Elizabeth Warren practiced law without a license?

Here’s a good comment on Jacobson’s post from a Massachusetts lawyer, Edward Wiest:

If the work in question was confined to consulting with admitted counsel (e.g., attorneys for asbestos insurers), as long as Prof. Warren did not file a sole appearance for a client, nor provide services to “laypersons”, she would likely be within the safe harbor of ABA Model Rule 5.5 (c)(1), as adopted in the Massachusetts Rules of Professional Responsibility (permitting non-Massachusetts lawyers to provide “legal” services “undertaken in association with a lawyer who is admitted to practice in this jurisdiction and who actively participates in the matter”.) Furthermore, _if_ Professor Warren’s work were limited to consultative services in the form of providing or guiding research and writing for trial/appellate/amici counsel, it would be little different from that of a “law student intern” permitted to assist an admitted attorney under ABA Model Rule 5.3, Comment [1], as adopted in Massachusetts.

IIRC, the scope of the activities of Haavaad law professors as more or less permanent consultants to one or several law firms (notwithstanding Harvard’s prohibition of its law faculty holding “of counsel” positions on law firm letterhead) has always been a source of bemusement/irritation to people inside and outside the Law School. If (for whatever reason), Professor Warren had ceased to be a member of any state bar, she should have received credit for her assistance to counsel of record by footnote (as customary for “nonlawyers”), rather than through “of counsel” credit on the cover of the brief (I doubt she would care as long as the checks cleared). I would hope that the limited resources I contribute to the Massachusetts bar disciplinary system would be directed to more serious threats to the public than this.[/

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One of my readers, a lawyer, writes in:

The post indicates that this is a federal case. You do not need to be licensed to practice law in Massachusetts to practice law in federal courts located in Massachusetts or anywhere else. Federal courts decide who can practice before them, and individual states can’t tell federal courts that an attorney cannot practice before them. It’s that whole supremacy clause thing. Constitution 101 and all that.

It is really well established that a federal district court can admit an attorney to practice before it even if the attorney is not licensed in that state. You most certainly do not need to be licensed in the state where a federal court of appeals sits to appear before the federal court of appeals. I am clearly practicing law when I argue before the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. It does not matter that I am not licensed in Ohio.

The blurb also mentions taking the case to the US Supreme Court. I have submitted an amicus brief in the United States Supreme Court on a case that originated in West Virginia state courts even though I am not licensed to practice there. I was not practicing law without a license when I did so because I was admitted to practice before the Supreme Court.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Another veteran lawyer writes in to Campaign Spot:

I have practiced law for 30 years. Your correspondent is correct that a federal court can permit an attorney from a state outside the state wherein the federal court sits to appear before that court. The practice is called “pro hac vice,” which is Latin for “for this occasion.” Here are the pro hac vice requirements for the District Court of Mass, which would be the relevant court in this case.

However, this does not conclude the issue. There would still need to be an attorney licensed in Mass. who moved for Ms. Warren to be admitted pro hac vice for the case at hand. Such a document would have to be in the docket of the case as to which she was representing her client. If Ms. Warren simply filed pleadings without first being admitted to the court pro hac vice, she would be implicitly representing to the court that she was, in fact, licensed to practice in Mass., and if she was not so licensed, she would have violated the court’s rules, and, in effect, have committed a fraud upon the court.