Just Conduct: Regulating Bench-Bar Relationships

Judicial conduct, particularly judicial misconduct, has long drawn public attention and concern. In the past few years, media coverage has brought the issue to the forefront, highlighting a reality that the legal profession might prefer to avoid-that problematic judicial conduct frequently implicates lawyers. Recent news stories have reported interactions between judges and lawyers that are clearly prohibited by the codes of judicial conduct: They entail bribery, improper financial ties, and even improper sexual relationships. Recent reports have also covered problematic interactions between judges and lawyers that are not proscribed and are, in fact, encouraged by the codes of judicial conduct- codes that prohibit similar ties between judges and other private individuals.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, these codes of judicial conduct, adopted in every state, are the product of a reform movement driven almost exclusively by the legal profession.