Ethics Opinion

Opinion 62-45

FLORIDA BAR ETHICS OPINION
OPINION 62-45
January 21, 1963
Advisory ethics opinions are not binding.
It is not unethical for a lawyer to write a letter to a candidate for public office on his
office letterhead, lauding the candidate and concluding with the wording, “Please feel free to use
this letter in full or in part if it will be helpful.”
Canon:

27 [See current 4-7.18]

Chairman Holcomb stated the opinion of the committee:
The Committee on Professional Ethics has considered the request of a member of The
Florida Bar for an opinion as to the propriety of a lawyer writing a letter on his office letterhead,
addressed to a candidate for public office, lauding the candidate and concluding with the
wording: “Please feel free to use this letter in full or in part if it will be helpful.” A photo copy of
the letter was published in a local newspaper with the heading: “Mr. X endorses Candidate Y.”
This Committee does not believe that any disciplinary action could be predicated upon
such an endorsement. Any attempt to curtail the political activities of members of the Bar would
be of doubtful constitutional validity and unsound from the point of public policy. There is no
way to completely divorce an attorney’s support of a political candidate from the fact that the
attorney is a member of the Bar. Every American citizen has the right to endorse candidates.
Of course, if the publication of the letter was intended in any way to secure business for
the lawyer as distinguished from securing votes for the man for whom the letter was written, a
different situation would be presented.
It would be well for attorneys to obtain stationery which does not show their profession
to be used on such occasions.
The matter seems to be one of intention. If the attorney was solely seeking to assist the
candidate and had no other motive, we cannot condemn his actions as unethical, although
perhaps they were ill-advised.