Digital Commons Network^™

Chicana Professionalism: Embracing Greñas, Glitter & Boots, Luz E. Herrera

Fordham Law Review

No abstract provided.

Answering Your Most-Asked Dental Benefit Questions, William Sullivan Jd, James Budd Mpp

The Journal of the Michigan Dental Association

This column examines the increasing federal scrutiny of non-compete agreements by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). It notes that both the Trump and Biden administrations have prioritized curtailing the misuse of these agreements, particularly in healthcare. The article provides practical steps for employers to audit existing agreements for reasonableness and individualization. It encourages exploring alternatives such as non-solicitation and confidentiality clauses and stresses the importance of documenting the legitimate business interests that justify any remaining non-compete requirements to withstand future regulatory scrutiny.

Rewired: Reconceptualizing Legal Services For The Ai Age, Lev E. Breydo

Faculty Publications

The legal profession is at a crossroads, caught between intensifying fears of AI-driven displacement and a generational opportunity for transformation. This Article provides a practical framework for navigating the shifting terrain.

Situating legal innovation within a multi-century arc of technological change, the Article draws on management and strategy scholarship to develop two core organizing models: the Legal Services Value Chain and the Innovation Frontier. The value chain disaggregates the lifecycle of a legal matter into five distinct nodes of activity, providing a map for subsequent analyses

Building on that foundation, the Innovation Frontier traces LegalTech’s evolution from 2000s-vintage e-discovery to …

Disconnected Connection, Dyane L. O'Leary

Arkansas Law Review

Lawyering is a human experience in a digital world. Lawyers have long derived pride from labels like personal counselor, trusted advisor, and steady confidant. Sure, sometimes a productized legal service or one-off Turbo-Tax-style filing is all a client needs. But it’s still a people profession, the lifeblood of which is connection with others: clients, colleagues, witnesses, and countless more. Calls for attention to lawyers’ so-called “soft” skills have grown louder in recent years, tagged with descriptors like “people” or “business” or “professional” skills. Modern communication tools facilitate connection and relationship building like never before. But that which connects us threatens …

Transforming Indigent Appellate Advocacy, Rachel T. Goldberg, Estelle M. Mckee

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Indigent appellate advocacy has long been confined to a narrow, technocratic model—one that prioritizes legal expertise over client autonomy and treats appellate cases solely as isolated legal battles rather than opportunities for systemic change. Unlike their trial-level counterparts, appellate attorneys representing indigent clients have received little scholarly attention, leaving critical questions about client participation, ethical representation, and social justice largely unexplored.

This Article challenges the status quo, arguing that appellate attorneys should rethink their role in ways that empower clients and confront the broader injustices shaping their cases. We introduce two alternative frameworks—client-centered appellate representation and participatory appellate representation—that draw …

Derivative Attorney-Client Privilege In Organizations, Douglas R. Richmond

University of Miami Business Law Review

A lawyer and client must be able to communicate about the client’s legal affairs in confidence for the lawyer to be able to meaningfully advise the client, hence courts’ recognition of the attorney-client privilege. Fundamentally, the very term “attorney-client privilege” seemingly requires a lawyer’s participation in a communication for the privilege to attach. But, in fact, lawyers need not always participate in client communications for the attorney-client privilege to shield the communications from discovery. Clients or their employees’ confidential conversations among themselves with respect to legal matters sometimes deserve privilege protection. This derivative application of the privilege can be crucial …

Ethics Of Artificial Intelligence For Lawyers: I’M Sorry Dave, I’M Afraid I Can’T Do That: Competence, Confidentiality, And Communication, Cliff Mckinney

Arkansas Law Notes

In Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, the spaceship’s onboard computer, HAL, calmly refuses to follow the astronaut’s command with the chilling words, “I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that.” HAL’s response has become a cultural shorthand for what happens when human expectations collide with machine limitations. The line endures because it captures the chilling reality that machines may appear capable, but they cannot always be trusted to act in ways humans expect or need.

