Opinion ID: 2262950
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Degree of Infringement Upon the Constitutionally Protected Areas Necessary to Further Significantly the State Interest Involved

Text: Rule []301 operates to force an attorney with more than ten cases over one year old to dispose of his old cases before accepting any additional clients. An attorney who falls within the ambit of the rule thereby suffers an infringement on his right to practice law. While that infringement cannot be characterized as de minimis, it is neither permanent nor all-encompassing. The attorney in question need only dispose of his old cases to obtain relief. There is no effect upon his civil practice or his practice beyond the city boundaries. As we have noted, courts must be permitted to regulate defense attorneys' caseloads in order to make any progress in reducing the overwhelming backlog of criminal cases. The rule's infringement of the rights here at issue has a salutary effect upon the backlog problem in two ways. First, the rule insures that the oldest cases will be disposed of first. A chronic problem in the criminal system is that the easily disposed of cases are skimmed off the top of the backlog, leaving the older, more difficult cases to languish further behind. Cf. Commonwealth v. Hamilton, supra. The rule would help to alleviate this problem. By invoking the rule's requirement that all old criminal cases be disposed of before any new appearances may be entered, this aspect of the rule could be enhanced beyond its effect in the case at bar (see f.n. 8, supra). Second, the infringement occasioned by the rule is necessary to insure continued efforts by all members of the bar to alleviate the backlog. It is reasonable to assume that an attorney with a heavy caseload who is not within the ambit of the rule would exercise self-restraint in order to avoid its sanction. Petitioner argues that the number ten is arbitrary. Rather than invoke a particular number, he would judge the merits of each case. Such an analysis would be more arbitrary and time-consuming than the procedure at bar. It is often necessary to set numerical standards to insure that all possible efforts are made to bring about speedy trials. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Hamilton, supra. We cannot say that ten is an arbitrary place to draw this line.