LLM Advanced Legal Profession Seminar

This course will explore the role of lawyers' ethics in the American legal system and the conceptual models that currently frame the ethical rules and regulate lawyer behavior. It also will explore those areas in which ethical regulation deviates from practice, and further examine the larger structural, social, and economic issues of the U.S. legal profession, including law firms, solo practice, and the role of general counsel. Materials will be largely empirical, sociological, and conceptual rather than practice-oriented, unlike related courses on advocacy ethics. The grade will be based principally on a non-anonymous paper and, to a lesser extent, on several smaller assignments. Some lesser aspects of the grading will also involve teamwork. The seminar is an intensive writing and editing experience which will result in a published book of student work. Professor Childress plans to invoke a rule penalizing students for failure to be prepared and/or excessive absenteeism. Students who take this class may not have taken, or co-enroll in the Professional Responsibility Seminar.