Legal Ethics Resources on the Web
Prepared by Brad Wendel
Associate Professor of
Links to Primary Sources of Professional Responsibility Law
Cornell Law School American Legal Ethics Library. An excellent collection of links to state bar association material (local versions of the Model Code and Model Rules, disciplinary opinions, bar admission information) and, in populous states, narrative overviews of the local law of lawyering, prepared by prominent law firms. There is also a topical overview, which collects disciplinary rules under subject categories (competence, conflicts of interest, and so on). All of the information is cross-indexed and interlinked with other pages for ease of use. This is a top-notch site, and should be one of the first resources you consult when conducting research on professional responsibility issues.
Virginia Resources. For students and lawyers interested in Virginia professional responsibility law, there are excellent resources at the Cornell site, including the current Code of Professional Responsibility, the newly (Jan. 1, 2000) adopted Rules of Professional Conduct, and a comparison chart of the Code and the Rules. We are also fortunate to have access to an outstanding summary of Virginia ethics opinions, painstakingly prepared by Tom Spahn, a partner at McGuire Woods. This database is searchable by topic, and is very user-friendly. The full text of opinions issued after 1990 may be printed from a site maintained by Virginia CLE. Finally, numerous articles on professional responsibility law in Virginia are available from Virginia State Bar ethics counsel Jim McCauley's web site.
FindLaw -- Ethics and Professional Responsibility Page. FindLaw is the Yahoo of the legal world, containing thousands of links, organized by subject, to on-line resources. This page is an extremely comprehensive collection of links to government agencies, bar association sites (including advisory ethics opinions), law libraries, publications, and Internet communities like mailing lists and Usenet groups. Along with the Cornell site, above, this is one of the best places to begin on-line research.
Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers. Another good collection of links, organized by state, to ethics opinions, state versions of the Model Code or Model Rules, state bar association websites, and the like.
Hricik's State Links. Updated more frequently than the ABA's site, this page of links connects you to primary sources (rules, ethics opinions, etc.) and sometimes analysis, organized by state. There is also a growing list of topics on this site for which the author (an experienced lawyer in attorney-discipline matters) provides his own analysis. Topics (as of May 2001) include multijurisdictional and multidisciplinary practice, conflicts, and technology issues like e-mail confidentiality.
ABA Center for Professional Responsibility. A very good place to go for current information about proposed changes to state lawyer disciplinary rules (the "Ethics 2000" initiative); links to state rules on advertising and solicitation; headnote summaries of ABA Formal Ethics Opinions; a comprehensive guide to bar admissions requirements; links to state resources such as local versions of the rules and ethics opinions, and information about ABA products and services. The Ethics 2k proposed final rules changes are now on-line. There are separate resources pages for lawyers interested in the issues of multijurisdictional practice (MJP) and multidisciplinary practice (MDP), both of which have been studied by ABA commissions. The commission home pages include notices of upcoming hearings, past hearing transcripts, written comments, and reports and recommendations of the commissions. Be forewarned: the server is slow as molasses.
Unauthorized Practice of Law Rules. Also maintained by the ABA, this compilation warrants separate mention for its usefulness. The document provides the statutes or court rules regulating the unauthorized practice of law in all 50 states. Excellent for considering multijurisdictional practice issues. For rules relating to a similar issue -- namely, whether in-house counsel can provide legal advice under the law of a jurisdiction in which they are not admitted -- see this collection of rules, maintained by David Hricik.
JURIST Legal Profession Subject Guide. JURIST is the "law professors' network" -- a collection of news items (pertaining to the U.S. Supreme Court, other legal happenings, and law schools), articles, book reviews, law school course pages, and law professors' home pages. The Legal Profession Subject Guide, edited by me, contains links to the resources on JURIST that pertain to legal ethics and the legal profession.
