The Arizona Supreme Court this year approved admission by motion to practice law in Arizona beginning on January 1, 2010. This is a fairly significant move since most states you would want to move to (including retirement states like Arizona) still require lawyers from other jurisdictions to take the bar exam and qualify for licensing like any fresh out of law school graduate. So while my license in Illinois to practice law would have qualified me for admission by motion in, say, Ohio, when I decided to practice law in Arizona, I had to pass the Arizona bar exam and fill out the extensive character & fitness application for the Arizona bar.
This practice is fairly common to protect the home state lawyers from lawyers licensed in other states who decide to move in and try to take a share of the legal business. It also acts as a check to make sure the lawyers practicing in a state know that state’s laws.
In Arizona, the fear of course is that a bunch of retired lawyers from New York, Chicago and California move here and continue to practice – taking away valuable legal work from Arizona licensed lawyers (the old saying being that lawyers never retire – they just die). By requiring most of the lawyers who want to practice in Arizona to sit for the rather grueling bar exam and fill out a questionnaire covering the entire history of their legal career, plus list any infraction down to traffic tickets going back many years – Arizona provides incentive for most of these “retired” lawyers to stick to working on their golf game and not practicing law when they move to Arizona.
So the change in rules creates the possibility that those “retired” lawyers moving to Arizona may again be able to practice law upon completion of certain conditions. Among these conditions are:
The lawyer must be licensed by bar examination in another state and be in good standing not subject to any disciplinary action; The lawyer must have been primarily engaged in the practice of law in one or more other states for 5 out of the last 7 years; The lawyer must have the character and fitness to practice law in Arizona (presumably meaning they still would have to fill out at least a portion of the character & fitness application); and The lawyer has to successfully complete a course on Arizona law (the course curriculum to be approved by the Arizona Supreme Court. So while there are still a few hoops to jump through, the main hurdle that keeps lawyers from trying to get licensed in another state – taking the bar exam – will no longer be required. The requirement that will trip up many of the currently retired lawyers living in Arizona from getting licensed is the requirement to have practiced 5 of the last 7 years. While the definition of “primarily engaged in the practice of law” is in the amended rule, I’m sure a few clarifications will need to be issued surrounding this definition (you can see a snowbird who has had only a couple of clients back home for the last five years arguing they were “primarily engaged in the practice of law”). Corporate counsel already practicing in Arizona will also be eligible to receive their license in Arizona by motion. So with the new registration/certification rules in place that I wrote about the other day, in-house counsel may just decide to receive full licensing instead of only getting certified. From the younger lawyers’ viewpoint, I think this change is positive as it will increase the mobility of a group of young professionals into Arizona – something we need more of. Currently, Arizona doesn’t tend to attract graduates directly out of the top-flight law schools. So, for instance, previously a young lawyer who grew up in Arizona, went to Columbia Law and practiced in New York for a number of years, may be reluctant to come home to practice because of needing to take the bar exam again. Now the process will seem a little less daunting and Arizona can grow its crop of young legal talent – a good thing for Arizona’s economy on a number of levels. Now if only they had passed this rule a couple of years earlier… A copy of the amended rule can be downloaded here (pdf).
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