Court Opinion

ID: 9631031
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 10:27:12.343692+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:07:47.236331
License: Public Domain

SPAETH, Judge,
concurring:
This is an equity case. On May 5, 1977, the lower court enjoined appellants “from contacting and/or communicating with those persons who up to and including April 1, 1977, had active legal matters pending with and were represented by [appellees’] law firm. . . . ” The court qualified this order by noting that it was not to be construed “to preclude [appellants] from announcing the formation of their new professional relationship,” or “to preclude those persons [who had been represented by appellees’ firm] from voluntarily discharging their present attorney and soliciting any of [appellants] . . . .”
The basis for this order appears from the lower court’s opinion, which may be summarized as follows. Appellants were “merely employees” of appellees’ firm. Opinion of lower court at 12. The persons on whose cases appellants were working were therefore not appellants’ clients but the firm’s. Id. at 9, 11. Appellants therefore had no right to write those clients that appellants were forming their own firm, and that the clients had the right to choose to be represented by appellants, or by appellees or any other attorney. Appellants’ letter to this effect represented “illegal solicitation in complete violation of and total disregard for the Code of Professional Responsibility.” Id. at 9. Accordingly, the letters were a “tortious [] interference] with the contractual and business relations that exist between [appellee’s firm] and its clients.” Id. at 10.
*568It is noble and daring to embark on a career of law by cutting the umbilical cord that ties one to an employment contract. But taking the heart and soul of the benefactor is immoral, illegal and repulsive. If they want their own firm, let them get their own clients. Id. at 11.
Judge HOFFMAN’s opinion suggests two, alternative, reasons in support of his conclusion that the order of the lower court must be vacated: First, that appellants’ conduct did not amount to solicitation, Slip Opinion at 7-8; and second, that even if it did, it was privileged under Sections 766 and 767 of the Restatement of Torts, id. at 8-18.
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The order of the lower court should be vacated, but I do not think the decision should rest either upon the Code of Professional Responsibility or upon the law of business relations. Instead I think it should rest on appellants’ First Amendment rights as defined by the United States Supreme Court in its recent decision in Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, 433 U.S. 350, 97 S.Ct. 2691, 53 L.Ed.2d 810 (1977).1
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The facts in Bates were as follows. The appellants were two attorneys who were members of the Arizona State Bar. The Arizona Supreme Court had adopted a disciplinary rule that prohibited members of the Bar from advertising in a newspaper. The appellants nevertheless did advertise; their advertisement said that their “legal clinic” offered “legal services at very reasonable fees”, and listed their fees for uncontested divorces, uncontested adoptions, simple personal bankruptcies, and changes of name. The State Bar’s Presi*569dent filed a complaint against appellants. After various proceedings pursuant to the complaint the Board of Governors of the State Bar recommended that each appellant be suspended from the practice of law for one week. Appellants appealed to the Arizona Supreme Court. They admitted violating the disciplinary rule prohibiting advertising but argued, among other matters, that the rule infringed their First Amendment rights. A plurality of the Arizona Supreme Court rejected this argument, and held the rule valid (although the court reduced the sanction to censure only because it found that appellants had acted in good faith). On further appeal the United States Supreme Court reversed this holding, concluding that the rule violated appellants’ First Amendment rights.
To be sure, Bates is distinguishable from the present case on the facts. In Bates the solicitation was of the public; here it was of clients of appellees’ firm.2 This factual difference, however, is of no legal significance; if anything, it makes this case a clearer one than was Bates. The correctness of this conclusion becomes apparent as one examines the reasoning of the Court in Bates.3
-a-
First the Court in Bates recognized its earlier decisions holding that the First Amendment protects “commercial speech”, which may be defined as speech that “propose[s] a mundane commercial transaction”, where “the speaker’s in*570terest is largely economic.” 433 U.S. at 364, 97 S.Ct. at 2699. This is because:
The listener’s interest is substantial: the consumer’s concern for the free flow of commercial speech often may be far keener than his concern for urgent political dialogue. Moreover, significant societal interests are served by such speech. Advertising, though entirely commercial, may often carry information of import to significant issues of the day. . . . And commercial speech serves to inform the public of the availability, nature, and prices of products and services, and thus performs an indispensable role in the allocation of resources in a free enterprise system. Id. at 364, 97 S.Ct. at 2699 (citations omitted).
It was clear in Bates that the appellants’ advertisements were commercial speech; it was also clear that the disciplinary rule “serve[d] to inhibit the free flow of commercial information and to keep the public in ignorance.” Id. Therefore, the Court concluded, the question was whether there was any justification for prohibiting the appellants to advertise.
This question is precisely the question here. Appellants’ letters were a form of commercial speech. The fact that they were addressed to specific individuals rather than to the public generally in no way affects this conclusion. Appellants’ interest in sending the letters was “largely economic”; and the letters “proposed a mundane commercial transaction.”
