Law Commons^™

Beyond The Model Rules: The Place Of Examples In Legal Ethics, Heidi Li Feldman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Model Rules of Professional Conduct defined the agenda for the post- Watergate renaissance in legal ethics. While there had been some form of codified precepts for American lawyers since at least 1908, Watergate inspired a desire to clean up a disgraced profession. The American Bar Association (ABA) promulgated the Model Rules; law schools instituted mandatory courses; and scholars debated and analyzed the new Model Rules. The organized bar devoted much time and attention to developing these guidelines. The mainstream media covered both the bar's original efforts and the subsequent adoption of the Model Rules by particular jurisdictions. Today, forty-three …

Faculty Pro Bono And The Question Of Identity, David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

My aim in this essay is to explain and defend a simple proposition, which I'll call the pro bono thesis: law teachers and law schools have the same pro bono responsibilities as lawyers and law firms. By "pro bono" I mean something more particular than community service or civic involvement. I mean free or reduced-rate legal work for those who cannot afford to pay for it. The pro bono thesis is that law teachers and law schools have pro bono responsibilities in this sense.

Taking Problem Solving Pedagogy Seriously: A Response To The Attorney General, Carrie Menkel-Meadow

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Attorney General Janet Reno has taken seriously the notion that lawyers should make the world better than they find it, that problems should be prevented, where possible, before they occur, and that law should serve the needs of the people and deliver long-term justice. I want to suggest some concrete ways in which we can take her challenges seriously.

The Zealous Advocacy Of Justice In A Less Than Ideal Legal World, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In The Practice of Justice, William Simon addresses a widely recognized dilemma -- the moral degradation of the legal profession that seems to be the unpleasant by-product of an adversarial system of resolving disputes -- with a bold claim: Lawyers involved in either the representation of private rights or the public interest should be zealous advocates of justice, rather than their clients' interests. If lawyers were to do what this reorientation of their basic identity would dictate -- that is, if lawyers were to zealously pursue justice according to law, rather than zealously pursue through all marginally lawful means whatever …

Ex Post Facto Payments In Legally-Aided Criminal Cases In The Old Bailey, Peter W. Tague

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

A much more pervasive scheme for overseeing the reasonableness of fees charged by legal professionals exists in England than in the United States. In England, for example, with or without a specific agreement over the fee, the client can challenge the solicitor's charges, and the court or the Law Society will assess their reasonableness.' Similarly, as part of assigning costs to the losing party, the reasonableness of the winning solicitor's claim for fees is evaluated. The lay client can even dispute the reasonableness of the barrister's fee after the fact.

In the United States, by contrast, lawyers hammer out agreements …

Representing Indigents In Serious Criminal Cases In England's Crown Court: The Advocates' Performance And Incentives, Peter W. Tague

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

While indigent defendants charged with serious criminal offenses can be represented by lawyers in the United States and by barristers and solicitors in England and Wales. Gauging the quality of that help is an important but elusive inquiry. This article has two purposes: to map how the indigent criminal defendant charged with very serious offenses is represented in England's Crown Court, and to examine whether economic incentives can induce the defendant's representatives to perform as expected.

While barristers profess to be skilled advocates, and while many lawyers have likewise extolled the barrister's advocacy, testing the point is extremely difficult. Apart …

Limiting Secret Settlements By Law, David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

I'm in the most embarrassing, impossible situation for a commentator- namely, agreeing fundamentally with what the principal speaker said. In fact, I wrote an article against secret settlements in the GEORGETOWN LAW JOURNAL in 1995. If Monroe Freedman were here, he would explain to us that progress in ideas comes from contention and the testing of hypotheses by marshalling the strongest arguments against them. Since he's not, I will nevertheless take that as my charge. Despite the fact that I agree with Richard on the ethical drawbacks of secret settlements, I'd like to begin by talking about what I think …

Contrived Ignorance, David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Lawyers often complain that it's hard to get clients to tell them the unvarnished truth. But it can be an equal challenge to avoid facts that the lawyer really doesn't want to know. Criminal defense lawyers rarely ask their clients, "Did you do it?" Instead, they ask the client what evidence he thinks the police or prosecution have against him-whom he spoke with, who the witnesses are, what documents or physical evidence he knows about. If the client seems too eager to spill his guts, the lawyer will quickly cut him off, admonishing him that time is short and that …

Cleaning Up The Legal Debris Left In The Wake Of Whitewater, Susan Low Bloch

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

We have learned a lot in the twenty-five years since Watergate. During the scandal itself, we confirmed that the President is not above the law. We learned that executive privilege is constitutionally protected, but that it is not absolute. And, we learned that a need exists for an independent counsel, but that we don't necessarily need a statute to establish such an office.

Watergate and the Nixon era spawned several so-called "reforms": the establishment of the independent counsel statute, presidential immunity from civil damage suits for official action, and public ownership of the President's official papers. It is interesting and …

Ethics And Professionalism In Non-Adversarial Lawyering, Carrie Menkel-Meadow

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Traditional notions and rules of professionalism in the legal profession have been premised on particular conceptions of the lawyer's role, usually as an advocate, occasionally as a counselor, advisor, transaction planner, government official, decision maker and in the recent parlance of one of this symposium's participants-a "statesman [sic]. '" As we examine what professionalism means and what rules should be used to regulate its activity, it is important to ask some foundational questions: For what ends should our profession be used? What does law offer society? How should lawyers exercise their particular skills and competencies?