Florida Legal Heavyweights Take on Bar Rules
Eight of the Sunshine State’s largest law firms have now joined the Florida Bar in asking the Florida Supreme Court to revisit its recently-adopted and widely-derided advertising rules for attorney websites.
The law firms’ brief (pdf available here) offers a great overview of the limits on attorney advertising regulation. And while the brief closes with a request that the court simply go back to how things used to be (i.e., websites are “information provided at the request of a client”, and hence not subject to the ad rules), it also provides support for a more expansive undertaking:
Scrap all attorney advertising rules.
Bar regulators in states like Florida, New York and Louisiana have proven that they can’t be trusted to regulate within the bounds of the Constitution. They routinely flout the First Amendment, create uncertainty in their membership and drive the cost of legal services higher. It’s high time to cut them out of the loop and simply let general prohibitions on deceptive advertising operate for attorneys as they do for every other product or service.
In any event, kudos to Bilzin Sumberg, Carlton Fields, Foley & Lardner, Jorden Burt, Holland & Knight, Hunton & Williams, Weil Gotshal and White & Case for pointing out the abject unconstitutionality of the Florida Supreme Court rules. While it’s doubtful the Court will listen to you, here’s hoping that at least one of you takes this fight to federal court.
