Court Opinion

ID: 9431381
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:32:11.207576+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:28.218802
License: Public Domain

Chief Justice Rehnquist,
with whom Justice Scalia joins, dissenting.
Three Terms ago the Court invalidated a New Hampshire Bar rule which denied admission to an applicant who had passed the state bar examination because she was not, and would not become, a resident of the State. Supreme Court of New Hampshire v. Piper, 470 U. S. 274 (1985). In the present case the Court extends the reasoning of Piper to invalidate a Virginia Bar rule allowing admission on motion without examination to qualified applicants, but restricting the privilege to those applicants who have become residents of the State.
*71For the reasons stated in my dissent in Piper, I also disagree with the Court’s decision in this case. I continue to believe that the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV, § 2, does not require States to ignore residency when admitting lawyers to practice in the way that they must ignore residency when licensing traders in foreign goods, Ward v. Maryland, 12 Wall. 418 (1871), or when licensing commercial shrimp fishermen, Toomer v. Witsell, 334 U. S. 385 (1948).
I think the effect of today’s decision is unfortunate even apart from what I believe is its mistaken view of the Privileges and Immunities Clause. Virginia’s rule allowing admission on motion is an ameliorative provision, recognizing the fact that previous practice in another State may qualify a new resident of Virginia to practice there without the necessity of taking another bar examination. The Court’s ruling penalizes Virginia, which has at least gone part way towards accommodating the present mobility of our population, but of course leaves untouched the rules of those States which allow no reciprocal admission on motion.* Virginia may of course retain the privilege of admission on motion without enforcing a residency requirement even after today’s decision, but it might also decide to eliminate admission on motion altogether.

At present, 28 states do not allow reciprocal admission on motion: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.