Legalethics.com. Despite its broad-sounding name, this site concentrates primarily on issues facing lawyers who use electronic media (e-mail, Web sites, Usenet, etc.) in their practice. In that area, it is the preeminent Web resource. For lawyers concerned with non-cyber issues, the site includes a number of good links to ethics sites maintained by state bar associations. For a scholarly analysis of professional responsibility issues arising from lawyer-nonlawyer communications through the Internet, see the article entitled "Attorney-Client Relationships in Cyberspace" by Catherine Lanctot, originally published in the Duke Law Journal.
Washington University Law School -- Legal Ethics Research Guide. A useful overview of print and on-line resources available to practitioners and law students researching professional responsibility issues. Internet sources are linked, although some of the links are restricted to Wash. U. students and faculty. This site is particularly helpful to students who may be unsure of the relevance and interrelationship of various authorities (such as ethics opinions) and the way the primary and secondary materials are organized.
Crossing the Bar -- Multijurisdictional Practice Rules. Good compilation of state rules for admission by motion, practice pro hac vice, unauthorized practice of law (UPL) rules as they pertain to in-house lawyers, and other rules applicable to UPL and multijurisdictional practice. The site features brief overviews and analysis of the rules, in addition to links to primary sources. This is a hot area, recently taken up by a special ABA study commission on multijurisdictional practice, which is currently holding public meetings.
U.S. Office of Government Ethics. This site provides information on the federal executive-branch conflicts of interest statutes. There are also links to sources of information on legislative and judicial branch ethics sites.
Enron Documents. Maintained by Weil, Gotshal & Manges.
English Professional Conduct Rules. For anyone interested in comparative professional regulation, the Law Society of England and Wales maintains an on-line collection of professional conduct rules for solicitors. A similar code of conduct for barristers is provided by the Bar of England and Wales.
Canadian Legal Ethics Resources. Links to resource pages in Canada and internationally, as well as articles on issues of legal ethics by Canadian lawyers and scholars.
National Organization of Bar Counsel. The NOBC site features a good compilation of reported disciplinary opinions from various jurisdictions. Another good resource is a reprint of a comprehensive bibliography of on-line legal ethics materials, compiled by a Stetson University law professor: A. Darby Dickerson, Ethics on the Web: An Annotated Bibliography of Legal Ethics Material on the Internet, 28 Stetson L. Rev. 369 (1998).
MPRE Information. Although I loathe the concept of the MPRE, it is a requirement for bar admissions in most states. This portion of the National Conference of Bar Examiners site provides an overview of the MPRE, dates of administration, subject matter coverage, and so on.
Codes of Ethics Online. Not limited to the legal profession, this site (maintained by the Illinois Institute of Technology) brings together the ethics codes of hundreds of organizations, including rock artists, air traffic controllers, nurse-midwives, ministers of the Covenant of the Goddess, and the International Friends of the Clumber Spaniel.
Analysis of Legal Ethics Issues
Freivogel on Conflicts. Excellent site -- essentially an on-line treatise -- maintained by a former loss prevention counsel for ALAS, the professional liability insurer to many of the nation's largest law firms. (As a former lawyer at an ALAS firm, take it from me -- these guys do very good work.) Contains thorough analysis of most conflicts issues that arise in large-firm law practice, including such topics as lawyer mobility and screening, the complicated corporate family representation rules, and positional conflicts. In addition, it's updated frequently. There's usually a reference to a significant case within a couple of days after it's decided. This site is highly recommended for anyone doing research on conflicts issues. I can't emphasize enough -- this is one of the best professional responsibility resources on the Web.
Ethics and Lawyering. This site is run by Bill Freivogel and Lucian Pera, two highly respected professional responsibility lawyers. It permits readers to subscribe to an e-mail newsletter providing summaries of recent court decisions on the law governing lawyers, and also maintains an archive of past newsletters. One of the best features of the site is links to PDF versions of recent judicial opinions, which saves the headache (and cost, if you're not in a law school) of printing them out from Westlaw. Another site that gets a big thumbs-up.
