From this vantage point, on the cusp of retirement and after a half-century in a profession I love, I look back on innumerable details: so many clients, cases, and community activities. On what do I reflect? Foremost is gratitude for the lawyers who taught me—sometimes through very hard lessons in court or in negotiations.

Starting with my lawyer father, lawyer brother, and the values I learned growing up, I look back to 1976 and to the Cincinnati Bar Association, of which I would later serve as president, and to its staff and members, who have been my anchor at every turn. I feel an urgent need to thank all of these people, including many who are gone, and I do so belatedly here and now.

My practice has been unorthodox, especially for a large firm like Taft Stettinius & Hollister, because I kept taking on clients in areas outside litigation and estate planning, the two areas in which I have nominally worked. Being asked by partners to take on my first deportation case and my first divorce led me to start the immigration and family law practices. I later turned those over to other lawyers, and after 1993 I focused on estate planning and nonprofit organization work. I would identify the following as representative of my career:

1. At the request of fellow trustees of the National Conference of Christians and Jews, I became legal counsel to create the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center. I chaired the building committee and became presiding co-chair. Today, she sits on Cincinnati’s central riverfront telling the world that our city’s vision is grounded in courage, cooperation, and perseverance to protect human rights everywhere.
2. I was retained to represent Sen. John Kerry in his 2004 presidential campaign in Ohio. That work included a number of lawsuits around the state that I supervised, all challenging voting irregularities before and on Election Day. On election night, Ohio’s electoral votes were to determine the presidency. I was up all night on the phone with Sen. Kerry confirming returns until he decided at dawn to concede Ohio and thus the presidency.
3. Out of my immigration practice came a case for a Chinese student facing indictment for larceny. As his second offense, a conviction would have meant permanent exclusion from the country. I took the case to the Ohio Supreme Court and then on habeas corpus to the U.S. Supreme Court. I won on a constitutional double jeopardy principle, and the Sixth Circuit praised me in its opinion for defending the Constitution. My client is now a U.S. citizen in a responsible career.

I have served for decades as legal counsel to five presidents of Hebrew Union College and on its board for many years. This has given me wonderful colleagues with whom I’ve shared a passionate commitment to Jewish life and education and to Reform Judaism, alongside serving as president of my synagogue.

Many other stories I could tell even where confidentiality is protected. I served as legal counsel for decades to the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, whose board I chaired; co-founded, represented, and chaired the board of Cincinnati Public Radio; and counsel to The Greater Cincinnati Foundation, among others. Many of my estate planning, trust, and probate matters brought me fascinating clients many of whom have been friends. Each one gave me the honor of helping to carry out their wishes, sometimes charitable. That I was elected a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC) and became board-certified in this field, I hope, offers me some bona fides.

My most important “accomplishment” was co-parenting my three amazing daughters, who have made the most of their education to become strong professional women. They survived my commitment of time to the law. Each has married the right husband, and they have brought six grandchildren into my life. 

Given the challenges of the world, we may retire from the law, but not from life. The law is our engine to keep working to make the world a little better than we found it. With the law in our blood, we can do it.

Dan Hoffheimer is past president of the Cincinnati Bar Association, and is now chairman of the Planned Giving Committee of the Cincinnati Bar Foundation.