TWENTY-THREE MEMBERS of the Bar will be honored at the 2003 NHBA Annual Meeting in recognition of their 50 years of service to the public as members of the legal profession. The following are brief sketches of three of this year’s group of honorary members. More profiles will appear in subsequent issues of Bar News.

Edward J. O’Brien, of Keene, is an unabashed traditionalist. At 75, he’s still coming into his law office most days a week, handling a variety of matters. Complete retirement just doesn’t suit him. "When I started, it was not unusual for attorneys to continue practice until they died. That was the work ethic." But, he jokes, another reason is that he might have to work harder if he stayed at home. O’Brien, who served as Cheshire County attorney for many years, went into private practice and has maintained a varied small-town practice ever since.

O’Brien said that as a prosecutor in the early 1960s, he faced many challenges accommodating new requirements in criminal law brought about by the Warren Supreme Court rulings, such as Miranda warnings and stricter search and seizure requirements. He said he always tried to keep his focus not on winning, but on producing a fair result, and he claims to have been the first prosecutor in the state to allow defense attorneys to have open discovery of his cases.

Today O’Brien remains active in his lifelong avocation as a trumpet player, and continues to play in the American Legion marching band in Keene.

Another Keene veteran attorney to be recognized is Charles H. Morang, who remains on active status, although he is winding down his real property and trust practice. For most of his career, Morang practiced primarily in the areas of land-use, municipal and environmental law. He served as Keene’s city attorney for five years, from 1979 to 1984. One of his career highlights was serving as special counsel to the Legislature in the mid-1980s, when he helped draft a series of statutes that reorganized a number of executive departments.

Morang, who started his legal career in the Boston area, believes that he was the last attorney admitted by motion in New Hampshire before the admission rules were tightened in 1979. (This year, the court restored the privilege of admission by motion.) A Portsmouth native, he was eager to return to New Hampshire, and did so to work as city attorney for Keene. After five years in that job, and following his work for the Legislature, Morang practiced in Concord, then later opened a private practice in Keene that he maintains today.

Morang said he plans to wind up his practice in the coming year and will probably move to Rhode Island, where he and his wife of 53 years, Pam Bavicchi Morang, will be able to visit more with his grandchildren. Morang is the father of two children, Alexandra Morang Jackson, an administrator for the Brown University School of Medicine, and Charles H. Morang, III, a consultant based in Keene.

Richard Brouillard, of Laconia, said he doesn’t feel that it’s possible that he’s been in practice 50 years. He, too, continues to work most days of the week, even when he spends winters in Naples, Fla. – he uses the telephone and e-mail to keep up on real estate matters at the law practice he shares with his son, Philip A. Brouillard. "I enjoy what I do. Why should I have to stop?" he said.

Brouillard enjoys celebrating the past as well as preparing for the future. He has been an active participant in the alumni associations of the University of New Hampshire and Georgetown Law School. He said his class at UNH was the first to endow a scholarship and he is working on a similar plan to commemorate his 50th anniversary of law school graduation.

Brouillard is proud of his long involvement with several charitable organizations, including the Lakes Region General Hospital, Taylor Retirement Home and New Hampshire Music Festival. But he is gradually cutting back on such involvement so he can devote more time to his family, including his second wife, Eleanor (his first wife of 35 years, Carmen, passed away) and his three children, Philip, Michele Flynn, and Damien Brouillard, who works in the business office at The Washington Post.

(Unless otherwise indicated, the non-judicial members remain on active status.)

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