BADC BATS THREE FOR THREE AT
ABA ANNUAL MEETING
By Robert L. Weinberg, Past BADC President & BADC Delegate to the ABA
The Board of the BADC adopted positions on three matters to come before the ABA House of Delegates at the ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco in August. All three of the BADC positions prevailed at the ABA meeting.
First, the BADC Board addressed the issues that had arisen during the hearings before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees on the dismissal of the United States Attorneys. The ABA had been unable to speak out on these because there was no current ABA policy addressing them. Pursuant to the action of the BADC Board, the BADC proposed to the House of Delegates a resolution which would adopt as ABA policy that the dismissal of the U.S. Attorneys and the hiring and retention of career government attorneys should be insulated from improper political influence from members of Congress or the Executive Branch. The BADC resolution garnered wide support and was adopted overwhelmingly by the House of Delegates. The incoming president of the ABA, Bill Neukom of Seattle, Washington, at his press conference following the House of Delegates meeting, spoke at length about his plans to implement the BADC resolution and described it as one of the three most important resolutions adopted by the House of Delegates. The BADC was thus able to take the leadership in the ABA in securing ABA policy on a matter of nationwide concern to the legal profession, but of special concern in our jurisdiction where so many career government attorneys practice.
Second, the BADC Board voted to co-sponsor a resolution, supported by a number of State Bar Associations, in which the ABA recommended that attorneys serving in the U.S. Armed Forces in combat zones should receive a waiver of their obligations for dues payments to the Bar. The BADC was one of the two entities whose Delegate addressed the House on this issue, and presented the position of the BADC Military Law Committee strongly supporting passage of the resolution, and calling for its unanimous adoption. The resolution was adopted unanimously by the House, and promptly thereafter the BADC Board implemented the resolution by waiving dues payments for members of our Association serving in combat zones. The Military Law Committee of the BADC is probably unique among State Bar Associations in the role which it has played over the years in recommending policies on military law issues which have been adopted by the ABA.
Third, the BADC Board voted to oppose a resolution from the State Bar of Massachusetts which would have broken up the partnership between D.C. and Virginia in selecting a representative to the ABA Board of Governors. Under the ABA Constitution, D.C. and Virginia comprise a district which is entitled to elect a member to the ABA Board of Governors for a three-year term, and the three-year terms are alternated between D.C. and Virginia. The elected Governor from the district is ordinarily familiar with both jurisdictions, and able to represent both effectively during his or her term. The Massachusetts Delegates proposed that Massachusetts should replace Virginia as the second jurisdiction in D.C.’s district, so that for three out of every six years our interests would be represented by a lawyer from Massachusetts instead of a Governor from across the river in Virginia. The BADC, the D.C. Bar, and the Virginia Bar all lobbied vigorously to obtain support for keeping D.C. and Virginia together, and when the Massachusetts proposal was reached on the House of Delegates agenda, the Massachusetts Delegates, seeing the handwriting on the wall, withdrew it. The D.C.-Virginia alliance remains intact in the ABA.