Document Type
Article
Publication Date
11-21-2020
Keywords
Legal ethics, professional responsibility, Judicial law clerks
Abstract
Judicial law clerks are largely overlooked in the Canadian legal literature. This article
provides a new doctrinal account of the ethical obligations of law clerks that is rooted
in the fact that at least some of the major work of law clerks constitutes the practice of
law—and thus that law clerks’ ethics are lawyers’ ethics. It argues that the lawyer’s
duty to encourage respect for the administration of justice transposes some of the
ethical obligations of the judge into professional obligations of the law clerk. The
article also argues that the law societies’ regulatory and disciplinary jurisdiction over
law clerks is at least largely incompatible with judicial independence.
Recommended Citation
Andrew Flavelle Martin, "Legal Ethics and Judicial Law Clerks: A New Doctrinal Account" (2020) 71 UNB LJ 248.
Publication Abbreviation
UNB LJ
