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Mid-Atlantic Ethics Committee Newsletter, Fall 2006-Winter 2007

Mid-Atlantic Ethics Committee Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Corporations And The Lateral Obligations Of The Social Contract, Benedict Sheehy

ExpressO

Social contract theorists suggest that society at some level is based on the idea that human people surrender freedom for the privilege of participating in society. That participation implicitly requires more than mere minimal compliance with law. Each human person’s contribution to society above the legal baseline, permits humans to create a society that is at least tolerable. Corporations as non-human act without regard for these supra-legal obligations which results in society suffering injustice. Corporate participation in society has become increasingly unjust and has done so to the extent that we may speak of living in a post-ethical world.

Peace Is Not The Absence Of Conflict: A Response To Professor Rogers' Article: "Fit And Function In Legal Ethics", Kirsten D. Weisenberger

ExpressO

This paper takes the theoretical model Professor Catherine Rogers developed in her article “Fit and Function in Legal Ethics: Developing a Code of Conduct for International Arbitration,” 23 MICH. J. INT’L L. 341 (2002) as the starting point for an original argument that conflicts of laws analysis should be used to determine which legal ethics rules should apply to lawyers practicing international arbitration. The argument is supported by the new ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct rule on choice of law explicitly applies conflicts of laws analysis to lawyers practicing in the multijurisdictional settings. This paper analyses the new ABA …

Mid-Atlantic Ethics Committee Newsletter, Summer 2006

Mid-Atlantic Ethics Committee Newsletter

No abstract provided.

How Can A Mediator Be Both Impartial And Fair: Why Ethical Standards Of Conduct Create Chaos For Mediators, Susan Nauss Exon

Journal of Dispute Resolution

This article focuses on newly developing Standards designed to regulate the mediation industry with respect to civil disputes. The particular focus is on the mediator's requirements of neutrality and impartiality and whether these requirements are impacted by assurances of a fair result and other fairness concepts such as a balanced process and informed decision making. The basic problem is that mediators are guided by Standards and stand-alone definitions of mediation, yet many Standards contain contradictory or vague provisions. Furthermore, the mediator's actual role may be dictated by her own personal style, values, and commercial needs in conjunction with the parties' …

Agenda: Climate Change And The Future Of The American West: Exploring The Legal And Policy Dimensions, University Of Colorado Boulder. Natural Resources Law Center

Climate Change and the Future of the American West: Exploring the Legal and Policy Dimensions (Summer Conference, June 7-9)

Sponsors: The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation; BP America; Holland & Hart; Patrick, Miller & Krope, P.C.; The Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, Rocky Mountain Natural Resource Center of the National Wildlife Federation, Western Water Assessment.

Exploring the legal and political dimensions that climate change will bring to the American West will be the focus of the CU-Boulder Natural Resources Law Center's 27th Annual Summer Conference.

Titled "Climate Change and the Future of the American West: Exploring the Legal and Policy Dimensions," the conference will be held June 7-9 at the Fleming Law Building on the University of Colorado at …

The Professionalization Of Law Firm In-House Counsel, Elizabeth Chambliss

Faculty Publications

This Article examines the structural evolution of the "firm counsel" position from a volunteer, part-time position filled by an existing partner to a specialized, often full-time position increasingly filled by career in-house counsel. Based on focus groups and interviews with firm counsel, as well as participant observation at meetings and conferences aimed at firm counsel, I examine how the professionalization of the firm counsel position affects: (1) the definition of the firm as the client; (2) the authority of firm counsel with partners; and (3) firm counsels' professional commitments and attitudes about ethical rules. I find that, from a regulatory …

Stealing What's Free: Exploring Compensation To Body Parts Sources For Their Contribution To Profitable Biomedical Research, Jo-Anne Yau

ExpressO

It is undisputed in the biotechnology industry that human body parts play a vital role in research. The body parts donors, referred to as "Sources" in this article, are subjected to physical and financial exploitation. Forbidding the explosion of profits from trickling down to the Source presents an irrational inequity. Despite established law, it is evident from case analysis, prevailing social practices, and constitutional interpretation that Source compensation is a plausible solution.

This article proposes a model of compensation for Sources, whereby Sources are compensated based on a proportionate share of the research profits set aside for the Source as …

Science, Humanity, And Atrocity: A Lawyerly Examination, Steven D. Smith

Michigan Law Review

Joseph Vining's reflection on (as the subtitle indicates) the claims of science and humanity begins with a terse but disturbing recitation of these and similar scientific experiments conducted on human beings during the twentieth century in Manchuria, Nazi Germany, and Pol Pot's Cambodia. The incidents are conveyed through quotations, sometimes of the coldly clinical prose that the researchers themselves chose as most suitable for their purposes. These quotations are juxtaposed against others from an array of distinguished scientists and philosophers explaining the naturalistic cosmology that, in the view of these thinkers, modern science has given us: it is a stark, …