David Hricik. A relatively new but rapidly growing collection of analyses and links on specific professional responsibility issues. Highlights include discussion of unauthorized practice of law issues raised by multijurisdictional practice, the latest on the multidisciplinary practice (MDP) debate, the law governing surreptitious taping and surveillance, and some rather esoteric but important conflicts issues, such as taking discovery from a current client and the "hot potato" rule.
Hoffman and Sharswood On-Line. David Hoffman and George Sharswood were Nineteenth Century lawyers who wrote influential commentaries on legal ethics. Their works are frequently cited today, but difficult to obtain in print. Thanks to Teresa Collett of South Texas College of Law for posting these resources.
Attorney-Client Relationship in Cyberspace. This electronically published article, by Catherine Lanctot, appeared in print in the Duke Law Journal. It is an excellent analysis of legal ethics issues posed by lawyer/nonlawyer communications online.
Wendel's Ethics Outline. While I make no claim to comprehensiveness, this outline does treat in detail many of the topics that are covered in a typical professional responsibility course. References are to the Hazard, Koniak & Cramton casebook.
AALS Professional Responsibility Section Newsletter. Published by the Association of American Law Schools' Section on Professional Responsibility, and edited by law professors specializing in legal ethics, this source is excellent for keeping current on developments in this area. Each edition of the newsletter contains summaries of important new cases on professional responsibility issues.
LJX Articles on Professional Responsibility. Articles that have appeared in the on-line news service Law Journal Extra.
NABRICO Links.
This page of links, maintained by a
Law Office Hornbook. A
collaborative project of the state bar associations of
Michael
Geist's Web Lecture on Legal Ethics. Michael Geist, a
colleague of mine from
Walter Steele. This site,
maintained by a former law professor to promote his consulting business, has a
good newletter, called "ethics chat," that covers in detail a few
current professional responsibility issues. (Recent topics include lying
in negotiations, lawyer liability for negligent misrepresentation, and
arbitration clauses in fee agreements.) Most of the references are to
Overlawyered.com. Here's an unusual site to close out this section. I often talk about the divergence between the public's conception of legal ethics and the profession's. The public generally (in my armchair empiricist mode) prioritizes social values like public safety and the prevention of serious frauds over individual values like loyalty to clients and confidentiality. Here's some evidence for that view. Overlawyered.com is a web site collecting articles about lawyer behavior that seems to outrage the general public. The site at large has a "personal responsibility" theme similar to books such as Philip Howard, The Death of Common Sense and Walter Olson, The Litigation Explosion. There's a separate section on legal ethics, which focuses on things like witness coaching, contingent fee abuses, frivolous litigation, and nondisclosure of information related to public safety (which I think is ironically in tension with the personal-responsibility message preached in the other sections of the site).
Print Resources with On-Line Indexes
Georgetown
Journal of Legal Ethics. The most important student-edited
legal ethics journal published in the
Legal Ethics.
Legal Ethics is a new interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal published
in
Journal of the Legal Profession. Published by the University of Alabama Law School, this is a relatively new publication concentrating on legal ethics.
Ethics. Ethics
is a journal published by the
Organizations
American Inns of Court. Inns of Court are groups of practicing lawyers, judges, academics, and law students, who gather to discuss issues related to professionalism, ethics, and civility. The Web site includes information about the organization, the Professional Creed of Inn of Court members, and some linked reports on ethics and professionalism, such as the Seventh Circuit's report on civility, and the final resolution of the Conference of Chief Justices. (Note that the index page of this site loads very slowly.)
