The ethics ruling eliminates the usefulness of the designation for the state’s 38,000 attorneys, and is likely to do so nationwide, because the ethics rules the New Jersey committee cited are common in most other states.

New Jersey lawyers will have to take the Super Lawyer and Best Lawyer designations off their Web sites, brochures, press releases, direct mail, email signature blocks, announcements, invitations, letterhead and advertising in print, broadcast and online media. Placing an ad in the “Super Lawyers” magazine is specifically banned.

“These self-aggrandizing titles have the potential to lead an unwary consumer to believe that the lawyers so described are, by virtue of this manufactured title, superior to their colleagues who practice in the same areas of law,” states the three-page Opinion 39 issued by the committee, which is appointed by the New Jersey Supreme Court.  Click here to see a PDF copy of the opinion.  For my opinion of this decision, click here.

Mislead the public

The publisher of Super Lawyers, Minneapolis-based publisher Law & Politics, a division of Key Professional Media, plans to contest the ruling. The company conducts surveys to identify the best 5% of all lawyers in a state, based on their verdicts, settlements, transactions, clients, experience, honors, position in the firm and pro bono work.

“This simplistic use of a media-generated sound bite title clearly has the capacity to materially mislead the public,” the opinion stated tartly.

Published biennially since 1983, The Best Lawyers in America is a lawyer referral guide covering 57 specialties in the U.S. The lists are compiled through a peer-review survey in which lawyers confidentially evaluate their professional peers. The 2006 edition of Best Lawyers, is based on more than 1.5 million evaluations of lawyers by other lawyers.

“'Best Lawyer' seems to be trending towards a “Super Lawyer” business plan with similar advertising supplements in other jurisdictions, but not yet in New Jersey,” according to the opinion.

The trouble begins

Complaints started coming in to the committee when a 2005 issue of New Jersey Monthly magazine and stand-alone magazine printed ads from law firms promoting their selection as “Super Lawyers.” The marketing publications were repeated this year.  The Super Lawyers magazine is also published in 20 other states.

“The “Super Lawyer” designations have spawned a new surge of attorney marketing in the form of advertisements placed in New Jersey lawyer-directed papers, in local newspapers and by distribution to the public through attorney mailers, flyers, brochures, telephone book listings, and on websites, all of which tout the “Super Lawyer” label and congratulate or promote the so-called “Super” lawyers,” the opinion states.

Back in 1975, the New Jersey Advisory Committee on Professional Ethics “warned that attorneys must be wary of directories whose primary purpose is publicizing the listings and must also be careful of using self-laudatory statements in those listings,” said the opinion.

This time, the court’s committee ruled that “Super Lawyers” and “Best Lawyers” designation directly violate the Rules of Processional Conduct, specifically:

• Rule 7.1(a)(3), which states that a communication is misleading if it “compares the lawyer’s service with other lawyers’ services.” The committee ruled that use of superlative designations by lawyers is inherently comparative and, thus, prohibited.“Such titles or descriptions, based on an assessment by the attorney or other members of the bar, or devised by persons or organizations outside the bar, lack both court approval and objective verification of the lawyer’s ability,” the opinion states.
• Rule 7.1(a)(2), which states that a communication is misleading if it “is likely to create an unjustified expectation about results the lawyer can achieve . . . .” “When a potential client reads such advertising and considers hiring a “super” attorney, or the “best” attorney, the superlative designation induces the client to feel that the results that can be achieved by this attorney are likely to surpass those that can be achieved by a mere “ordinary” attorney,” the opinion states.

Mixed reactions

Comments posted on the Wall Street Journal Law Blog both attacked and supported the decision. Supporting viewpoints included:

“I have found this Super Lawyer questionable since if first appeared as a supplement in Philadelphia Mag two years ago. I don’t care what the publishers claim is the methodology. There is a direct correlation between size of ad placed in the supplement by a firm and the number of “Super Lawyers” listed in the directory,” wrote “Happy Former Lawyer.”

“I received an unsolicited copy of a Super Lawyer publication at my home not long ago. I promptly emailed the publisher and requested his home address, so that I could return the favor and deliver some of my garbage to his doorstep,” wrote “Jake.”

Critics said:

“Is this for real? I think if the attorneys are picked using a fair methodology, they should be allowed to have special designation announcing they are the tops in their field. Me thinks that jealousy is afoot by the attorneys not picked to appear in an issue of Super Lawyers,” stated a comment by “Mickey.”

A Houston lawyer said, “I agree that the Super Lawyer publications are in business to sell ads… But, I don’t think the process is corrupt or misleading. I may be biased, having been selected a Texas Super Lawyer three times, but on the whole, I think the people selected are the better lawyers in Texas. … But, in my experience, the designation is a pretty good gauge of who the better lawyers are.