Law Commons^™

Sanctifying Secrecy: The Mythology Of The Corporate Attorney-Client Privilege, Elizabeth G. Thornburg

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This article surveys the traditional justifications for giving corporations the benefit of attorney-client privilege. It rejects both moral and utilitarian explanations and argues that, far from being beneficial or benign, the privilege actually does great harm to the truth-seeking function of litigation and imposes tremendous transaction costs on the litigants and on the judicial system as a whole.