Faye Prudence

I have an older sibling that has suffered two mental breakdowns, both requiring hospitalization and one incident needing a straight jacket. My question is, can recovery occur if, once released from the hospital, there is no further treatment, i.e., medication, counseling, etc.?

I don't know where everyone get's the idea that inmates have internet access THEY NO NOT! Just wanted to set the record straight!

When paralegals branch out on their own? After all, it is the paralegal who does all the work and they know the law as well if not better than the lawyers.

I am not a paralegal but I have many friends who are. Some worked for lawyers and a couple worked in the DA's office. They have all left and started their own Pro se Self Help Businessess.

The American Bar Association convinced states to pass "unauthorized practice of law" statutes in the 1920s and 1930s, which effectively gave lawyers a monopoly over the sale of legal information.

In the last two decades many Americans . . . have begun to assert their historical and constitutional right to participate in the legal decisions that affect their lives. Unfortunately, the Bar — despite the fact that its leaders concede that at least 100 million Americans can't afford lawyers — continues to resist this powerful democratic trend.”

SOURCE: (Warner, Every American a Lawyer” at http://www.nolo.com/everyam.html

Pro se litigation was the rule rather than the exception in early American history.

“Lawyers were actually banned outright or faced tight restrictions in many colonies for much of the 18th century. . . . The "Body of Liberties" adopted by the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1641 expressed the typical attitudes of the time: "Every man that findeth himselfe unfit to plead his own cause in any court shall have libertie to employ any man ..., provided he give him noe fee or reward for his pain.".

The strong tradition that each American should be able to master the laws probably peaked in the years between . . . 1825 and . . . 1865. Most states enforced few if any restrictions on non-lawyers appearing in court on behalf of others — as Lincoln himself did before he talked a judge into granting him attorney status.

Source of information: (Warner, Every American a Lawyer” at http://www.nolo.com/everyam.html