Opinion ID: 1230281
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Common Law Duty of Loyalty and the Prohibition on the Right to Sue

Text: (10a) Although the question of an attorney's suit against a present client is not explicitly covered in the Rules of Professional Conduct, or by any statute, arguably it may be prohibited by the general duty of loyalty recognized at common law. It is clear that the duties to which an attorney in this state are subject are not exhaustively delineated by the Rules of Professional Conduct, and that these rules are not intended to supersede common law obligations. (See rule 1-100, and accompanying discussion.) (11) This court's statement of the attorney's duty of loyalty to the client over 60 years ago is still generally valid: It is... an attorney's duty to protect his client in every possible way, and it is a violation of that duty for him to assume a position adverse or antagonistic to his client without the latter's free and intelligent consent.... By virtue of this rule an attorney is precluded from assuming any relation which would prevent him from devoting his entire energies to his client's interests. ( Anderson v. Eaton (1930) 211 Cal. 113, 116 [293 P. 788].) We have also decided that the duty of loyalty for an attorney in the public sector does not differ appreciably from that of the attorney's counterpart in private practice. (See People ex rel. Deukmejian v. Brown (1981) 29 Cal.3d 150, 157 [172 Cal. Rptr. 478, 624 P.2d 1206] [Attorney General's role as `guardian of the public interest' does not exempt him from conflict of interest rules applicable to other attorneys].) (10b) No reported appellate cases in this state have considered the extent to which an attorney's duty of loyalty to a client prohibits the attorney from suing the client. It may well be that the lack of case law is due to the obviousness of the prohibition. As one court has stated: The almost complete absence of authority governing the situation where, as in the present case, the lawyer is still representing the client whom he sues clearly indicates to us that the common understanding and the common conscience of the bar is in accord with our holding that such a suit constitutes a reprehensible breach of loyalty and a violation of the preamble to the Canons of Professional Ethics. ( Grievance Com. of Bar of Hartford County v. Rottner (1964) 152 Conn. 59 [203 A.2d 82, 85].) The attorney's duty of loyalty to the client has led the Los Angeles County Bar Association to conclude that an attorney in a fee dispute with a client must withdraw from representing a client prior to filing suit against a client. (Los Angeles County Bar Ethics Opns., opn. No. 212 (1953).) Indeed, courts in some jurisdictions have concluded that attorneys may not sue their ex-clients in some circumstances, such as for retaliatory discharge, where the lawsuit would disrupt the confidentiality of the attorney-client relationship. (See Balla v. Gambro, Inc. (1991) 145 Ill.2d 492 [164 Ill.Dec. 892, 584 N.E.2d 104, 16 A.L.R.5th 1000] [former in-house counsel may not sue for retaliatory discharge]; but see Parker v. M & T Chemicals, Inc. (1989) 236 N.J. Super. 451 [566 A.2d 215] [retaliatory discharge suit permitted].) But we do not decide here generally the extent to which the duty of loyalty precludes an attorney's lawsuit against a current client. Rather, we seek to determine whether an attorney's lawsuit to enforce rights granted pursuant to a statutory scheme of public employer-employee bargaining is fundamentally incompatible with the essentials of the duty of loyalty. In order to answer this question, we must decide another, more fundamental, issue: to what extent is the collective bargaining relationship between an attorney/employee and a client/employer itself compatible with the attorney's duty of loyalty?