It's Who You Know UPDATED

Gregg Smith has been blogging about Schweitzer's lawyer's ex parte contacts with Dennis Unsworth in the illegal PSA case. That is a very serious matter. Go read.

Me, I still don't get how Eric Stern was allowed to do any of this to begin with, as I wrote last month. I called the Montana Bar and found out he is not licensed to practice in this state. Was he ever licensed, and if so where? If not, how can he be an attorney without a license?

In case you're wondering, "practicing law" is not restricted to appearing in court and filing court papers. From the Montana Code Annotated:

37-61-201. Who considered to be practicing law. Any person who shall hold himself out or advertise as an attorney or counselor at law or who shall appear in any court of record or before a judicial body, referee, commissioner, or other officer appointed to determine any question of law or fact by a court or who shall engage in the business and duties and perform such acts, matters, and things as are usually done or performed by an attorney at law in the practice of his profession...shall be deemed practicing law.

From the state web site bio, where he is identified as "senior counsel":

Eric Stern was Schweitzer's campaign manager and is an attorney and business consultant. He is a native of Teaneck, NJ, and attended Connecticut College and Columbia Law School. He worked after college at CNN in Atlanta, and then went on to serve in the Clinton Administration as a political aide to the Vice President of the United States, directing the Vice President's international and political trips; and also as a policy aide to the U.S. Secretary of Education, overseeing the political elements of important education reforms of the 1990s. He also worked on the national staff of three presidential campaigns. Stern moved to Bozeman, Montana in 2001 to do non-profit legal and environmental work, and business consulting.

That's enough for me, right there. But also in his illegal ex parte contacts he called Unsworth about legal procedural matters, clearly acting as an attorney would.

What about reciprocity, you ask? Montana doesn't have it.

• Montana does not have reciprocity with any state.


• There is no admission on motion.


• All applicants are required to sit for the bar exam.


• There were rule revisions pending with the Montana Supreme Court, which would have allowed admission on motion. The proposal was sent to the State Bar Board of Trustees in April 2003 by the Committee on Multi-Jurisdictional Practice. It sought to have the Montana Bar enter a reciprocal agreement for attorney admissions in a five-state area of the Northwest. The Court denied the petition...

Maybe by some stretch he could slip in under pro hac vice rules, but they don't really fit anyway.

B. An attorney may not appear pro hac vice under this section if the attorney is a resident of Montana, is regularly employed in Montana, or is regularly engaged in the practice of law or in substantial business or professional activities in Montana, unless the attorney has an application for admission pending with the Bar Admissions Administrator of the State Bar of Montana.

So that's out.

Why do I care? Because I would like to do the same thing - hold myself out as General Counsel for my employer, write letters, make calls, and avoid the fees and CLEs and other hassles of maintaining a current Montana law license.

But I guess I don't know the right people.

UPDATE: Newsbusters' coverage of Ethics Violations by Governor Brian Schweitzer.