Biography
The following interview on Wednesday, August 10, 2005 is with Robert Hambright who has practiced law continuously since 1981 with the law firm of Orgain, Bell, and Tucker. The interviewer is Cynthia Devlin.CD is Cynthia Devlin
RH is Robert Hambright
Transcript
CD: This is Cynthia Devlin and I am interviewing Robert Hambright, it is about 9:25 on August 10, 2005 and we're in the Jack Brooks Federal Courthouse in Beaumont Texas. Mr. Hambright if you will go ahead and introduce yourself and tell me a little about you; your background, where you were born and educated, and your professional history and what kind of law you practice
RH: Well my name is Robert Hambright, I was born in Beaumont in 1956, I went through Beaumont schools, graduated from high school here and went to SMU for college and also law school, was licensed in 1981, I've practiced continuously since 1981 with the law firm of Orgain, Bell, and Tucker, a firm that was established in 1907, I am a partner in the firm, have been a partner since 1986, and currently the managing partner of Orgain, Bell, and Tucker, my practice area is labor and employment law with an active practice both in the state and federal courts, I'm certified in that area of law and I can add anything that you might ask about that, but that's in a nutshell where I'm coming from
CD: Ok. So you've basically have always practiced in this area?
RH: That's right
CD: Ok. What federal judges have you argued in front of, I mean, and what were the highlights of some of those cases
RH: Well it's a general question: I have appeared before Judge Parker, Judge Fisher, in the early days I knew Judge Steger, his son who later died and I were in speech class together at the high school. I don't remember appearing before judge Steger if I did it would have been just for a small motion matter, I've appeared before Judge Heartfield of course, Judge Crone, I have some cases pending in Judge Clark's court but I have not yet appeared before him formally. If I mention Judge crone I'm sorry to repeat myself but I've had cases in her court
CD: Is that Judge Marcia Crone?
RH: Right
CD: Ok. I don't know too much about her because a lot of people say they don't have enough experience
RH: I've appeared before her, I've appeared before the magistrates Earl Hines, and Wendell Radford, former magistrate Wendell Radford,
CD: That's a wide variety
RH: Yes, an employment law docket includes a lot of federal statutory claims and so that's why I've been over here quite a bit, Judge Schell of course I've tried several cases in his court when he was here in Beaumont
CD: So is federal the sorts of discrimination cases or do you do the whole gamut
RH: Combination
CD: Do you do for a group of plaintiffs or individual clients
RH: I exclusively, exclusively represent management in that regard I've handled racial discrimination cases, sex discrimination cases, pregnancy discrimination, sexual harassment for both private companies where you have the section 1981 title 7 ADA, FMLA, the full gamut of federal protections, and then also some public entities where you have constitutional questions presented such as due process, and questions of their liking
CD: So you have oil clients or some of the schools?
RH: Well yes
CD: well yes, ok. [Laughs] you can't tell them a lot about that. Over time have you noticed any differences in how court decisions reflect the community values of the area?
RH: I guess I will need to reflect on that, I have not really thought of that from the perspective you're asking. I've practiced since 1981, we've seen federal laws passed which continue to give additional rights to employees, for example the disability, Americans with disability act was enacted in approximately 1990, the family medical leave act was the first piece of legislation that bill Clinton signed in about '93 or so and so during my practice I've seen the reach of the federal statues grow, and in that regard the statues have in a sense molded the community because there are additional things to be aware of that corporations in communities need to abide by, now as far as whether the judges reflect the morale of the community I would say yes, I would say that by and large I've found that the federal judiciary over here has been a little conservative when it comes to applying the federal employment laws, and has by and large construed those narrowly and as written. I don't know if that answers your question or not
CD: Would it be in Texas, the Texas state law seems to be pretty conservative as far as employees go with union and different things and so would you say the federal court is more along that line.
RH: Well I think you're generally correct, the Texas state law conservative in some areas, although the legislator continues to enact legislation that in some ways parallels the federal act we are an employment at will state, there's one exception
CD: you're right to work:
RH: well you're mixing apples and oranges
CD: I'm I mixing apples and oranges
RH: Just to an extent. An employment at will means that an employer can discharge an employee for any or no reason under the common law unless and to the extent that's been limited by legislation at the federal or state level, but as a matter of common law this would apply to employees who are typically not union and there's one exception to the common law, employment at will doctrine in Texas, that's a cases I represented the employer in the Texas supreme court and that exception is called the Sabine Pilot exception and an employer cannot discharge an employee for the sole reason that the employee refuse to commit an illegal act, when you say
CD: seems logical [laughs]
RH: well it would but it was, the employment at will doctrine was adopted in Texas importing from the English common law in 1888, and until 1985 there had never been an exception and that was created by the Texas Supreme Court in 1985, the other laws you referred are when you get into the area of union relations we are a right to work state
CD: do you have more of that around here because there seems to be more unions in the golden triangle area than in some other parts of Texas
RH: well the right to work laws of Texas speaking very generally allow employees to belong or not to belong to labor unions which is not the cases in some other states where to work in some other sates you must belong to a union for example. But here in Texas an individual has a preference as to whether to join a union or not join a union in an organized work force, and yes we have several organized workforces here in this part of the country, especially since we're heavily involved in the petro chemical industry and refining of gasoline, making chemicals and so forth
CD: Do you find it difference when you practice in a state court versus doing federal cases, under say judge Heartfield?
