Arizona Supreme Court rejects ABA political correctness rule

The following quote may be attributed to Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Brad Abramson regarding the Arizona Supreme Court’s rejection Thursday of American Bar Association Rule 8.4(g), a rule which, if adopted, would have led to politically correct monitoring of and restrictions on the speech and client choices of attorneys that practice within the state:

“Americans don’t surrender their constitutionally protected freedoms when they enter the legal profession or any other profession. The Arizona Supreme Court quite possibly understood what the high courts of two other states also may have seen when they rejected the ABA’s proposed rule: that it would violate an attorney’s free speech, free association, and free exercise rights by allowing restrictions and monitoring based on political correctness, not the First Amendment. The rule’s proponents continue to dismiss its serious constitutional flaws without substantively addressing them. We trust that other states will follow Arizona’s lead in rejecting this rule.”

Abramson led the effort to file a comment with the Arizona Supreme Court in May on behalf of a group of Arizona attorneys opposed to adoption of the ABA rule.