I highly recommend Margaret Tarkington's article, A First Amendment Theory for Protecting Attorney Speech. Apart from its critical importance to explaining and advancing the lawyer's constitutional role, the article is a pleasure to read because it is so clearly written and powerfully argued. Abstract:
In June
2010, the United States Supreme Court held that Congress could
constitutionally prohibit attorneys from providing legal assistance and
advice regarding lawful nonviolent conduct to groups that the Secretary
of State has designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). The
plaintiffs, Ralph Fertig and the Humanitarian Law Project, wished to
assist two such FTOs invoke international human rights law, petition the
United Nations and United States Congress, and peacefully resolve their
disputes. The Supreme Court held that the statute clearly prohibited
plaintiffs’ proposed activities, but did not violate the Free Speech
Clause of the First Amendment because the attorneys could still engage
in “independent advocacy” of any message they wished to promote.
Allegedly, the plaintiff attorneys’ First Amendment rights were not
abridged because the law merely criminalized (with a potential
fifteen-year prison sentence) their speaking “in coordination with or
under the direction of” their proposed clientele.
Holder v.
Humanitarian Law Project underscores some of the distinctive problems
associated with restrictions on attorney speech. Unfortunately, as
demonstrated by the Court’s opinion, as well as Justice Breyer’s
impassioned dissent, there is not a workable First Amendment methodology
for analyzing restrictions on attorney speech.
Indeed, many
regulations on attorneys can be couched as restrictions on attorney
speech because the work of an attorney is done primarily through oral
and written communications. Attorneys – through their speech – play a
key role in providing access to justice and the fair administration of
the laws. They provide to clients speech that has the force of law and
that is intended to invoke or avoid the power of government in securing
individual or collective life, liberty, or property.
In this
paper, I propose a new access-to-justice theory of the First Amendment
to be used in examining the constitutionality of restrictions on
attorney speech – regardless of the regulating entity. The
access-to-justice theory proposes that where attorney speech is key to
providing or ensuring access to justice or the fair administration of
the laws, it needs special protection under the Free Speech Clause, akin
to the core protection afforded political speech. The paper identifies
four types of attorney speech that deserve this high level of
protection, namely, (1) the power to invoke the law on a client’s
behalf; (2) the provision of legal advice regarding proposed or past
client conduct; (3) the ability to raise relevant and colorable
arguments in court proceedings; and (4) the ability to preserve the
Constitutional rights of others.
Traditional self-regulation of
attorneys preserved, although imperfectly, the special role of
attorneys in our justice system because, in theory, the judiciary as
regulator understood the attorney’s role. By providing First Amendment
protection to attorney speech that is essential to our justice system,
the access-to-justice theory also safeguards the attorney’s essential
role as self-regulation declines and regulation is imposed by national
and intergovernmental entities, including legislative entities subject
to majoritarian pressures.
Found here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1669617
Posted by: Patrick S. O'Donnell | November 30, 2012 at 06:56 AM
I just got through with it and I agree with you, Monroe, that the article is well done.
Posted by: John Steele | November 30, 2012 at 05:02 PM
So folks don't draw the wrong inference (e.g., that I'm a dufus), my comment with the link was made before Monroe added it, and the abstract, to his post.
Posted by: Patrick S. O'Donnell | November 30, 2012 at 08:51 PM
@Patrick: sorry. First, no one who's seen your comments thinks you're a doofus! Second, it was your comment that prompted me to edit Monroe's post. (Previously I had received permission from the bloggers to add links, etc., to their posts. It was I who added the link and the abstract.)
Posted by: John Steele | November 30, 2012 at 10:36 PM