Herbert Hart Elucidated, A. W. Brian Simpson

Michigan Law Review

There are a number of good biographies of judges, but very few of individual legal academics; indeed, so far as American legal academics are concerned, the only one of note that comes to mind is William Twining's life of Karl Llewellyn. Llewellyn was, of course, a major figure in the evolution of American law, and his unusual life was a further advantage for his biographer. In this biography, Nicola Lace has taken as her subject an English academic who also had an unusual career, one whose contribution was principally not to the evolution of the English legal system but to …

Multijurisdictional Practice Of Law Under The Revised South Carolina Rules Of Professional Conduct, Jane Hawthorne Merrill

South Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

On Letters Of Reference As Frames Of Reference, Roderick A. Macdonald, Alexandra Law

Dalhousie Law Journal

Requesting, writing and reading letters of reference are everyday features of academic life. Yet they are neglected as a matter of professorial training and their pedagogical importance is rarely acknowledged. This paper reviews various practical aspects of the reference process, with emphasis on its politics and ethics. It argues that letters of reference frame the lived experience of candidate, writer, reader and community-both for the present and the future.

Civil Engagement Versus Social Engineering: What Can Be Learned From Nanojury Uk, Michele L. Mekel

Michele L Mekel

Although nanotechnology is pervasive in scientific circles, it has only just begun to cross the public's radar screen here in the United States and around the world. But, as nanotechnology moves from under the microscope into the mainstream at an ever-accelerating pace, and as the citizenry begins to take notice of this nascent technology that promises everything from revolutionizing the economy to curing intractable diseases, understanding public sentiment toward nanotechnology and the societal issues it raises is critical to the formulation of appropriate nanopolicy.

Legal Doubletalk And The Concern With Positional Conflicts: A "Foolish Consistency?", Helen A. Anderson

ExpressO

This article explores the question whether lawyers should be able to argue both sides of a legal issue is unrelated cases. Today the ABA and many state bar associations caution against so-called “positional conflicts,” analyzing them as potential conflicts of interest under a multi-factor test. This relatively recent concern misses the real potential for harm: it is precisely when a lawyer decides not to make a contradictory argument for one client in order not to offend or harm another client that an ethical problem is likely to be present. A positional conflict is therefore evidence that any pressure to modify …

Standing In Babylon, Looking Toward Zion, Katherine R. Kruse

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Implementation Of Sarbanes-Oxley: New Rules For Lawyers And What Lawyers Think, Olga Yevglevskaya-Wayne

ExpressO

This paper discusses practical implications of Sarbanes-Oxley for lawyers. Emphasis is on the new federal rules of professional responsibility the Act sets up. The paper includes the views of various renowned practitioners interpreting and using these rules. The paper also contains suggestions for how the Securities and Exchange Commission could potentially improve those areas that are proving problematic for attorneys so as to better effectuate the purpose of this major new law, in light of its legislative history and intent, which are also discussed in the paper.

Is Forensic Computing A Profession? Revisiting An Old Debate In A New Field, Bernd C. Stahl

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

Forensic Computing is a new and quickly developing field. It is in the process of becoming an academic discipline or sub-discipline with all the features from full undergraduate and postgraduate course provision to conferences and journals. An important question in this process of turning into an established discipline is whether it will coincide with the recognition of the graduates as professionals. This paper hopes to stimulate the debate as to whether forensic computing is or should be a discipline. In order to approach this question, the paper will discuss the concept of forensic computing including the most salient topics of …

Bankruptcy Ethics Issues For Solos And Small Firms, Nancy B. Rapoport

Scholarly Works

This chapter, in Corinne Cooper & Catherine E. Vance's book Attorney Liability in Bankruptcy, walks the reader through some of the traditional ethics issues triggered by representing consumers and small businesses. It also addresses some of the ethics issues that the recent Bankruptcy Amendments (BAPCPA) have created.

Expecting Too Much And Too Little Of Lawyers, Eugene R. Gaetke

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The regulation of lawyers' behavior remains a controversial topic. Over the past hundred years, the organized bar has engaged in a number of efforts to generate rules governing lawyers' conduct. Still, prominent lawyers and jurists, the public media, and legal scholars perceive an ongoing decline in the profession's ethics.

Bar leaders tend to respond to the problem by calling for greater "professionalism" among practicing lawyers. Drawing on professional images from earlier times, they urge lawyers to look beyond the rules and to be more virtuous, selfless, independent of clients, and dedicated to justice.

