Wanted: Lawyers Who Speak Spanish
Writing in 2004, Anne Marie Slaughter, the current Director of Policy Planning for the United States Department of State and former Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University recognized, “The consensus among lawyers, CEOs, NGO activists, and others is that the people whom they would most like to hire are those who understand how to navigate between cultures. In a dream world, such competence would include knowledge of at least one foreign language.”
Slaughter’s wishful thinking now appears to be reality. A recent Wisconsin Law Journal article reports that bilingual attorneys are carving out a “growing niche” in legal practice in the state. The WLJ reports, “As the minority populations in the state continue to grow, so too has the opportunity for bilingual attorneys to expand their client base.” Now it seems, new lawyers will not only wish to market their law school academic achievements, but also their command of a language other than English.
In particular, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the Hispanic population in Wisconsin has increased by 48.2 percent since 2000, numbering close to 300,000 members of our community. In Milwaukee alone, the Hispanic population represents twelve percent of the population.