North Carolina Administrative Code › Title 27 - STATE BAR › Chapter 02 - RULES OF PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT OF THE NORTH CAROLINA STATE BAR › Section .0200 - COUNSELOR › Section 02 RULE 2.01 - ADVISOR

Current through Register Vol. 39, No. 2, July 15, 2024
In representing a client, a lawyer shall exercise
				  independent, professional judgment and render candid advice. In rendering
				  advice, a lawyer may refer not only to law, but also to other considerations
				  such as moral, economic, social, and political factors that may be relevant to
				  the client's situation.
Comment
Scope of Advice
[1]
				A client is entitled to straightforward advice expressing the lawyer's honest
				assessment. Legal advice often involves unpleasant facts and alternatives that
				a client may be disinclined to confront. In presenting advice, a lawyer
				endeavors to sustain the client's morale and may put advice in as acceptable a
				form as honesty permits. However, a lawyer should not be deterred from giving
				candid advice by the prospect that the advice will be unpalatable to the
				client.
[2] Advice couched in
				narrow legal terms may be of little value to a client, especially where
				practical considerations such as cost or effects on other people are
				predominant. Purely technical legal advice, therefore, can sometimes be
				inadequate. It is proper for a lawyer to refer to relevant moral and ethical
				considerations in giving advice. Although a lawyer is not a moral advisor as
				such, moral and ethical considerations impinge upon most legal questions and
				may decisively influence how the law will be applied.
[3] A client may expressly or impliedly ask
				the lawyer for purely technical advice. When such a request is made by a client
				experienced in legal matters, the lawyer may accept it at face value. When such
				a request is made by a client inexperienced in legal matters, however, the
				lawyer's responsibility as advisor may include indicating that more may be
				involved than strictly legal considerations.
[4] Matters that go beyond strictly legal
				questions may also be in the domain of another profession. Family matters can
				involve problems within the professional competence of psychiatry, clinical
				psychology, or social work; business matters can involve problems within the
				competence of the accounting profession or of financial specialists. Where
				consultation with a professional in another field is itself something a
				competent lawyer would recommend, the lawyer should make such a recommendation.
				At the same time, a lawyer's advice at its best often consists of recommending
				a course of action in the face of conflicting recommendations of experts.
Offering Advice
[5] In general, a lawyer is not expected to
				give advice until asked by the client. However, when a lawyer knows that a
				client proposes a course of action that is likely to result in substantial
				adverse legal consequences to the client, the lawyer's duty to the client under
				Rule 1.4 may require that the lawyer offer advice if the client's course of
				action is related to the representation. Similarly, when a matter is likely to
				involve litigation, it may be necessary under Rule 1.4 to inform the client of
				forms of dispute resolution that might constitute reasonable alternatives to
				litigation. A lawyer ordinarily has no duty to initiate investigation of a
				client's affairs or to give advice that the client has indicated is unwanted,
				but a lawyer may initiate advice to a client when doing so appears to be in the
				client's interest.
Authority
				  G.S.
				  84-23;
Eff. July 24,
				  1997;
Amended Eff. February 27,
				  2003.