On April 16th 1879 Bulgaria adopted its first constitution and that date turned into the Easter of Bulgarian state resurrection. To call April 16th the gala day of the lawyers is the same as to call Christmas the gala day of the priesthood. The attribute “professional” cannot accommodate the nationwide thirst for justice and for state pride which will better suit to the joyful exclamation “It has resurrected indeed !”.

Today we wholeheartedly welcome our youngest colleagues lawyers who bring in the most valuable assets to the profession : harmony of the young soul, common sense, simple justice and painful conscience which are the sacred source of law. They are the real columns of the temple and not the experienced perversity of some arrogant high priests who shine like fireflies in a sunny day. “The lawlessness in Babylon came from the senior judges”, says Prophet Daniel.

The young colleagues are already looking into the eyes of the mystery sphinx of our profession. Law draws its compulsion from power. Morality shapes human behavior through conscience. The law of power wants to look moral while the morality of conscience wants to be binding. But power and politics imply alliance with the stronger while morality and religion advise alliance with the weaker. How to manage this tragic dualism, how to exchange conscience for power and force ?

The real lawyer cannot be a government’s friend. He is either a devoted lawyer or a devoted government friend but never both because vocation of justice is to restrict the stronger in favor of the weaker- unlike the jungle. That is why the fundament of state is justice and not only law. The daily battle for justice in the court rooms is a battle for national sovereignty. A weak justice in peace time is like a weak army at war. The crushed little man does not fight for the flag.

There are a lot of masons and painters in Bulgarian legislation but hardly an architect. Almost every subject of regulation is proclaimed a branch of law, thus we have masons in “investment” law or in “public procurement” law. Almost every law has its own implementation regulation and its own procedure for settling disputes. Like a city without a plan and construction supervision where only legal twaddle is heard.

Judiciary is faced with a mass grave of unexposed and unpunished crimes. And not all corpses have been decently buried. When an ill man does not feel pain
but pain is for those around him and when an ill man alleges he is the victim of conspiracy just because of his best health- then the doctors conclude a mental disease. This massive grave of failed Bulgarian justice reminds of that ancient

Greek field where from the drake’s teeth soldiers grew who killed each other. Law is also a kind of a social contract to argue by words and not by bullets. When words get perverted, the frank bullet comes back. And then follows what Alexis de Tocqueville said about the French revolution : “Instead of attacking only the bad laws, the people attacked all laws.”

For the sake of the young colleagues’ high spirit we shall paraphrase Napoleon in our context: “Every magistrate carries in his bag a lawyer’s baton”.

These are not the first hard times for the profession and they shall be overcome like the previous ones : by a powerful outburst of valour, courage and conscience or simply said- by a spiritual jump.

No one has said it better than St. Mathew in the New Testament (24/12-13)

“Because of increased lawlessness, the love of most will grow cold,
but he who stands firm to the end will be saved”.

CONGRATULATONS FOR THIS GREAT DAY, DEAR COLLEAGUES !

16.04.2004 - Braykov’s Legal Office