Professional Responsibilities (850-001)

PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES (850-001)

Professor Marsha M. Mansfield University of Wisconsin Law School, Office 1349 Tel (608) 262-9142; [email protected]

Class Schedule: Tuesdays & Thursdays 10:30-11:50 Room 2225 Office Hours: Wednesday 10:30-12:30 or by appointment

REQUIRED TEXTBOOKS  Lerman & Schrag, Ethical Problems in the Practice of Law (Concise Third Edition)  Lerman, Shrag & Gupta Ethical Problems in the Practice of Law OR  ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct (2016)

TOPICS FOR FIRST CLASS: Introduction to the course Institutions that regulate lawyers State ethics codes Admission to practice The character and fitness inquiry

Problems (be prepared to discuss): 1-2 The Doctored Resume Your First Ethics Problem (below)

READINGS: Text: pp. xxvii-xxx and pp. 1-61 Model Rules: Preamble and Scope note, and Rule 8.1

Your First Ethics Problem You secured a good job at a mid-sized litigation firm following graduation. You decided early on in law school that you enjoyed trial work and this job has been a good fit. You work very hard for your clients and to impress the partners as you would like to make partner in this firm.

One day, about two years into your work, a problem comes up in a case you are handling for one of the firm’s largest clients. Either you or your paralegal miscalculated the date that your reply brief to a summary judgment motion was due by mail to opposing counsel and your opponent has refused to stipulate to electronic service. The brief is complete but you are a day late and the judge hearing the motion is a stickler with a reputation for not even considering pleadings that are not timely served.

You are in a panic, thinking about losing your job and how you will make those student loan payments, not to mention the payments on the new car you treated yourself to when you passed the bar. You confide in a fellow associate who was a couple of years ahead of you in law school. She asks whether you are serving electronically and you reply that your opponent insisted on mail service. “Great,” she tells you. “Here’s what you can do. Just turn the postage meter back a day, backdate the date on your brief, and mail it out this morning. Sometimes the postal service rejects backdated mail, but usually if you get it in the mail early enough, they don’t. It’ll probably get you off the hook and no one will know the difference.”

You walk away feeling confused and upset. You know that turning back the postage meter is not the right thing to do, yet it seems so easy, and the ethics of the situation raised little concern with your more experienced colleague, whose sense of “right” and “wrong” you’ve always admired. You feel enormous pressure, not just for yourself, but to protect your client’s case. You know that your law school ethics teacher would have cited you a rule —probably several – that this conduct would violate. You also recall that your supervising partner always talks about doing “whatever it takes to get the job done.” You consider whether turning back the postage meter may be a situation of “no harm, no foul” since no one will be the wiser. You aren’t sure what you should do now.

1. How do you feel you “should” be acting in this situation and why? 2. Are there any rules of professional responsibility that provide guidance in this situation? 3. Is there a tension between what the rules seem to see a lawyer must do and what you feel a lawyer should do in this situation? 4. Are there any practical considerations that guide your decision-making?