This installment explores three pillars of Formal Opinion 512: competence, confidentiality, and communication. These pillars focus on what lawyers need to understand about …

Teaching Cross-Cultural Communication In Law School: Lessons From Medicine, Social Work, And Business, Mireille Butler, Jaclyn Celebrezze

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

Legal clients in the United States are increasingly multilingual and multicultural. More than 71 million people living in the United States communicate in a language other than English. Consequently, the lawyer’s duty of shared understanding is taking on new meaning. With the advent of ABA Ethics Opinion 500, cross-cultural communication skills are a lawyer’s ethical duty and a law school’s mandate. Additionally, ABA Standard 303(c) and the potential of increased experiential learning credit requirements make clear that immediate curricular changes are needed. To prepare for the modern practice of law, tomorrow’s lawyers need to develop cross-cultural skills while in law …

Pro Bono, Supplied And Demanded, Anita Bernstein

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

. Of the fifty-six blackletter provisions in the Model Rules of Professional Conduct, the rule about pro bono is the only one that tells lawyers they “should”—rather than must, must not, or may—take a particular action. This verb, which in effect says: “You deserve praise if you do it but hey, no pressure,” embodies the partial perspective that dominates pro bono—partial in the sense of both incomplete and biased. Valorizing pro bono while imposing no consequences on people who fail to perform it indulges and flatters what this Article calls pro bono’s supply side. Bar leaders, rule writers led by …

Ethics And Originalism, Michael L. Smith

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

This Article addresses a blind spot in the theorizing and debate over originalist interpretation: the implications of rules of legal ethics. For the few originalist theorists who take the practical side of originalism seriously, attorneys’ rules of professional conduct are almost entirely absent from the discussion. These rules bind all attorneys who, in turn, construct the record, present the evidence, and make the arguments upon which judges and Justices rely. And these rules have profound, though mixed, implications for originalist theory. Some ethical duties—such as those requiring attorney competence and candor to the tribunal—might enhance the quality of originalist analysis …

The Ai Advocate: Tracking The Impact Of Artificial Intelligence On Trial Advocacy, John G. Browning

Loyola University Chicago Law Journal

In his annual State of the Judiciary address on December 31, 2023, Chief Justice John G. Roberts chose to focus on the use of generative AI. He cautioned that while AI "has great potential to dramatically increase access to key information for lawyers," its use "requires caution and humility" because of the risk of "dehumanizing the law." Chief Justice Roberts' timely warning, made at the height of concerns nationally about lawyers relying on fabricated case citations caused by the "hallucinations" of generative AI, could have just as easily been targeted not only to the legal profession generally, but to trial …

Equal Justice & Generative Ai, Milan R. Markovic

Faculty Scholarship

The United States has long suffered from unequal access to justice, with countless low-and middle-income Americans forced to navigate the legal system alone. Recently, prominent judges, lawyers, and scholars have seized on generative AI as a potential corrective. These techno-optimists maintain that ChatGPT and other large language models can demystify the law and address unmet legal needs. Chief Justice John Roberts has proclaimed that AI-based tools "have the welcome potential to smooth out any mismatch between available resources and urgent needs in our court system."

Although AI will be an increasingly important source of legal assistance for underserved populations, the …

Revisiting Law Society Disciplinary Powers Over The Attorney General: Professional Discipline For Policy Decisions?, Andrew Flavelle Martin

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In this article, I assess whether the law society can, and should, discipline the attorney general for their policy decisions and those of the cabinet. In addition to a parallel to policy immunity in tort law, I also consider other potential restrictions applicable to policy decisions, including the scope of parliamentary privilege—and related concepts—as apparently broadened in more recent decisions by the Supreme Court of Canada.

This article consists of five parts after this introduction. I begin in Part II by revisiting the statutory jurisdiction of the law society and the impact of the rule of law considerations embodied in …

Statutory Immunity Of The Attorney General From Law Society Discipline In Alberta: A Comment In Justice Statutes Amendment Act, 2025, Andrew Flavelle Martin

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In December 2025, Alberta became the second Canadian province to grant its Attorney General statutory immunity from law society discipline. This comment analyzes this amendment to the Legal Profession Act and the rationales and critiques that emerged during the legislative process. It argues that, while some of the critiques were misplaced, the rationales given by the government are problematic in themselves and insufficient to justify the tension between the immunity of the Attorney General to law society discipline and the constitutional principle of the rule of law. In the absence of a more clearly articulated and justified rationale for adopting …

A Trusteeship Theory Of Pro Bono: Versions And Perversions, David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This chapter develops a trusteeship justification of pro bono, arguing that lawyers, as trustees of a public legal system created through democratic self-authorship, have a moral obligation to help address the persistent justice gap affecting persons of limited means. It evaluates multiple forms of pro bono — including voluntary, mandatory, low bono, and state-compelled service — evaluating how well each aligns with the trusteeship model. The chapter contrasts the trusteeship theory with, and criticizes, two alternative justifications for pro bono: presumed lawyer consent rooted in professional tradition and a quid pro quo based on state-authorized privileges. It concludes by distinguishing …

