I would imagine that after 20 years inactive, that the Bar would deem anybody ineligible because the laws would have changed sufficiently to make them way out of date.......
witha license u are always grandfathered in
1. Active - eligible to practice law and required to take continuing legal education (CLE) courses, and maintain a client trust account in the state where you are practicing.
2. Inactive - a member of the bar, paying some portion of the full active dues assessment, but not eligible to practice and not required to take CLE courses or maintain client trust account.
3. Emeritus - some bars will have a category for retired members, they pay reduced dues, still get the monthly magazine (and Avis car rental discount!), are not required to take CLE. They can be active or inactive. In Wisconsin, this category requires to you be 70 or older. If you were active, you'd have to maintain the client trust account, even if in this emeritus category.
Just to add to the confusion, some states have mandatory bars, others (Minnesota for example) are voluntary bars. In a voluntary state you have to maintain your professional license with the state, and then separately can pay dues to the voluntary organization which provides some nominal benefits. In a mandatory state, you must maintain bar membership, in effect it is your license.
I think Professor Jacobsen is doing a great service by calling attention to this issue. I will not attempt to recite all of the information he has developed. It's a dynamic story, with new information emerging every day. I think that there is enough information from credible sources to suggest there is more than just smoke here.
Much of the time lawyers are concerned about unauthorized practice of law (UPL) issues because of the cartel-like nature of the legal profession. We doesn't want too many people able to compete with us, and so we define some things as functions that lawyers, and only licensed (active members if in a mandatory state) lawyers may perform. In Georgia, for example, real estates closings must be conducted by a lawyer. Most often this means detecting and prosecuting folks who nibble around the edged of the legal profession (say notary who perform real estate closings in GA, or notary in non-English speaking communities who draft contracts, etc.) It's usually a bottom feeding form of competition that is the focus of UPL investigations by state bar investigators.
In this instance it seems that for some of the work done from an address in MA, Warren was billing at $675/hr. Nice work if you can get it, and not something which could be characterized as bottom feeding. But potentially illegal all the same.
The following is from "Future of the State Bar: Mandatory/Voluntary Membership Report" Prepared by The Strategic Planning Committee of the State Bar of Wisconsin in February 2010:
While all 50 states have statewide bar associations, they vary widely in terms of how they were created, how they are structured and what services they offer. The origins of most can be traced back to the mid-19th Century, when the practice of law was largely unregulated. Those in need of legal assistance had no reliable way to determine if individuals who claimed to be lawyers had received even minimum legal training. Leaders of the legal profession in Wisconsin and across the country began to organize self-governing bar associations to establish standards of education and professional conduct.So, Warren had to be a member of the bar in Texas to practice there. She didn't need to be a member of the New Jersey Bar Association or the Massachusetts Bar Association to practice there, but she did need to be licensed by each of those states.Wisconsin is one of 32 states with mandatory bars; 21 states have voluntary bars; and three states (North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia) have both mandatory and voluntary bars. Most integrated bars achieved that status by court rule, although legislatures were involved in 13 cases (seven via joint legislative/court action and six via legislation only). The first wave of bar unifications occurred in the 1920s and the Hawaii State Bar Association was the most recent state to become integrated (in 1989).
Three of Wisconsin's regional neighbors (Illinois, Iowa and Minnesota) have voluntary bars. Other States with voluntary bars are: Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia and West Virginia.
One neighboring state, Michigan, has a mandatory bar. Other states with mandatory bars are: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wyoming.
Voluntary bars are organized and governed by their members. Other than the temporary suspension of mandatory State Bar membership by the Wisconsin Supreme Court from 1988- 1992 (discussed below), no state association has converted from mandatory to voluntary status. One notable distinction between the SBW and more than half of the other integrated bars is that SBW does not oversee admissions or discipline of attorneys, with those activities being performed by court agencies in Wisconsin.
Bar discipline is a very slow process anyway, and since Warren has resigned from New Jersey (9/11/2102) and Texas (9/20/2012), there is nothing they can do. Whatever process that could be invoked in MA to look at this would take far longer than the time between now and the election. But that doesn't mean the facts cannot be developed by diligent press inquiry. or by Prof. Jacobsen in their absence.