Joking that they represented two of the most reviled elements in American society, politicians and lawyers discussed the role of lawyers in American politics before an audience of 25 last night in Harvard Hall.

The panel, titled "Law and Politics: An Unhappy Marriage?" was sponsored by the Harvard-Radcliffe Pre-Law Society and the Harvard Political Union (HPU).

Panelists included Renee M. Landers '77, an attorney with Ropes & Gray in Boston; Associate Professor of Government Edward Schwartz; Jonathan Schwartz, associate deputy attorney general in the U.S. Justice Department and former U.S. Senator Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.), director of the Institute of Politics.

Hannah Choi '01, chair of HPU, hoped that the panel discussion would be "a good substantive discussion about how law affects politics, noting more than the fact that a lot of politicians are lawyers and re-enter the legal profession after politics, but seeing how this affects politics as it works."

The discussion, moderated by Tanya L. Barnes '00, co-director of the pre-law society, centered on the question of whether legal or political considerations should take precedence in the mind of legally trained politicians.

Relating his experience arguing that Secret Service agents could not testify against President Clinton, Schwartz explained that politics often find their way into the courtroom.

"It was a situation in which you got to go into court against the independent council arguing about who was even representing the United States" he said.

Landers, who used to work for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and worked in recent years on cases of state referendums legalizing the medicinal use of marijuana, said that there is often a conflict between popular politics and federal law.

"It raises fundamental questions about law and policy," she said. "What do the voters decide? What do the elected officials decide?"