Miracle On Eagle Street: New York's Temporary Practice Rule

To many in the New York professional responsibility community, it seemed like a Christmas miracle. For more than 15 years, the New York State Bar Association and legal ethics experts have implored the Office of Court Administration, the Presiding Justices of the four Appellate Divisions, and the Chief Judge of the Court of Appeals (the Presiding Justice and Chief Judge, the "Administrative Board") to adopt a version of ABA Model Rule 5.5, the so-called "multijurisdictional practice rule" that would allow lawyers admitted in other jurisdictions to come to New York on a temporary basis to handle particular litigation and transactional matters. This would, proponents hoped, bring New York's ethics rules into step with the day-to-day reality of modern law practice. Every day, New York lawyers travel to other states and out-of-state lawyers come here to serve their clients. But numerous reports, resolutions, and articles fell on deaf ears. The revised New York Rule of