Parity In Practice: The Defender's Duty To Ethically Use Ai, Mason R. Clark

Faculty Articles

This white paper provides a framework for ethical and practical AI use across all types of criminal defense practice, grounded in the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct and best practices as described by practitioners, academics, and other experts. While AI tools can meaningfully improve efficiency and expand analytical capacity, those benefits are highly contingent on tool selection, implementation, and oversight. The white paper also recognizes that cost, access to training, and institutional resources remain significant barriers — particularly for solo practitioners, small firms, and under-resourced public defense offices — and discusses AI throughout as a set of tools whose …

Teaching Cross-Cultural Communication In Law School: Lessons From Medicine, Social Work, And Business, Mireille Butler, Jaclyn Celebrezze

Articles

Legal clients in the United States are increasingly multilingual and multicultural. More than 71 million people living in the United States communicate in a language other than English. Consequently, the lawyer’s duty of shared understanding is taking on new meaning. With the advent of ABA Ethics Opinion 500, cross-cultural communication skills are a lawyer’s ethical duty and a law school’s mandate. Additionally, ABA Standard 303(c) and the potential of increased experiential learning credit requirements make clear that immediate curricular changes are needed. To prepare for the modern practice of law, tomorrow’s lawyers need to develop cross-cultural skills while in law …

Legal Ethics Of Ai Snake Oil: Navigating The Hype, Harm, And Hope Of Legal Ai, Drew Simshaw

Scholarly Works

This paper argues that the legal ethics of AI extend far beyond competence and hallucinations. It shows how AI often functions as a mirror, exposing deeper ethical questions about institutional incentives, lawyer wellbeing, access to justice, and AI's broader social and environmental impacts.

Legal Ethics, Patrick Emery Longan

Mercer Law Review

This Survey covers the period from June 1, 2024–May 31, 2025. The Article discusses developments with respect to lawyer discipline, bar admission and reinstatement, malpractice, ineffective assistance of counsel, disqualification of counsel, judicial misconduct and recusal, attorney’s fees and liens, contempt and other sanctions, unauthorized practice of law, attorney-client privilege, prosecutorial misconduct, amendments to the Georgia Rules of Professional Conduct, advisory opinions, one miscellaneous matter, and potential reforms to the delivery of legal services.

Leveling The Playing Field? Exploring The Moral Ambiguity Of The Private Attorney General Model, Nathan Heastie

Washington and Lee Law Review Online

Johnson & Johnson’s market cap is twice the GDP of Oklahoma. So, when Oklahoma hauled Johnson & Johnson and other behemoth pharmaceutical companies into state court for their participation in the opioid epidemic, Big Pharma’s resources created a David v. Goliath situation. Against all odds, Oklahoma stood toe-to-toe with Big Pharma and brought home more than $650 million in settlement funds.

Oklahoma’s success would be otherwise impossible without the assistance of three private law firms serving the role of “private attorneys general.” The State signed contingency fee arrangements with the firms, transferring the financial burden of litigation from the State …

Representing The Incommunicado Client: Regulating The Attorney-Client Relationship In A Civil Rights Emergency, Michael Kagan

Washington and Lee Law Review Online

When the government obstructs a detainee’s ability to communicate with attorneys, normal rules governing the formation of attorney-client relationships break down. While some work-arounds exist to allow lawyers to bring such cases to court, they have significant limitations and can create problems of their own. The legal profession and the courts should adopt new rules modeled on emergency medicine to facilitate the filing of urgent civil rights claims for clients who are not in a position to consent. In emergency medicine, physicians can presume client consent for certain narrow and urgent purposes. Certain lawyers, in extreme cases, should be able …

Public Defender Discretion, Alma Magaña

Articles

A focus of criminal legal system reform efforts has been the curtailment of police, prosecutorial, and judicial discretion, which has been criticized for its arbitrariness and its contribution to racial, class, and gender disparities. However, one system actor has largely escaped similar scrutiny: public defenders, who, by grant of authority from ethical rules of practice and Supreme Court jurisprudence, have significant decision-making authority in the cases of indigent persons charged with crimes.

This Article will, for the first time, explore the historical rationale for giving public defenders the power to make life-altering decisions for their clients. Specifically, it dissects the …

Learning By Doing: The Importance Of Thoughtful And Limited Generative A.I. Use In The Il Legal Writing Classroom, Luke Repici

Faculty Publications

Technological advances that impact lawyers day-to-day work are nothing new. From typewriters, dictaphones, and computers to electronic legal research, email, and e-discovery, new technologies have changed the nuts and bolts of how lawyers practice for decades. Previous technologies may have replaced the pen with the typewriter and supplanted the letter for the email, but the lawyer remained the one doing the work. For more junior lawyers, this meant assigned tasks – reading cases, drafting motions, dictating client updates, summarizing discovery, and creating deposition outlines – could not be outsourced to technology.