-b-
Next the Court in Bates examined in turn each of a number of justifications for prohibiting the appellants to advertise. It is unnecessary to refer to all of these; three were the most important. These three were: That advertising would have an adverse effect on professionalism; that any advertising would be inherently misleading; and that advertising would have an adverse effect on the administration of justice. The Court rejected these justifications, reasoning as follows: It used to be that law was regarded by *571lawyers as a form of public service and “above” trade. This attitude discouraged advertising as unethical. Today, however, we recognize that lawyers are not “above” trade; like many others, they earn living by charging for their services. Nor do we regard it as necessarily undignified for professions to advertise; other professions, such as bankers and engineers, advertise and are not regarded as undignified. Moreover, because lawyers do not advertise, many persons do not obtain a lawyer, even when they know they need one, either because they are afraid of the cost or because they can not find a competent lawyer. It is true that advertising might be misleading, but it need not be; it depends upon the sort of legal services advertised, and upon what is said. It is also true that advertising might increase use of the judicial machinery, but that is not the same as saying that it would have an adverse effect on the administration of justice. To the contrary: At present the middle 70% of the public is not adequately served by the legal profession. It would be better if these persons were adequately served, even if that meant more lawsuits. Advertising can help to ensure that they will be adequately served. It is appropriate that advertising should be resorted to for this purpose, for it is “the traditional mechanism in a free-market economy for a supplier to inform a potential purchaser of the availability and terms of exchange.” At 376, 97 S.Ct. at 2705. Consequently, “[a] rule allowing restrained advertising would be in accord with the bar’s obligation to ‘facilitate the process of intelligent selection of lawyers, and to assist in making legal services fully available.’ ” Id. (quoting from the Code of Professional Responsibility).
This reasoning is dispositive here. It is true that appel-lees’ clients already had, and therefore did not need to seek, a lawyer, specifically, appellees. That fact is of no significance, however. The advertisement upheld in Bates would be read by two different classes of persons: those who had no lawyer, and those who (as was true of appellees’ clients) did have a lawyer. The essence of the Court’s reasoning is that persons in both of these classes have a right to learn, *572through advertising, that a given lawyer offers given legal services at a given price. If as a result a person already represented decides to change, and to retain the lawyer identified in the advertisement, so be it.
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Finally, the Court in Bates noted a number of qualifications to its conclusion that the First Amendment protected “restrained advertising.” Thus it noted that it did not have to consider advertising that included a claim relating to the quality, as distinguished from the availability and price, of legal services. At 366, 97 S.Ct. 2691, 2700. Also, that it did not have to consider a claim that the advertising in question was deceptive, or misleading, or false, or extravagant. Id. Also, that it did not have to “resolve the problems associated with in-person solicitation of clients—at the hospital room or the accident site, or in any other situation that breeds undue influence . . . .” Id.
The same may be said here. There is no finding that appellants’ letters were in any way inaccurate, or that appellants engaged in any conduct that could be characterized as undue influence. The lower court does in one of its findings (No. 18) find that one of the appellants, Alan B. Epstein, deposited to his account “a referral fee paid by an out-of-state attorney to [appellees’] firm for a case being handled by Mr. EPSTEIN.” We cannot tell from the record whether this conduct, or other conduct by other of appellants, would support a claim by appellees in quasi contract or quantum meruit. We may assume for sake of discussion that appellees do have, and will be able to recover on, a quasi contract or quantum meruit claim against some or all of appellants. That fact is no justification for enjoining appellants from exercising their First Amendment right of commercial speech. Because appellants’ First Amendment rights have been violated I concur in the conclusion reached by HOFFMAN, J., that the order must be vacated.

. In fairness to the lower court it should be noted that Bates was filed on June 27, 1977, almost two months after the lower court’s order. Judge HOFFMAN’s opinion suggests in footnote 5, that the constitutional issue need not be considered because of his conclusion that appellants’ conduct was privileged as a matter of the law of torts. However, Bates has changed the law of tortious interference with business relations (as well as the law under the Code of Professional Responsibility). Therefore, to define appellants’ rights it is essential to consider the impact of Bates. See discussion infra.

. I disagree with Judge HOFFMAN that there was no solicitation. There was no solicitation in the sense of barratry, nor any that involved either fomenting litigation or the sort of conduct described in Klensin v. Bd. of Gov. of Pa. Bar, 312 Pa. 564, 168 A. 474 (1933). These are not the only kinds of solicitation, however. “Solicitation” means “to solicit”, and one meaning of “to solicit” is “to seek eagerly or actively”. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 2169 (1965). By writing the clients of appellees’ firm, appellants “eagerly or actively” sought their business.

. BLACKMUN, J., delivered the opinion of the Court; BRENNAN, WHITE, MARSHALL, and STEVENS, JJ„ joined him. The other Justices filed, among them, two opinions concurring in part and dissenting in part, and one opinion dissenting in part.