060668 NYEO, ETH 076

• Case Date: June 06, 1968
• Court: New York

ETH 076 Ethics Opinion 076 New York Ethics Opinion New York State Bar Association Professional Ethics Committee Opinion June 6, 1968          (25-67)          Modified by 416          Topic: Group Legal Services Programs          Digest: Validity of group legal service programs under recent United States Supreme Court decisions          Canon: Former Canon 27, 35, 47          QUESTION          Numerous inquiries have been made relating to the validity of various types of group legal service programs. Heretofore, Canons 27 and 35 have been widely interpreted as making it ethically improper for lawyers to organize or participate in most group legal service programs. The current inquiries stem from widespread uncertainty as to the continued validity of prior interpretations applicable to such programs in view of the recent decisions of the United States Supreme Court in United Mine Workers v. Illinois State Bar Association, 389 U.S. 217 (1967); Railroad Trainmen v. Virginia State Bar Association, 377 U.S. 1 (1964); and NAACP v. Button, 371 U.S. 415 (1963).          The Mine Workers case sustained the employment of a salaried attorney by a labor union to prosecute workmen's compensation claims for union members. The Trainmen case sustained a referral plan under which union members with personal injury claims arising out of their employment were advised to consult specific lawyers who had agreed with the union to handle such cases at specific rates. The NAACP case permitted that organization to provide the services of staff lawyers to members and to others in litigation involving racial discrimination.          OPINION          Our Committee recognizes that substantial uncertainties have been created by these Supreme Court decisions as to the extent to which group legal services programs, previously held to be ethically improper, should now be permitted. These decisions, together with the growing movement to provide adequate legal service to the disadvantaged, have led bar associations throughout the country to begin to restudy the desirability of amending Canons 27 and 35 so as to permit...