By STATE SEN. RODNEY ELLIS and BARRY SCHECK – 03/16/2008 In Harper Lee’s classic novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, the protagonist Atticus Finch embodies what we hope attorneys, our gatekeepers to justice, to be — a stoic figure of immeasurable fairness and integrity who protects the rights of the innocent. Finch summarizes the American ideal of justice this way, ”The one place a man ought to get a square deal is the courtroom.”� Continue reading: Op-Ed archives: Texas – Well-funded, independent public defender’s office is needed to balance scales of justice for defendants