Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility Commons^™

Making A List And Checking It Twice: Must Tax Attorneys Divulge Who's Naughty And Nice?, Richard Lavoie

ExpressO

This article analyzes the ability of tax attorneys to shield a client’s identity from disclosure to the Internal Revenue Service under the attorney-client privilege. The article concludes that, on policy grounds, the attorney-client privilege should be limited in the context of tax planning. Consequently, client identity should not be privileged irrespective of whether a tax shelter is involved. The article also concludes that the privilege would not be available under the current judicial approach to client identity questions. As a result, recent regulations requiring tax attorneys to maintain lists of clients engaging in specified tax motivated transactions represent an appropriate …

Using Our Brains: What Cognitive Science Teaches About Teaching Law Students To Be Ethical, Professionally Responsible Lawyers, Alan M. Lerner

ExpressO

Throughout our lives, below the level of our consciousness, each of us develops powerful values, intuitions, expectations, and needs that powerfully affect both our perceptions and our judgments. Placed in situations in which we feel threatened, or which implicate our values, our brains, relying on those implicitly learned, emotionally weighted, memories, can "downshift," to primitive, self-protective problem solving techniques - fight or flight. Because these processes operate below the radar of our consciousness, we react without reflection or the opportunity for interdiction. Thus, it may be that automatic, “emotional” reaction, rather than thoughtful, reasoned analysis leads to our responses to …

Lawyers In The Moral Maze , Mark A. Sargent

Working Paper Series

This article overviews the various forms of lawyer complicity in illegal or immoral behavior by corporate managers in the corporate scandals of the last three years, but focuses primarily on the question of why lawyers so often seemed willing to engage in or ignore behavior that presumably violated their own personal moral codes (whether religious or secular) as well as their professional role morality. The article draws on Robert Jackall's Moral Mazes (1988) for an answer derived from the sociology of corporate bureaucracies. Jackall's case studies of corporate managers found that managers adhered to the moral "rules-in-use" developed in their …

Save A Little Room For Me: The Necessity Of Naming As Inventors Practitioners Who Conceive Of Claimed Subject Matter, David Hricik, Alexandra Geczi, Zachary Thomas

Mercer Law Review

This Article addresses ethical and malpractice issues arising from the fact that attorneys who prosecute patents almost inevitably add to the inventor's original disclosure to the attorney. In the course of drafting a patent application-a process in which the attorney describes, necessarily in his own words, what the client has invented-the attorney will, at minimum, contribute ideas, thoughts, and means of expression that the client had not used. The application is not a verbatim transcript of an interview with the client; it is the creation of the patent lawyer. ...

However, under established law governing inventorship and derivation, seldom during …

Nothing Lost, Nothing Owed: Supreme Court Upholds State Iolta Program In Brown V. Legal Foundation Of Washington, Robert C. Hughes Iii

Mercer Law Review

In a 5-4 decision in Brown v. Legal Foundation of Washington, the United States Supreme Court held that a state law that (1) requires lawyers and limited practitioner officers ("LPOs") to deposit client funds that cannot otherwise generate net-earning for their clients into an interest on lawyer's trust account ("IOLTA account") and (2) mandates that the interest produced on those funds be transferred to a different owner for a legitimate public use could constitute a per se taking of the clients' right to that interest, but no compensation is owed to such clients when they suffer no net loss. …

Interviewing Ex-Employees: One Answer, New Questions, Susan P. Koniak

Faculty Scholarship

In Clark v. Beverly Health and Rehabilitation Services, Inc., 440 Mass. 270, 797 N.E.2d 905 (2003), the Supreme Judicial Court held that a lawyer for a party may contact former employees of the opposing party without violating Mass. r. Prof. C. 4.2. Lawyers who represent entities with former employees are not happy because, where 4.2 applies, the Rule makes it harder for the other side's lawyers to obtain information that might be damaging to the organization. Understandable. But some purport to be aghast, which is ridiculous. The Clark holding is in line with the ABA's position, the text of …