Stein Center for Law and Ethics --
Fordham Law School. Fordham is one of the best centers for
legal ethics scholarship in the country, with several scholars who specialize
in the subject. The
Nelson Mullins Riley
& Scarborough Center for Professionalism. This center, at
the
University of San Francisco School of Law -- Center for Applied Legal Ethics. This site is under construction, but it is expected to focus on the teaching of legal ethics. Here is a statment of the Center's mission: "The Center for Applied Legal Ethics is dedicated to fostering ethical behavior in the practice of law. . . . The Center's focus is on the everyday practice of law, with the goal of enriching the legal community's understanding of ethics and morality."
Institute for the Study of Legal Ethics -- Hofstra Law School. Hofstra has long been a leader in the study and teaching of legal ethics. The Institute, directed by Monroe Freedman and Roy Simon, sponsors conferences and publishes the Journal for the Institute for the Study of Legal Ethics.
Harvard University Center for Ethics and the Professions. Offering fellowships and sponsoring conferences.
New! Appalling Lawyer Ads
I am generally in favor of a broad sphere of freedom for lawyers' advertisements, for reasons of ensuring access to legal services for consumers who are not plugged into elite lawyer referral networks. But I must admit that the Supreme Court's commercial speech jurisprudence, which has limited the traditional authority of states to regulate advertising, has given lawyers room to produce some pretty tasteless advertising. The links in this section feature some of the most egregious examples of tacky advertising, submitted by my professional responsibility students.
Jim "the Hammer"
Shapiro. Famous in
Willie Gary. I don't know how obnoxious this ad is -- it's actually kind of tasteful -- but I'm amazed at this guy's private jet. The interior looks like a law firm, albeit one with beds, but it's inside a 737.
Moral Philosophy and Applied (Non-Legal) Ethics
Association for Practical and Professional Ethics. The leading national organization for philosophers and other scholars working on ethical issues as they pertain to public and professional life. The site has job listings, calls for papers, conference schedules, and links.
Ethics Updates: From the Values Institute -- University of San Diego. This site consists of useful links, arranged by topic, to journal articles, reference works, discussion forums, and very thorough annotated biobliographic guides to readings in the philosophy literature. Topics include moral theory (e.g. Aristotle and Virtue Ethics, Moral Relativism) and Applied Ethics (e.g. Abortion, Punishment and the Death Penalty, Animal Rights). Some primary sources (mostly classic texts in moral philosophy) are linked also.
Center for Applied Ethics -- University of British Columbia. Good collection of links to online resources in practical and applied ethics, as well as a bibliography of works in print, arranged by subject. One helpful page is a collection of the codes of ethics of various professions. (Hint: The book bibliography on this site has links to Amazon.com and a Canadian Internet bookseller. If you want to save some money, before buying the books new, see if a used book is available by searching the Bibliofind service. Bibliofind is a database of the inventory of used book stores all over the country, many of which stock academic and scholarly books.)
Ethics Connection: From the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics -- Santa Clara University. Interesting resources, including case studies for discussion, resources for making ethical decisions (which is really just a summary of numerous issues in the contemporary moral philosophy debate), a database of articles addressing ethical issues and, of course, a collection of links. Plenty of original content and a well organized site.
Society for Business Ethics. One feature of interest on this site is an archive of newsletters, containing notices of upcoming conferences, calls for papers, and brief abstracts of recently published books in professional (but mostly business) ethics. There's also a good collection of links to other business-ethics sites.
Institute for Business and Professional Ethics -- DePaul University. Featuring a newsletter, calendar of conferences, calls for papers, a list of ethics consultants (expert witnesses, anyone?), and the usual links.
Institute for the Study of Applied and Professional Ethics -- Dartmouth College. This site features course syllabi from the College, a comprehensive international list of conferences and calls for papers in practical and professional ethics, as well as a quarterly newsletter, posted in PDF format. The links page collects Web sites of similar institutes at other universities.
Center for Business Ethics -- University of St. Thomas. Home of the Online Journal of Ethics, as well as a list of conferences, seminars, and events.
Page updated: September 19, 2002.
Please send me an e-mail to let me know if
any of these links are out of date, or with comments and suggestions.