'The Man to See: Edward Bennett Williams'
by Evan Thomas
Simon & Schuster, $27.50
Edward Bennett Williams, one of the best known trial lawyers of our time, characterized the ideal client as "a rich man who is scared." Williams had plenty of them: mafia don Frank Costello, former Treasury Secretary and Texas governor John Connally, President Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters Union, the Washington Post - even junk-bond king Michael Milken.
Williams recognized that taking every case to trial was not necessarily the best defense: "Nothing is often a good thing to do and always a brilliant thing to say." Whether by delaying, cajoling, bargaining, or simply wearing down the prosecution, Williams often got his clients off without even entering the courtroom.
This new biography of Williams, by Newsweek's Washington Bureau chief Evan Thomas, covers his life and times thoroughly and is a pleasure to read. It is packed with stories of Williams' notorious trials and lively wheeling and dealing, both in and out of the courtroom, as well as his later fame as owner of the Washington Redskins and Baltimore Orioles. Thomas carefully notes the inconsistencies in Williams' positions and carefully points out the flaws in the man that many consider the ultimate trial lawyer.
Brendan Sullivan, Williams' protege, once indignantly defended his right to object in the Senate hearing investigating his client, Oliver North, by declaring, "I am not a potted plant." It's a claim Edward Bennett Williams never needed to make.
