"Preserving the intellectual and moral standard and otherwise promoting the interests of the members of the Lawrence Bar."
Operating for more than 100 years, the Lawrence Bar Association has been recognized as one of the most active bar associations in Massachusetts. The LBA provides its members with six major events each year, plus regular continuing legal education opportunities, an attorney mentor program, scholarships to area students, awards to community leaders, and other benefits. Members of the LBA come from many disciplines of law, but each is dedicated to advancing and promoting the legal profession in Lawrence, Massachusetts, and the surrounding communities:
- For our Members: to educate, mentor, and lend assistance to our members to improve their legal skills and otherwise provide support; to promote appropriate referrals to better fulfill the needs of our members’ clients; to promote business skills; and to encourage civility and collegiality in the practice of law while maintaining the highest ethical standards;
- For our Profession: to raise the visibility of lawyers in Lawrence and the surrounding communities and to foster and promote in the community an awareness of, and respect for, the practice of law in general; the laws of our members’s constituent municipalities, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and the United States; and of the rights of all persons in our society; and
- For our Community: to recognize leadership and good works within the Bar and in our communities; to provide scholarship assistance to worthy students of the law; and to participate in and encourage law-related civic, charitable, and community projects.
Join the Lawrence Bar Association today to find out more about what membership can do for you!
Historical References to the Lawrence Bar Association
There were 54 attorneys who attended the inaugural meeting of the Lawrence Bar Association on January 11, 1905. Among those in attendance, some notables included: former Congressman William S. Knox (the LBA's first President, who was perhaps as well known for owning the first telephone exchange in Lawrence); future Superior Court and Supreme Judicial Court Justice Louis S. Cox; former State Senator Daniel Saunders; future Judges Frederic N. Chandler, Charles A. DeCourcy, Harry R. Dow, and Newton P. Frye.
The association has grown over the years. At its founding, fifty-four Essex County attorneys signed on as incorporators. Historic membership records are scant, but as of 1924 the association had 90 members; in 1983 the rolls stood at 221 attorneys; and 297attorneys belonged in our centennial year of 2005. Most members know each other personally, or at least by face and by reputation. Such intimacy undoubtedly promotes the professional courtesy that our bar expects and enjoys.
The original organizational meeting of the Lawrence Bar Association was reported in The Evening Tribune on January 12, 1905.
The Lawrence Bar Association was mentioned in "The History of Lawrence, Massachusetts with War Records" by Maurice Dorgan, published in 1924.