Re: Wisconsin's Diploma Privilege

On Tue, 24 Aug 1999, Nick Zales <zales[_at_]execpc.com> wrote:
>
> On Mon, 23 Aug 1999, Bob Cumbow, <rcumbow[_at_]grahamdunn.com> asked me:
> >
> > Tell us again how you bypassed the bar exam ... ?
> >
> > In Washington state you can even become a lawyer without going to
> > law school -- but NEVER without taking the bar exam!
>
> Wisconsin, in the tradition of progressiveness, has what is
> called the "diploma privilege."

     A few minutes after I was admitted to the bar in NY (after a bar exam), one of my law school professors was admitted in NY on motion. It was his sixth state bar admission without taking a bar exam. Never graduated from college, either.

     Seems he was something of an undergraduate hell-raiser and got expelled from Tulane for some infraction. Family connections and a period of penance got him admitted to Tulane's law school. Louisiana law being what it is, the state also followed the Wisconsin rule, and on graduation he was admitted in Louisiana on motion.

     He got a job at Yale as an assistant to John Norton Moore working on part of Moore's treatise and was admitted in Connecticut on motion as a faculty member at an in-state law school.

     Moved to the faculty at U. of Virginia and was likewise admitted on motion as a faculty member. Maryland and D.C. have reciprocity, so he was admitted there on motion, as well.

     He took a year's sabbatical the year I was graduated to come up to NYC to work in the tax department at Mudge, Rose, Guthrie etc. (his field was federal courts and civil procedure, but he helped on tax litigation), and was admitted in NY on motion based on his years of practice in VA.

     As a federal courts/civil procedure maven, he consulted on litigation throughout the country and was admitted to the U.S. Supreme Court and most of the U.S. Courts of Appeals, as well as various U.S. District Courts.

     Some people collect stamps.

Michael J. O'Connor
<mjoconor[_at_]erols.com> Received on Wed Aug 25 1999 - 13:56:15 GMT