Celebrating the Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award - LER Bonus Content No. 13 (05.30.24)
Susan Fortney (Texas A&M) receives the prestigious ABA Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award
Welcome
Welcome to your thirteenth installment of bonus content from the Legal Ethics Roundup. In addition to the free weekly roundup every Monday morning, I regularly post bonus content for paid subscribers. However, for this bonus post in celebration of the Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award, I removed the paywall. Please feel free to share it widely with others. (This is the second bonus content post celebrating a professional responsibility award. Check out Bonus Content No. 6 for coverage of the Fred C. Zacharias Memorial Prize for Scholarship in Professional Responsibility.)
Greetings from Denver! I’m in the Mile High City to speak at the American Bar Association National Conference on Professional Responsibility. I’ll have more to say about that in Monday’s Roundup. But I’m sharing this bonus content post to celebrate the Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award, which was given this evening to Susan Fortney (Texas A&M) as part of the conference events.
Every year since 1994, the ABA bestows the prestigious Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award. As the ABA website explains: “The Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award is named in honor of Michael Franck, late director of the State Bar of Michigan and long-time champion of improvements in lawyer regulation in the public interest. From the time of his first major undertaking in the name of legal professionalism—serving as reporter to the ABA Clark Commission investigating the state of lawyer discipline in America—to his final years speaking on the floor of the ABA House of Delegates to promote improvements in the Model Code of Judicial Conduct and the Model Rules of Professional Conduct, Michael Franck’s work stood as a benchmark for turning intellectual honesty, compassion, and uncompromising ethics to every aspect of the practice of law. In an era when lawyers’ dedication to the public good is often questioned, the Michael Franck award brings deserved attention to individuals whose career commitments in areas such as legal ethics, disciplinary enforcement and lawyer professionalism demonstrate the best accomplishments of lawyers.”
I thought we should celebrate this award here at the Legal Ethics Roundup, both to learn more about Professor Fortney’s work as a legal ethics scholar and also to honor and remember Michael Franck.
Here’s what the ABA said about Fortney’s selection as this year’s recipient:
Susan S. Fortney J.D., LL.M., J.S.D. is the recipient of the 2024 Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award. Ms. Fortney is the Stephen R. Alton University Professor and Director of the Program for the Advancement of Legal Ethics at Texas A&M University School of Law.
Nationally and internationally renowned for her extraordinary research, scholarship, and teaching on legal ethics and the regulation of lawyers. Professor Fortney is also an outstanding, dedicated, and creative public servant, whose work with scholars, lawyers, regulators, courts, and bar organizations demonstrate a commitment to improving lawyer ethics, conduct, and regulation reflect the true spirit of the Michael Franck Award.
Professor Fortney’s dedication to legal ethics and professional responsibility has had a profound impact on the legal profession both nationally and internationally; she has taught legal ethics in the United States at Texas Tech, Boston, St. Johns, Hofstra, and Texas A&M universities and abroad in Slovenia, Poland, and Australia. She is credited by many as being one of the first to introduce the Proactive, Management-Based Regulation (PMBR) concept to lawyer regulation entities and has been an integral resource to multiple U.S jurisdictions in development of their individual PMBR programs. Her international work includes assisting Canadian and Australian regulators in implementing and improving their proactive approaches and serving as a Fulbright Scholar.
As a pioneering empiricist in the legal ethics field, Professor Fortney’s work regarding ethical infrastructure and culture of lawyer organizations has been foundational in both the legal academy and across the legal profession. She has conducted research with and for regulators and lawyer organizations in the U.S. and abroad. Her studies have helped regulators and lawyers better understand and improve lawyer regulation and conduct.
Professor Fortney has also championed various access to justice initiatives. This includes creating and obtaining funding for the Texas Apprenticeship Network, an incubator-accelerator program designed to provide training, mentoring, and supervision to lawyers representing modest-means clients.
Professor Fortney has individually authored over 50 articles, research reports, essays, and reviews dealing with legal ethics and the legal profession. Her books include co-authoring the first textbook on legal malpractice law, as well as the new West Academic professional responsibility hornbook, called Legal Ethics, Professional Responsibility and the Legal Profession.
Professor Fortney has worked on numerous ABA committees and bodies, including many years of service as a member of the ABA Editorial Board for professional responsibility publications. . She currently serves as a member of the planning committee for the ABA National Conference on Professional Responsibility.
Readers of the Legal Ethics Roundup are no strangers to the work of Professor Fortney, who is very much deserving of the award. Her scholarship has been featured as recommended reading — revisit LER No. 37 to learn more.
Last, but certainly not least, here is a list of past winners of the award. They are an impressive group. You’ll note that Michael Franck himself was the first recipient. He received it on May 31, 1994, and is pictured below.
He died on June 28, 1994, less than a month after receiving the award. Jon Muth, then-president of the State Bar of Michigan, said this as a tribute:
With the passing of Michael Franck, our system of justice has lost a great champion and a beautiful exemplar of the law as a high calling. Mike brought great intellect and deep passion to his career. He was dedicated to assuring access to justice for the least fortunate. He was committed to eradicating manifestations of prejudice He was called to articulate the conscience of the profession. We will miss him greatly.
Here is the full list of past recipients. The ABA has compiled biographies for each if you want to learn more about their accomplishments.
2023 Award Recipient - Jayne R. Reardon
2022 Award Recipient - Lucian T. Pera
2021 Award Recipient - Nancy J. Moore
2020 Award Recipient - Robert Mundheim
2019 Award Recipient - Peter Jarvis
2018 Award Recipient - Bruce Green
2017 Award Recipient - Robert A. "Bob" Creamer
2016 Award Recipient - Wallace E. “Gene” Shipp, Jr.
2015 Award Recipient - Steven C. Krane
2014 Award Recipient - Jeanne P. Gray
2013 Award Recipient - John S. Gleason
2012 Award Recipient - Seth Rosner
2011 Award Recipient - Stephen Gillers
2010 Award Recipient - Marvin L. Karp
2009 Award Recipient - Mary C. Daly
2008 Award Recipient - Geoffrey C. Hazard, Jr.
2007 Award Recipient - Lawrence J. Fox
2006 Award Recipient - Deborah L. Rhode
2005 Award Recipient - E. Norman Veasey
2003 Award Recipient - Charles W. Kettlewell
2002 Award Recipient - M. Peter Moser
2001 Award Recipient - John T. Berry
2001 Award Recipient - Raymond R. Trombadore
2000 Award Recipient - Andrew L. Kaufman
1999 Award Recipient - Robert E. O'Malley
1998 Award Recipient - Monroe H. Freedman
1997 Award Recipient - Lewis H. Van Dusen, Jr.
1996 Award Recipient - Mark I. Harrison
1995 Award Recipient - Fr. Robert Drinan
1994 Award Recipient - Michael Franck
I'll be back Monday with another Legal Ethics Roundup. Until then, thank you for reading and reflecting upon the memory of Michael Franck and his incredible legacy that endures through this award. And congratulations to Professor Fortney!