Submit Inquiries to the MBA Committee on Professional Ethics
All requests for ethical advice must be submitted in writing here.
Your inquiry must include:
- A brief summary of the facts raising the ethical issue
- The ethical problem as you see it
- Whether there is an emergency requiring a rapid response
In accordance with the rules that govern the Committee on Professional Ethics, advice may not be rendered in instances where the matter is pending before a court or tribunal, contains a question of substantive law or unauthorized practice of law, pertains
to a hypothetical scenario, or questions the conduct of another attorney.
Emergency Advice
Inquiries requiring emergency advice will be handled, when feasible, on an expedited basis by a single committee member. Emergency inquiries must be in writing here,
with an indication that your inquiry should receive emergency consideration.
*The committee only gives advice. It is not a governmental body and its advice has no binding force, although successive bar counsel have stated that as a general rule, they will not take disciplinary action against lawyers who follow the committee's advice if they have given the committee all the relevant facts. That, however, is a matter of bar counsel's policy, not of committee power. As might be expected when the subject matter involves sensitive questions of lawyers' obligations, bar counsel has very occasionally expressed public disagreement with the committee's views.