exactly that in ruling on the offer to prove such a situation as to the San Diego dissenters, described in para. 15 of the Lester declaration (see Chapter One), marked Intervenors' exhibit 6 for Identification at the hearing on the intervention on July 16, 1981. For the offer of proof and the ruling taking judicial notice of the inability of busing dissenters to retain counsel in cases of this complexity, seeconclusion of July 16, 1981, hearing reported below in this chapter.

There must be "public interest" attorneys in such places, like me, who are convinced of the need for representation of such dissenters, despite the "political incorrectness" of such opposition, despite formidable opposition in the educational, legal and social fields, and despite the prospects of "racist" labels surfacing.

My experience can serve to alert those counsel similarly motivated to act in a pro bono capacity, as to how to meet the challenge of a deserving representation which otherwise could not be provided.

I had retired as a U.S. Magistrate at the end of 1973, and in the spring of 1979 my practice was limited to handling selected public interest matters, out of an office in my mountain home in Julian about 60 miles from the San Diego County Courthouse.

In 1977, I had successfully prevented the collection of automatic fines assessed upon back country school board members by reason of their inadvertent failure to make financial reports to the County Registrar of Voters concerning their campaigns for such seats. The unique aspect of the victory was that the statutory fines were in the nature of a penalty, concerning which those parties had the right to legal representation, which was denied them by the governmental action in trying to enforce them in small claims court where counsel was excluded.

My legal support facilities in 1979 were primitive compared to those which had been available to me in my prior positions as Assistant U.S. Attorney, legal services program chief counsel and U.S. Magistrate. In contrast, I now was my own secretary with only my treasured manual Underwood typewriter (on which I had written the 1957 bar exam) and a current Weekly Law Digest set immediately available. The nearest law library facilities were in El Cajon, over 40 miles away, and copy work had to be done elsewhere.

These home facilities had been sufficient for the initial period of