Note 42 — IV CORRUPTION IN THE PROFESSIONS, JOURNALISM, AND THE HIGHER EDUCATION

Even if it be sneered at in certain quarters as a mere counsel of perfection, the following statement of the principles underlying “the lawyer’s duty in its last analysis” is of great significance:—“No client, corporate or individual, however powerful, nor any cause, civil or political, however important, is entitled to receive, nor should any lawyer render, any service or advice involving disloyalty to the law whose ministers we are, or disrespect of the judicial office, which we are bound to uphold, or corruption of any person or persons exercising a public office or private trust, or deception or betrayal of the public. When rendering any such improper service or advice, the lawyer invites and merits stern and just condemnation. Correspondingly, he advances the honour of his profession and the best interests of his client when he renders service or gives advice tending to impress upon the client and his undertaking exact compliance with the strictest principles of moral law.” The “Canons of Professional Ethics,” adopted by the American Bar Association at its thirty-first annual meeting at Seattle, August 27, 1908, are conceived in the spirit of the foregoing, taken from Canon 32. Canons 2, 3, 6, 26, 29, and 31 also declare specifically and unqualifiedly against various forms of corruption.