Change is hard. Even where it appears to be wanted.

I have been meaning to do this and am long overdue in getting to it, but you might recall back in the summer of 2017 when I wrote pretty extensively about the contents of the Oregon Futures Task Force Report, and its positive proposed changes to the ethics rules.  If you don’t, you can read those posts here and here.

In November 2017, the chair of the Legal Ethics Committee in Oregon who also was a member of the Futures Task Force was kind enough to drop me a line and update on how those proposed rules revisions were progressing.

Initially the Board of Governors of the Oregon State Bar approved the proposed revisions to RPC 5.4, 7.2, and 7.3 for discussion and voting by its House of Delegates.

After the process in the House of Delegates, in which there was quite a significant amount of debate and discussion as I am told, the proposed revisions to RPC 5.4 and 7.2 were referred back to the Board of Governors to a study committee, but the proposed revision to RPC 7.3 was passed and has been submitted to the Oregon Supreme Court so it can decide whether to adopt it or not.

While in my prior postings I discussed the RPC 5.4 proposed revision at some length, I did not provide any real detail of the RPC 7.3 change Oregon was considering beyond the fact that it would involve allowing in-person or real-time electronic solicitation, with limited exceptions.  For the record, this is what the Oregon Supreme Court now has in front of it for consideration:

RULE 7.3 SOLICITATION OF CLIENTS
A lawyer shall not solicit professional employment by any means if:

(a) the lawyer knows or reasonably should know that the physical, emotional or mental state of the person who is the target of the solicitation is such that the person could not exercise reasonable judgment in employing a lawyer;
(b) the [person who is the] target of the solicitation has made known to the lawyer a desire not to be solicited by the lawyer; or
(c) the solicitation involves coercion, duress or harassment.

Now, you know what I know on this topic.