RH: well the main difference is that in the federal court there are law clerks. Full time law clerks motions are filed and considered and there's usually a written opinion at some point and in the state court generally there are no full time law clerks, and so there's very seldom a written opinion on a motion that is either granted or denied without written opinion
CD: It's all oral argument in the state court?
RH: Well there is oral argument in the state court and also, sometimes in the federal court, a lot of times in the federal court at least these days motions are decided without oral argument, but in the state court typically and there are exceptions but typically you go discuss the matter with the judge and he rules in chambers either the motions granted or the motion's denied without a detailed written opinion although sometimes the state judge will write a letter explaining why they've done what they've done
CD: with your experience do you feel that it is more family like situation here in the eastern district here or professional-like, I know there are certain judges, I mean I've heard stories about judge Fisher stating that you have to wear jackets and come in prepared for his court and if not its quite a scene
RH: well yes in fact, this is just lower up, I don't have any personal knowledge of this not only did judge fisher require coat and ties but he also required white shirts, and when one of the first colored shirts showed up in his courtroom one of the partners in our firm Dave Kreger was wearing it and he got sent home because it was not white, but again I like to qualify that that's lowering and that's just what I've been told
CD: The others that you mentioned judge Parker and Judge Brown do they have any eccentricities similar to that
RH: Well I would agree that's there's a family atmosphere in the sense that Beaumont is such a small community that you see the judges on occasion out in the community, not really socializing one-on-one but they're members of the community which is small to begin with, we have an active bar association, the Jefferson County Bar Association, and several of the federal judges are active in that , and so you have access to the judges, I guess you'd say on a personal level, not an unethical personal level but just a social you have some interactions so that when you come into the courthouse you're not a complete stranger, but when you get over here its much different than the states court in that it is formal, I don't know if you've seen when the judge comes out to his bench but they hammer the door and then the law clerk comes out an announces 'here-he, here-he,' and what we're there for and so the adrenaline level and the degree of formality is very different once you get into the legal proceedings and no nonsense is tolerated and yet those of us who live here with the judges at least know who they are and so it's not as if you were going before a complete stranger and like any other group of people there are some people that have more in common with individual judges and more to talk about and so from my perspective I think calling it a family atmosphere is a little more informal than my experience has been
CD: On I understand that; do you any particular case that you recall as a highlight?
RH: Like we said before we began every case is important
CD: that's the purpose right to defend you client
RH: well exactly, and in the federal court there are, there is more summary judgment practice especially in employment cases and I have argued summary judgment motions before virtually all of the judges and have had a pretty good record of those having been granted mainly because I pick the one's that I feel like a motion would be proper in and don't file those in every case, some of those have gone to the fifth circuit on real narrow aspects of employment law that are probably beyond the scope of what you're doing. I've also tried jury cases and non jury cases here, employment disputes
CD: Do you rather the non-jury?
RH: Well title 7 of the federal law prohibiting discrimination all of those cases were tried non-jury before the civil rights act of 1991, so in the old days quote-on-quote I tried cases to Judge Fisher and Judge Heartfield to the court without a jury but in 1991 congress amended that law where virtually all employment cases are jury cases, and I've also tried jury cases in judge Heartfield's court and judge Schell's court and others.
CD: The law has changed, reading all the different things, and just trying to getting prepared for this, we've been going back to the original judicial act, and there have been lots of changes…
RH: there's been a big evolution in the law, in fact title 7 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, national origin, was only enacted in 1964
CD: of the original civil rights act with President Johnson…
RH: right, and so the eastern district have been here a lot longer than that, and so
CD: we've heard stories about judge fisher and judge parker with the ping pong balls, desegregation cases, and the integration of Lamar University, the integration of Lamar and how that occurred, and so we're trying to just build on that and…
RH: Well as I've said the law's evolved and will continue to evolve and the eastern district has seen it all
CD: They have they really have, it seems like the Lamar integration went very smoothly
RH: That's my understanding I don't have any information about that you might check with Tanner for something like that.
CD: Well if there's anything else that you can think of that you'd like to tell me, otherwise if you do think about something, if you don't mind giving me your address I am going to just send you a short follow-up letter and then you can email me with anything else you can think of that might be fruitful for us
RH: Alright well I'd be happy to.
END OF INTERVIEW