I was almost always on the defense side as a lawyer,” Miller said. “Being in trials and prevailing was very satisfying.” He added that some of the more memorable cases settled during those trials.

His 18-year tenure on the bench began in 1981, when he was appointed to the vacancy of Judge Roger Little, who had died a year earlier.

One of a handful of candidates, Miller cites financial considerations as a reason for having been unsure that he wanted to become a judge. “But I thought it would be a good thing to do in my career,” he said.

He was appointed by Supreme Court Justice Robert Underwood and later ran unopposed. “I've not had to campaign at all, and that's a good way to do it,” he said.

Miller retired from the circuit court in 1999. “I do miss the bench from time to time,” he said.

He taught trial advocacy at the University of Illinois College of Law between 1975 and 1997, and he has been involved in the Illinois State Bar Association throughout his years as a lawyer and judge.

He was a member of the Insurance Law Section Council from 1972 to 1977, and of the Assembly from 1972 to 1978. He also served on a Special Committee on Auto Accident Reparations for a year.

Stints on the Committee on Federal Judicial and Related Appointments (1979-80), the Committee on Legislation (1981-87), and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Section Council (2001-03) complemented his almost unbroken service on the Bench and Bar Section Council during two decades.

Miller was appointed to the section council in 1988 and was its chair in 1991-92. He termed off in 1999 but was reappointed in 2001 and remains an active member.

Those “beliefs in their own causes” that led to the attack in his courtroom may also contribute to attorney image problems, Miller said.

“When two individuals who believe in their causes are confronted with the moment of truth in the trial, one of them loses,” he observed.

“More often than not, the loser can't understand why he lost. So he blames his lawyer, the court and the jury.” And when a client is billed, the fee may seem disproportionate to what was done.

Much of the lawyer's time “is invisible, but worthy of billing,” Miller said. “A lot of what a lawyer does is unfortunately hidden from the client, and it has to be. I don't know if you can be completely transparent.”

Today, he is of counsel at his old firm: Thomas, Mamer & Haughey. E-mails keep him busy, and he has done some mediation, averaging about one a month.

“But I'm gone all summer and for about a month in the winter,” he added.

James R. Sweeney of Chicago, a pillar in the development of intellectual property practice and education, is among ISBA members who will be honored as Senior Counsellors in December.

A 1956 graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law after Navy submarine service as an officer, Sweeney had an undergraduate degree in chemistry.

After a 42-year career in patent, trademark and copyright prosecution and litigation, he was named director of the John Marshall Law School Center for Intellectual Property Law in October 1998.

Then senior partner in Lee, Mann, Smith, McWilliams, Sweeney & Ohlson, he had chaired the center's advisory board for a year, building on a curriculum that began in 1940 at the law school in cooperation with the Chicago Patent Law Society.

Due to his extensive national and foreign experience in intellectual property, Sweeney often testified as an expert witness and served as an arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association.

He was president of the Intellectual Property Law Association in 1974 and served on the council of the American Bar Association Section of Intellectual Property Law from 1978 to 1983. He was secretary for three years.

A member of the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission Hearing Board for nine years, Sweeney was appointed to the ISBA Committee on the ARDC in 1989 and was its chair in 1994-95. He served again from 1997 to 2002.

Also a member of the ISBA Assembly from 1990 to 1996, he served on the Special Committee on Gender Bias in 1991-92 and subsequently the Joint Committee on Gender Equality for three years.

Sweeney is a retired partner in Barnes & Thornburg.

Fifty years of legal practice and strong involvement in the Illinois State Bar Association have given Senior Counsellor James E. Buchmiller of Greenville strong opinions and a love for his craft.

Buchmiller's general practice has included some trial work, as well as family law, personal injury and real estate. “I think I've had the most satisfaction from trial work,” he said. “I usually represent the little guy, and frankly, I like to see the big guy's butt get kicked.”

Buchmiller, who practices as James E. Buchmiller Ltd., served two years in the Army and went to Korea after the armistice was signed. “I defended Illinois successfully with huge 120-millimeter anti-aircraft guns,” he quipped.

After graduating in 1956 from the Washington University School of Law, he was a State Farm insurance adjuster for a year before joining Cox, Smith & Basset.

In 1957, he went to Greenville to begin a private practice that continues to this day. He also served as Bond County state's attorney from 1960 to 1964 and city attorney for Greenville from 1960 to 1985.

“My idea of retirement,” he explained, “is to work from 9:30 a.m. till about 4 p.m. with Thursday off. I haven't quite achieved this yet.”

A member of the ISBA General Practice Section Council, Buchmiller also has served on the Alternative Dispute Resolution Section Council, the Bench and Bar Section Council, the Civil Practice and Procedure Section Council and the Committee on Legal Education, Admissions and Competence.

That being said, he isn't one who's afraid to speak his mind. He talked about the legal profession's public image problem, part of which he said can be traced to the beginning: law school.

Buchmiller has strong feelings about legal education today, in which he sees a serious problem resulting from “deterioration over the years” -- a result of the “approach that law schools have been taking.”

He told of a meeting with two assistant law school deans while serving on the legal education committee. “I told them that some of us older guys felt that the products coming out of their schools weren't quite up to snuff,” he said.

“Their response was very different from what I expected. The one dean told me that we'd better get used to it. I asked what she meant, and she said that they represented the second-tier law schools.

“The best schools take the best students, and they get the next group,” he recalled. “She added that the number of high-quality students was down, and consequently, standards had to be lowered in order to fill the seats.”

The next remark startled Buchmiller. “She said that the seats had to filled and tuition had to keep coming.” Both deans told him that no students were flunked the previous year.

