City Ethics | Breaking the oxymoron: "City Ethics"

Local Government Practice March 6, 2009

The Government Attorney and Zealousness

Lawyers are supposed to zealously represent their clients. After all, Canon 7 of the ABA Code of Professional Responsibility says, "A lawyer should represent a client zealously within the bounds of the law." This requirement applies as much to government lawyers as it does to private lawyers, right?

Ethics Commissions & Administration March 5, 2009

Against the Whole Thing

It's refreshing when an elected official attacks government ethics head-on. This is what Tennessee state representative Willie "Butch" Borchert did in an impromptu speech yesterday, according to an Associated Press report.

March 5, 2009

Concern About Corruption in Illinois

Politics may be local for politicians, but is it for citizens? The 2009 Joyce Foundation Illinois Survey shows that in January the people of Illinois were more concerned about corruption in government than about the economy. Last January only 49% of those polled were extremely concerned about corruption; now 61% are (and 50% are extremely concerned about the economy, as opposed to 45% the year before).

What changed?

Conflicts of Interest March 4, 2009

Local Government Attorneys' Conflict re Conflicts

The most complicating (sic) part of conflicts of interest is the being interested part. When one is interested in something, not necessarily in a financial way, it can be very hard to get the emotional distance necessary to analyze a conflict properly. In other words, it's hard for many people to admit the possibility that they may have a conflict and then to determine rationally what should be done about it.

A case in point involves the village attorney of Mokena, IL.

Local Government Practice March 3, 2009

Political Activity on the Job

The ethics provision that is probably most consistently violated is the one about political activity in city or county hall.

The City Ethics Model Code Project version reads as follows:

Local Government Practice March 2, 2009

Telling Local Government Officials About Honest Services Fraud

One argument rarely made for effective government ethics programs is that they will prevent government officials from being prosecuted for "honest services fraud."

Honest services fraud is to bribery what manslaughter is to murder. Sort of. By this I mean that many officials accused of bribery plead down to honest services fraud, a lesser, but still serious crime (the maximum sentence is 20 years).

Conflicts of Interest March 1, 2009

Labor Peace Through Unethical Conduct

Rarely does an ethics commission get a clear chance to show it has no favoritism. The Nevada Commission on Ethics will soon get that chance.

The Nevada senator who raised a legislative immunity defense last year against the commission was accused of a conflict of interest due to his position as president of the Las Vegas chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC), a nonunion contractors association.

February 28, 2009

A Miscellany

On the legislative immunity front, according to an article in the Providence Journal, a date has been set for the Rhode Island Supreme Court to hear the appeal by the Rhode Island Ethics Commission of the decision upholding the old constitutional legislative immunity clause against a more recent constitutional amendment creating the ethics commission and giving it jurisdiction over the state legi

February 27, 2009

Thumbs Up and Down Today

Thumbs up for the Virginia House of Delegates General Laws Committee. According to an editorial in today's Charlottesville Daily Progress, this House committee greatly improved a Senate bill on disclosure of conflicts of interest by local land-use board members. The Senate wanted to make disclosure of financial interests in rea

Resources & Learning February 27, 2009

F. G. Bailey's The Prevalence of Deceit

Another cause for my last blog entry, on the three lies of government ethics, is that I had just finished F. G. Bailey's book The Prevalence of Deceit (Cornell, 1991). The book is about the close connection between deceit and power. Bailey pictures politics as a contest for power that employs rhetoric.

Subscribe to