A number of commentators go further. These …

Supplying Human Body Parts: A Jewish Law Perspective, Steven Resnicoff

College of Law Faculty

This article explores two related, but distinct, questions: (1) whether, under Jewish law, it is ethical for someone to buy or sell human body parts, and (2) whether, given Jewish law's perspective, it would be appropriate for the United States to adopt a distribution system that would give preference to people who volunteer to be prospective donors. These questions should interest three different kinds of people: (1) those who seek to abide by Jewish law and, therefore, need to know its rules; (2) those who respect Jewish law, who are curious about it, and who might be persuaded by its …

Do Ask And Do Tell: Rethinking The Lawyer’S Duty To Warn In Domestic Violence Cases, Margaret B. Drew, Sarah Buel

Faculty Publications

Empirical data document that while domestic violence victims face high risk of recurring abuse, batterers’ lawyers may be privy to information that could avert further harm. Attorneys owe a duty of confidentiality to their clients that can be breached only in extraordinary circumstances, such as when counsel learns her client plans to commit a crime. To resolve the tension between client confidentiality and victim safety, this Article argues that, in the context of domestic violence cases, lawyers have an affirmative duty to (1) screen battering clients who have indicated a likelihood of harming others, (2) attempt to dissuade them from …

Are You Misappropriating Client Funds - Missouri's Iolta Plan After Mottl, Timothy D. Steffens

Missouri Law Review

In Mottl v. Missouri Lawyer Trust Account Foundation, the Missouri Court of Appeals for the Western District addressed the constitutionality of Missouri's IOLTA program for the first time and held that participation in Missouri's IOLTA program is not state action because of the voluntary nature of the program. 6 By so deciding, the court shifted liability for participation in the program from the state to private attorneys and law firms. As a result, an attorney must inform a client during initial consultation that the attorney or the attorney's firm voluntarily participates in the IOLTA program and that, as a result …

Everything I Wanted To Know About Teaching Law School I Learned From Being A Kindergarten Teacher: Ethics In The Law School Classroom, Debra Moss Curtis

Faculty Scholarship

This article discusses the ethics of teaching law school. It was not until the 1920s and 1930s that full-time law teachers, rather than part-time practitioners or judges, held the main responsibility for teaching at many law schools. When this shift began to occur, the field of "law professor" was born, and there arose the need for rules in all areas governing law professors, including ethics. Today, most law professors in the United States are members of both the legal and teaching professions and therefore must comply with the ethical rules of each profession. However they may be professionally licensed, law …

Nanotechnologies: Small Science, Big Potential, And Bigger Issues, Michele L. Mekel

Michele L Mekel

Ethical, legal, and social implications must be taken into account when considering environmental, health, and safety issues, as well as the constitution of human nature. The hyperbole related to emerging technologies must be broken down around the marketing of nanotechnologies in order to discuss, much more candidly, pressing ethical and legal risks.

World Health Organization, Wendy Braun

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Over the past 60 years the World Health Organization (WHO) has succeeded in improving the general standard of health around the world. The WHO is an international agency within the United Nations and is comprised of 192 countries. The World Health Assembly, a 34 member elected board, meets annually to determine new regulations and budgetary needs for the organization. Rights-based policy is integrated throughout the World Health Organization’s programs. The WHO works with several entities, including non-governmental organizations, U.N. agencies and private organizations to achieve goals and implement new programs. Key topics for the WHO include gender rights, policy, and …

Against Idols: The Court As A Symbol-Making Or Rhetorical Institution, Marie Failinger

Faculty Scholarship

Symbolic politics can be quite powerful. This article pursues the question of how the Supreme Court signifies itself, how it discovers and enacts the metaphors from which it will play its part in the American political drama aimed at containing some of the nightmares of human existence, while affirming and encouraging the possibilities for human flourishing. Embedded in this inquiry is the question of how the Court can signify itself while still preserving the truth-telling and humility necessary to legitimize Court decisions.

Washington's New Rules Of Professional Conduct: A Balancing Act , Johanna M. Ogdon

Seattle University Law Review

Part II begins by exploring the history of the Rules of Professional Conduct. Part II then briefly turns to the origins of the modern debate over candor and confidentiality and focuses on two of the most essentially opposed and well known scholars on the issue, Judge Marvin Frankel and Professor Monroe Freedman. Part III dissects Washington's newly adopted RPC, focusing on Rules 1.6 and 3.3. Part IV suggests that although the new rules mostly balance a client's interest in confidentiality with a court's interest in candor, attorneys should be given the discretion to reveal client confidences when necessary. In conclusion, …

Institutional And Individual Justification In Legal Ethics: The Problem Of Client Selection, W. Bradley Wendel

Hofstra Law Review

Monroe Freedman is well known as a proponent of the "standard conception" of legal ethics - that is, that a lawyer cannot be criticized in moral terms for actions taken in a representative capacity. Surprisingly, however, Freedman has argued that client selection is a decision for which a lawyer may be required to provide a justification in ordinary moral terms. This apparent inconsistency reveals a conceptual distinction in normative ethical theory, which is often blurred, between justifying a practice (in this case, the legal system or some specialized practice such as criminal defense) and justifying an action falling within the …

Moralizing In Public, Anita L. Allen

Hofstra Law Review

No abstract provided.

Power As A Factor In Lawyers' Ethical Deliberation, Susan Carle

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.