The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (“Gen AI”) presents …

Preventive Transparency In Third-Party Litigation Funding, Seth Katsuya Endo

Northwestern University Law Review

For years, efforts to comprehensively regulate third-party litigation funding have been unsuccessful. But bills requiring mandatory disclosure are being introduced in Congress, and the Advisory Committee for Civil Rules has finally agreed to take up the issue. By grounding the discussion of third-party litigation funding in both the broader civil procedure and professional responsibility scholarship, this Article identifies an easy, uncontroversial reform to preventively address the categorical concerns raised by the practice. The primary contribution is a doctrinal intervention, identifying how legal ethics are an integral part of federal civil procedure and then drawing out the implications for third-party litigation …

Attorneys And Ai: How Lawyers Use Artificial Intelligence And Analyze Its Impacts, Matthew I. Hall, Christian Turner, Eddie A. Gomez Schieber, Nathaniel Kite, Ari Schlesinger

Scholarly Works

AI systems are testing lawyers' professional ethics obligations of competence, confidentiality, and candor. In the legal profession, the widespread availability of AI systems presents opportunities, like improving the review of documents during the discovery stage of a lawsuit, and challenges, illustrated by the handful of high-profile incidents where lawyers submitted legal briefs in court citing and describing fictitious cases based on AI-generated output. We conducted interviews with 44 legal professionals in the U.S. to understand how attorneys are making sense of AI technology and the impacts these technologies are having on their profession, legal ethics, and legal institutions. We describe …

The Role Of "Light Plagiarism" In Legal Writing , From A Recent Practitioner's Perspective, Donna L. Eng

UF Law Faculty Publications

Because practitioners are pressured to complete their tasks as quickly and efficiently as possible, lawyers regularly use documents previously drafted by other lawyers as a starting point for their drafting. Law students may be surprised to learn that in the modern practice of law, plagiarism is so widely accepted and encouraged. This article proposes several reasons why Legal Writing Professors should consider addressing that fact by discussing the process by which many lawyers draft documents in the real-world practice of law today.

First, the rules against plagiarism do not relate to the real-world practice of law. Unlike law students, who …

Legal Insurance And Its Limits, Nora Freeman Engstrom

Michigan Law Review

Courts are buckling under the weight of a staggering access-to-justice crisis. In three-quarters of cases, at least one side lacks a lawyer, default judgments are on the rise, and most Americans with valid claims never take legal action. The situation is dire, and it understandably has policymakers casting about for a fix. On the menu are a range of uncontroversial reform ideas, such as expanding legal aid, supporting system simplification, and promoting pro bono. But it is increasingly clear that those measures—even if accomplished—would not make a dent in the problem. Attention is thus turning to other reform ideas, such …

How The Billable Hour Can Survive Generative Ai, Jonah Perlin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The legal profession is rapidly adopting generative AI technology. With this shift has come an increasingly common assumption that generative AI will significantly reduce or even bring an end to hourly billing. The logic underlying this conclusion seems intuitive: if AI reduces the time lawyers spend on certain tasks while eliminating others altogether, then the total number of billable hours will fall. That decline, in turn, could threaten the financial viability of hourly billing, despite its place as the dominant law firm compensation model over the past half century.

This Article challenges this assumption. It argues instead that the billable …

Organizing For Abolition In Ice Custody, Sarah R. Sherman-Stokes

Faculty Scholarship

The final Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) detainees were released from the Irwin County Detention Center in early September 2021.² A court did not order the end of ICE detention at Irwin. A social movement, led by people detained at Irwin, had a pronounced impact on the epistemological landscape and changed both normative principles and public opinion.³ Those detained at Irwin organized and acted to create new understanding of law and protect their rights in ways that courts and legislatures could not. This Essay tells the story of that demosprudential project; a dialectic between legal elites and people …

Reforming The Indian Bar: The Limits Of Technological Solutions, Varsha Aithala, Karthik Suresh

Articles

A majority of Indians do not have effective access to legal services, despite the constitutional promise of access to justice. There are two intertwined reasons for this: the unavailability of a sufficient number of good quality lawyers, and the high costs of accessing legal services. The Indian legal profession is highly unequal, with ‘prestige’ being the currency of upward professional mobility. The professional regulator, the Bar Council of India, simply lacks the capacity to regulate quality. As a consequence, clients lack the information to access lawyers, and to understand the outcomes they desire from them, and the fees they have …