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First Amendment

New Jersey bar can reserve positions for members of underrepresented groups, appeals court says

By Debra Cassens Weiss

December 23, 2024, 2:22 pm CST

The New Jersey State Bar Association has a First Amendment right to expressive association that would be violated if forced to change a diversity program for leadership positions, a state appeals court has ruled.

The Superior Court of New Jersey’s Appellate Division ruled Dec. 20 against Rajeh A. Saadeh in his lawsuit alleging that the program violated the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination.

Law360 has coverage.

The diversity program reserves 13 out of 94 leadership positions in the bar for members of certain underrepresented groups. Saadeh is a Palestinian Muslim American attorney who was not eligible for the positions.

The bar association had maintained that it had a First Amendment right to select leaders consistent with its values regarding diversity in the legal profession. The appeals court agreed.

Requiring the New Jersey State Bar Association to change or eliminate its program would “significantly burden the expression of its views, thus running afoul of the association’s First Amendment right of expressive association,” the appeals court said.

The appeals court cited the 2000 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Boy Scouts of America v. Dale, which held that the Scouts had a First Amendment right of expressive association that protected its decision to oust an openly gay assistant scoutmaster.

“Applying Dale to the undisputed facts in this record establishes beyond peradventure that the bar association qualifies as an expressive association, and that compelling it to end its practice of ensuring the presence of designated underrepresented groups in its leadership would unconstitutionally infringe its ability to advocate the value of diversity and inclusivity in the association and more broadly in the legal profession,” the appeals court said.

The appeals court did not decide whether the program amounted to unlawful discrimination because of the First Amendment holding.

A trial judge had ruled that the diversity program was a “quota system” that violated the law.

Saadeh “will promptly seek correction” of the appellate decision, Lindsay McKillop, his lawyer, told Law360.

The New Jersey State Bar Association applauded the decision in a Dec. 20 press release.

The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a temporary ban on drone flights in more than 20 New Jersey communities — prohibiting them from entering their local airspace until Jan. 17 for “special security reasons” — as authorities investigate over 5,000 reported sightings that have come in the last few weeks, according to FAA officials, sparking widespread speculation.

“At the request of federal security partners, the FAA published 22 Temporary Flight Restrictions (TFRs) prohibiting drone flights over critical New Jersey infrastructure,” the FAA told Law&Crime in a statement Thursday. The agency’s official ban alert calls for temporary flight restrictions “from the surface up to and including 400 feet AGL (above ground level),” per the online description.

“No UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) operations are authorized,” the alert says.

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Ethics

Overturning 45-year precedent, New Jersey gives disbarred lawyers second chance

By Debra Cassens Weiss

October 16, 2024, 11:55 am CDT

Former New Jersey lawyers who are disbarred will in most cases be allowed to apply for reinstatement after five years, the New Jersey Supreme Court has decided.

The New Jersey Supreme Court’s Oct. 15 order and determination reject the approach that it adopted in a 1979 case that imposed automatic and permanent disbarment for knowing misappropriation of funds. Now, lawyers disbarred for misappropriation, as well as lawyers disbarred for other reasons, can apply for readmission in five years as long as several conditions are met.

Law360 and Law.com are among the publications with coverage.

New Jersey now joins 41 other states and the District of Columbia in allowing disbarred attorneys to seek readmission. Most of those jurisdictions allow an application for reinstatement after five years.

But not every lawyer can apply for reinstatement in New Jersey. The state supreme court retained the authority to impose permanent disbarment in future egregious cases and to block successive applications for reinstatement for particular attorneys, according to an Oct. 15 press release on the new admission process.

The path back to a law license won’t be easy. Lawyers seeking readmission must meet several conditions, including requirements that they prove fitness to practice law, that they take and pass the New Jersey bar exam and the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination, that they complete specified continuing legal education courses, and that they file a statement of restitution paid to former clients and a client protection fund.

The New Jersey Supreme Court acted on a recommendation of the so-called Wade Committee, also known as the state supreme court’s Special Committee on the Duration of Disbarment for Knowing Misappropriation. It is named for lawyer Dionne Larrel Wade, who was disbarred after a random audit showed that she sometimes took money from her client trust account to pay bills. She always repaid the money, however, and she had no prior discipline.

Wade had represented underserved clients and was honored for her pro bono work.

“Everything I’ve done in my life was to become an attorney and to help people,” Wade told the ABA Journal in a December 2022 article.

The New Jersey Supreme Court’s opinion disbarring Wade convened the special committee to evaluate whether disbarment should always be permanent. Twenty-one of the committee’s 28 members recommended a path to readmission.

New Jersey Supreme Court Chief Justice Stuart Rabner commented on the readmission decision in the press release.

“Going forward, New Jersey’s legal system will have a robust and fair review process that not only protects the public but also affords disbarred attorneys, who have taken appropriate steps, a chance to practice law again after five years,” Rabner said.