ABA approves changes to the Model Rules

Professor Andrew Perlman, Chief Reporter of the ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20, is reporting (at the Legal Ethics Forum) that this afternoon the ABA House of Delegates approved numerous changes to the Model Rules of Professional Conduct and related ABA policies, adopting all six resolutions proposed by the Commission.  A brief two page summary of the changes can be found here, and you can find the specific amendments that the ABA adopted along with the accompanying reports here.  (Resolutions 105A and 105F in the preceding link underwent minor changes after they were posted.  Clean versions of those Resolutions should be available within the next few days.) 

Professor Perlman is also reporting that the six resolutions adopted today reflect the bulk of the Commission's proposals, though the Commission will continue to study several remaining issues before the Commission completes its work in February 2013.  Those issues relate to virtual law practice, choice of law problems associated with conflicts of interest and nonlawyer ownership, and domestic practice authority for inbound foreign lawyers.  (The Commission's continued consideration of the choice of law problems associated with nonlawyer ownership was the subject of a remarkably spirited debate today in the ABA House of Delegates.)