“So what they were telling me,” he said, “was that they were going to fill those seats and get that tuition. That's what it's all about.”

Buchmiller added that “in retrospect, I guess I wasn't all that surprised at what they said. I just didn't think I'd hear them say it.”

The image problem always comes up at bar meetings, along with what can done to remedy it. Buchmiller said that at one Bench and Bar Section meeting he said something he didn't think would be well-received, but said it anyway.

“I said that we can start by cleaning-up our own house. We can't hire P.R. firms and place ads which say we're really nice guys. The image problem can begin to be addressed by making it illegal for lawyers to make huge donations to judicial campaigns.”

Buchmiller observed that “there are firms that donate huge sums to these campaigns. And when I have to appear in court against these guys, I get nervous because opposing counsel may have contributed money to the judge's campaign and I've contributed nothing.

“The public knows this sort of thing goes on, and then they wonder if they'll get a fair shot. And they don't respect us for that and they never will until we remedy it.”

Buchmiller would like to see more communication between the practicing bar and the law schools, stressing that there needs to be more real-world influence on the schools.

“There's a huge divide between the teaching profession and the practicing profession in law,” he said. “My committee involvement has shown me that all the law schools were interested in was what directly involved them and shown little interest in issues affecting the practice.

“I got the idea that they looked down upon the practicing profession like we were peons or money grubbers,” he added. “Of course, the practicing profession resents that.”

When asked if pro bono might improve the image, Buchmiller responded, ”Did you ever see a sign that says something like ‘This is a charitable organization but we didn't mean to be'? That applies to my office.

“Easily 25 to 30 percent of my time involves work that I don't get paid for, nor do I expect to get paid for it,” he said. “Maybe I didn't intend to do all of this pro bono, but there isn't always a choice. You just do it, and I'm sure that I'm not the only law office that does this.”

Buchmiller called on the state bar to take the lead. “The ISBA is a powerful organization,” he said, “and it's not without influence.”

“Every lawyer has a big ‘something,'” said Chicago attorney Ronald J. Guild. “If you go to court, it's a case. If you don't go to court, it's something else.

“My something was quarterbacking a $40 million lawsuit involving the refusal of a lender to fund a loan commitment when the loan commitment became illegal because of the passage of a federal statute. We won in the trial court, and we won on appeal,” he said.

Guild has had many other professional achievements, one of which directly involved the Illinois State Bar Association: establishing a captive professional liability insurance carrier.

With a degree in journalism, Guild took some night school classes in law before being called for military service in Korea. He served in the field artillery from 1951 to 1952 and managed to do a fair amount of writing while in the service.

“So I figured I always had a career in journalism if I didn't do well in law,” he said. “But after four semesters of law school, I figured I was going to finish.” He graduated from the University of Illinois College of Law in 1956.

Guild practiced with several firms before forming Teitelbaum, Wolfberg, Guild & Toback in 1968. He concentrated in real estate with some general practice.

“I did some litigation,” he said, “but I never considered myself a litigator.”

The firm dissolved in 1988. Guild became a sole practitioner and maintained an of counsel relationship with a couple of other firms.

A former member of the ISBA State and Local Taxation Section Council, he was appointed to the Real Estate Law Section Council was associate editor and editor of its newsletter for 15 years.

Guild said his biggest contribution was his involvement in formation of the ISBA Mutual Insurance Co. That effort began when President Richard L. Thies, a law school classmate, asked him to chair the Committee on Insurance Program.

“Dick's charge to me was to find out why we were being faced with the explosion in malpractice premiums,” Guild recalled. “We really couldn't find any definitive reason, other than the fact that the companies could get away with it.”

Guild's report led to the creation of the Task Force on Professional Liability Insurance Program, on which he also served. That led to the desire to form a malpractice insurance company.

“The company had to be in business for about 12 weeks before it got around to writing a policy,” Guild said. “During that time, we had to operate, but we had no officers, so several of us were incorporators.

“When we did formally form the company, I became a board member. I was chairman last year, and I chair the marketing and finance subcommittees.

Looking back, Guild realizes that the task force successfully justified the formation of the company. “Before the approved insurance company thought that we were going to form, they said were going to face a 30 percent rate increase,” he said. “We got them down to 15 percent.

“When we did form, our rate schedule was about 30 percent below where they had been, so they dropped their rates to meet us.

“From the start, we were saving Illinois lawyers substantial dollars, and not just ISBA members or members who bought insurance from us,” Guild explained. Commercial carriers have had to meet ISBA competition.

A 10 percent dividend was declared this year on premiums for each member insured. “So if you paid $3,000 for professional liability coverage with ISBA Mutual, you received a $300 check,” he said.

Interaction with other lawyers continues to give Guild the most enjoyment from law. He especially likes what he's seen in the judiciary in Cook County and throughout Illinois.

“The biggest single change is that the judges are much better and better organized.” In Cook County, there is less concern about corruption and favoritism.

Guild allows that lawyers do have an image problem, but he disagrees with the popular notion that lawyers lack civility. He calls that an overblown notion.

“There are large areas where you have no choice but to be civil,” Guild explained. “You are not going to practice municipal law very long if you are rude and overbearing with anybody. That includes rudeness with clerks, village boards and neighbors who come to the meetings.

“In administrative law, for example, in any hearing, there's a large amount of discretion in the hearing officer, and he can always rule for or against you. You want to give him a reason to rule against you? Be rude. He'll rule against you.”

Guild maintains that you can be uncivil only to those you don't expect to see again. “In the smaller towns, you don't find a civility problem,” he observed. “I talk to judges in these smaller towns, and they say they don't see a civility problem”