Hues and cries continue about the lack of civility in the legal profession and society in general. What does it take to deter incivility? Will lawyers in particular ever learn? I suggest lawyers will learn if they think, listen, exercise their conscience, and, of course, exercise self-control.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals “laid down the law” about its intolerance for incivility on March 8, 2024, in the case of Clapper v. American Realty Investors, 95 F.4th 309 (5th Cir. 2024). In ordering a new trial, the court decried the fact that the lawyers for the party in whose favor the jury found, “employed nearly every category of what we have previously held to be improper closing argument. These improper and highly prejudicial statements, examined in the aggregate and in context, demonstrate the need for a new trial.”