Civil Obedience, W. Bradley Wendel

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Discussions of legal ethics generally assume that lawyers should deliberate straightforwardly on the basis of reasons to act or refrain from acting. This model of deliberation fails to account for the role of the law in resolving normative disagreement and coordinating social activity by people who do not share comprehensive ethical doctrines. The law represents a collective decision about what citizens ought to do, which replaces the reasons individuals would otherwise have to act. This Article contends that legal ethics ought to be understood as an aspect of this theory of the authority of law. On this account, lawyers have …

Ethics And The 21st Century University, Judith Bailey

Center for the Study of Ethics in Society Papers

Papers presented for the Center of the Study of Ethics in Society Western Michigan University

Whats The Harm?: Rethinking The Role Of Domestic Violence Advocates And The Unauthorized Practice Of Law, Suzanne J. Schmitz

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

A Public View Of Attorney Discipline In Florida: Statistics, Commentary, And Analysis Of Disciplinary Actions Against Licensed Attorneys In The State Of Florida From 1988-2002, Debra Curtis, Billie Jo Kaufman

Faculty Scholarship

This article is intended to serve as a commentary and analysis of a public-eye view of disciplinary actions taken against licensed attorneys in the State of Florida during the past 15 years. The idea for this statistical review arose in 2002, prompted by discussions regarding self-regulation of various professions following the many corporate scandals then playing out in the headlines. Through these discussions, Professors Curtis and Kaufman developed the idea of looking at empirical data--from the Florida Bar to determine how the disciplinary system treated Florida lawyers.

Can I Call Kimura Crazy?: Ethical Tensions In The Cultural Defense, Rashmi Goel

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Using the tragic case of Fumiko Kimura as a back drop, the author discusses the impact of culture on defendants and argues for a client-centered approach that considers the client beyond the walls of their legal issue. The author concludes her article with a discussion of legal ethics, advocating for a more well rounded vision of the client that includes both legal and cultural interests.

To: [email protected]: Privilege At Risk?, 23 J. Marshall J. Computer & Info. L. 75 (2004), Dion Messer

UIC John Marshall Journal of Information Technology & Privacy Law

As more attorneys now days use the e-mail as their primary source of communication with their clients, new issues arise regarding the potential threat to attorney-client communication privilege resulting from the standard and systematic employer monitoring of their employees e-mails. Indeed employers monitor their employees’ computer use and in some cases terminate employees as result of this monitoring, for various reasons such as to increase of employee productivity and efficiency, protect their public image, prevent workplace harassment, protect their Intellectual Property assets and their network capacity. Given the systematic workplace monitoring but also the fact that contrary to the American …

To Discountenance The Haughty And The Lawless: The Ethics Of Dealing With Bad Clients, Donald L. Burnett Jr.

Articles

No abstract provided.

Sec Enforcement Of Attorney Up-The-Ladder Reporting Rules: An Analysis Of Institutional Constraints, Norms And Biases, Michael A. Perino

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Lawyers In The Moral Maze, Mark A. Sargent

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Undated (2004), Cso Gap Analysis Of Ifc Proposed Pss, Ifc

IFC E&S Performance Standards

No abstract provided.

Undated (2004), Csos, Draft V1 Of Gaps Analysis, Ifc

IFC E&S Performance Standards

No abstract provided.

2004 (Undated), Notes Of D. Hunter Re Cao Case Updates, Cao

CAO General 1999-Present

No abstract provided.

Misconduct By Law Professors: Why It Matters, Lisa G. Lerman

Scholarly Articles

No abstract provided.

