Tyler Portner, Attorney & Mediator

Asking the Hard Questions

2025-07-23T17:36:55Z

In the United States, it sometimes feels like we are realizing the curse of living in interesting times. Recently, some of the challenges facing the American experiment and an ever global and digital world have caused a retreat into ideological camps. Among legal colleagues, our ability to explore, uphold, and represent the rule of law is being censored from without and within as inherently partisan. I think this is inconsistent with our training as lawyers and our social development as neighbors and citizens. These conversations have to happen. I’ve been trying to think about some of the foundational questions we inherited and will pass on in this attempt to maintain and improve our “more perfect union”: Who should have what rights? Should the opinions and priorities of the wealthy be weighted? Should the central seat of power carry more authority or the decentralized states? What should be the relationship between our remarkably conceived several branches of government? What should be the relationship between individual identity and nation? In theory, the answers to these and other questions help clarify and refine the systems and structures that make up the rule of law. The rule of law is the promise to be able to honestly identify and ask the questions, without the questions themselves being some partisan dog whistle. Our systems and structures were designed on purpose. In part, I believe this was to provide a forum where these conversations can and should take place. If these conversations cannot take place then we should suspend any hope to take meaningful action, to withstand present and new challenges, and to create practical solutions that benefit everyday people. Law school and the Bar exam were not so long ago for me that I cannot remember how issues need to be identified, analyzed, supported with precedent and perspectives. I wonder how many of us in the legal profession can say that we still apply that training in engaging with these interesting times in which we find and may continue to find ourselves. I understand not everyone with an opinion is a lawyer and I’m certain my colleague readers will echo my sentiment when I say: good. I also think we as lawyers have a privilege to engage with these ideas and each other; to have an idea but not be had by one; to remember the call of the question. The above was written in conjunction with the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association for the May/June 2025 edition of their Bar Journal emphasizing the importance of the Rule of Law

Will Artificial Intelligence Replace Human Contract Drafting and Review Attorneys?

2023-06-12T22:23:53Z

Artificial Intelligence means something totally different to the average person from what it meant a decade ago. What used to be sci fi is now fully here. Synthetical programs are improving every day that can simulate the scrutiny and experience of the legal professional. Specifically in contract drafting and review, there’s no doubt that some people will find it cheaper and more efficient to outsource their contract needs to algorithms. I struggle to blame them. Plug in your terms, personalize your template, even consider the risks and opportunities. AI will be able to do this. In some ways, it already can. However, this doesn’t spell certain doom. Any permanence by human practitioners will need to be earned. In a transaction, it is not just an equation with Party A and Party B and a few variables. There is a Person behind Party A, often several, with full histories of people, their goals and values, that came before them. And same for Party B. I believe AI could help someone ‘win’ a contract. One thing Artificial Intelligence cannot do (yet) is empathize. To get to know a client and their unique and evolving goals. To compromise. To communicate with sensitivity and to react with relationships in mind. I believe a human is better equipped to write a contract that could be easy to honor, to celebrate a client’s goals, to creatively imagine risks and to be willing to change their mind, to offer flexible and affordable services based on a Client’s situation and needs. I cannot say for sure what the role of attorneys will be in an automatic future. At best, I can predict, which is a fancy word for guessing and a softer science than the weather. I am also ruled by my bias against becoming obsolete. These technologies are tools, made to make our lives easier to fill a perceived need. Attorneys have historically done a lot to preserve the profession, sometimes by changing the very rules that they allegedly understand. Still, I fail to find a way to legislate our way out of this wide-open Pandora’s Box. Instead, the path forward is to adapt. To emphasize the human element in law. To be patient and attentive. To hear a person, actually. To value efficiency but to value the other stuff too. If we lose these jobs to the robots, it’s because we were robots first and they’re better at it.

On Being (Wrong)

2023-03-29T20:12:45Z

It’s hard to shake our backgrounds. Part of my unshakeable background is an obnoxious appreciation of Philosophy. So much that I seek it out, sometimes at my own expense (see My college major). One of my favorite things about it is how stories can be used to illustrate ideas. Sometimes true history, sometimes fantastic metaphor, the stories we encounter also become part of our backgrounds. As the story goes, Hermodorus was a student of Plato and helped circulate Plato’s writings. Since people thought Plato was pretty smart and his ideas were sort of state-of-the-art, this put Hermodorus in a category where he was thought of as some kind of elite, at least by some and most likely by himself. Heraclitus, one of my personal favorite philosophers, talked about when the Ephesians kicked Hermodorus out of their city, saying:

"We will have none of who is best among us; if there is any such, let him be so elsewhere and among others."

Nice. So many of us are uneasy at admitting confusion, misunderstanding, and the other things that keep us from knowing it all. Blame our backgrounds. Although our backgrounds may not be shakeable, we can shake so much, including our response when face to face with a confusing or complicated situation. Disclaimer: This is the part where someone is probably trying to sell you something. Legal professionals have come to be viewed as separate, institutional, even some sort of special. They are also human and with that comes some necessary gaps in understanding. I can say confidently that there is so much I do not know. As I’m writing this, I am technically a young professional with biased and partial life experiences. The only part of that likely to change is the ‘young’ part. The story I shared could mean that we shouldn’t try to be the best. I don’t read it that way. I read it as a commitment to always try to become better, to recognize the gaps in our own abilities and understanding, and to collaborate with curiosity. In my own practice, this means doing everything I can to help to make clients’ problems a little smaller and their goals a little closer.

What and Why Is a Blog?

2023-03-29T19:52:47Z

It’s a little strange. I’ve gone this far without a blog post and now, all of a sudden, here comes this guy with a blog. Why now? Why ever? What even is it? It sounds like a character from Seuss or Star Trek. Its blog-ness may exist in some Platonic superspace. I know it as an ultimatum from some algorithm-minded internet optimization folks smarter than I am. I’ve learned that it’s not a story and it’s not an article; it’s not a sound bite and it’s not an advertisement. A blog, believe it or not, is the shortened version of a weblog, like someone named Nathaniel going by Thaniel. It’s apparently supposed to be informal, a conversation. There’s an irony in there somewhere. To introduce myself loosely, I am–among other things–an attorney. The legal profession is designed to be formal, often distancing itself from the people it’s designed to serve. But why a blog? And why now? So far, I see it as an attempt to solidify myself digitally, to improve my writing and outreach, to speak and be heard because the code is listening. I only hope that these posts serve a double purpose of introducing myself as I sometimes see myself, to share my thoughts and impressions (numerous but few), and to document this journey. If someone happens to read it, I warn that I am and will continue to be incomplete. At the same time, please continue to grow and explore with me as I learn how to blog (and maybe learn some other stuff too).