Cooperation And Self-Interest Are Strange Bedfellows: Limited Waiver Of The Attorney-Client Privilege Through Production Of Privileged Documents In A Government Investigation, Ashok M. Pinto

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Leaders, Followers, And Free Riders: The Community Lawyer's Dilemma When Representing Non-Democratic Client Organizations, Michael Diamond, Aaron O'Toole

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article explores various aspects of the dissonance between the democratic ideal and the reality of groups in disenfranchised and disempowered communities. The authors discuss the intersection of democracy and community action by examining the sociology of groups and the social psychology of leaders and followers. They also examine the role of, and choices presented to, an attorney working in a community and for a local community group.

Learning From Practice: What Adr Needs From A Theory Of Justice, Kate Kruse

Faculty Scholarship

Adding to the impressive body of work that has made her a leading voice in the fields of both alternative dispute resolution and professional responsibility, Carrie Menkel-Meadow's Saltman Lecture connects the theoretical exploration currently occurring on two parallel tracks: (1) theories of justice that investigate the ideal of a deliberative democracy; and (2) theories of alternative dispute resolution arising from its reflective practice. As she notes, theorists on both tracks are grappling with similar questions about the processes or conditions that will best bring together parties with widely divergent viewpoints to consensus-building dialogue around contested issues.

While Menkel-Meadow focuses on …

Professionalism's Second Wave: A Sampling Of Issues Arising Within Legal Education, Donald L. Burnett Jr.

Articles

No abstract provided.

Rethinking Attorney Liens: Why Washington Attorneys Are Forced Into "Involuntary" Pro Bono, Zach Elsner

Seattle University Law Review

After a brief discussion of the history of the attorney lien in Part II, Part III discusses the basic rules governing the attorney lien in Washington. Part IV of this Comment discusses the various limitations on attorney liens and how those limitations have discouraged use or encouraged misuse of the statute. Part IV begins with a discussion of general professional responsibility concerns and continues with withdrawal and termination as they relate to attorney liens. Part IV concludes the Comment with a discussion of the inconsistencies of the retaining lien and a discussion of the various limitations on the charging liens.

Law, Human Rights, Realism And The “War On Terror”, J. Peter Pham

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

The Lesser Evil: Political Ethics in an Age of Terror by Michael Ignatieff. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004. 212pp.

Lisa Schechtman On Social Work And Human Rights: A Foundation For Policy And Practice By Elisabeth Reichert. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. 295pp., Lisa Schechtman

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Social Work and Human Rights: A Foundation for Policy and Practice by Elisabeth Reichert. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. 295pp.

Legal And Ethical Duties Of Lawyers After Sarbanes-Oxley, Roger C. Cramton, George M. Cohen, Susan P. Koniak

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Recent Case: Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Holds That A Lawyer May Be Liable For Malpractice For Failure To Ensure That A Mortgage Is Properly Filed And Indexed, Anthony Faranda-Diedrich

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Remembrance Of Things Past? The Relationship Of Past To Future In Pursuing Justice In Mediation, Carrie J. Menkel-Meadow

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

What must be remembered and acknowledged before we can move forward to create a future together, whether individually or collectively? Or, as Avishai Margalit has recently put it, is there an ethics of memory - must some things be remembered; what can be forgiven or forgotten in a moral sense? I have long been worried about the emphasis in mediation to focus on the future, to seek ''solutions" to problems in which the parties are guided to "move forward," even while "reorienting the parties to each other," in crafting a more productive relationship. With the growing use and adaptation of …

Religious Lawyering In A Liberal Democracy: A Challenge And An Invitation William A. Brahms Lecture On Law & Religion, Russell G. Pearce

Faculty Scholarship

At a time when many believe that law is no longer a noble profession, many lawyers see no reason to devote time and energy to promoting the public good. Religious lawyering may offer a powerful antidote: a robust framework for lawyers to integrate into their professional lives their most deeply rooted values, perspectives and critiques, and persuasive reasons to improve the quality of justice and work for the common good. At its best, religious lawyering echoes Martin Luther King's advice to the street sweeper. How wonderful it would be, indeed, if we practiced law so well that the host of …