House of Delegates Guide

The Oregon State Bar Board of Governors has developed guidelines for the Bar's participation in legislative and policy activities. These guidelines are found in BOG Bylaw Article 12. The guidelines are drawn from the Bar's statutory purposes, the constitutional limits on the use of mandatory membership dues, and election law limits on the activities of public employees. They also reflect the recognition that the OSB is a diverse organization whose members have differing views on many subjects.

The Purpose of the Oregon State Bar

ORS 9.080(1) charges the Board of Governors to "direct its power to the advancement of the science of jurisprudence and the improvement of the administration of justice." Article 2 of the OSB Bylaws describes the Bar's purposes to also include promoting high standards of professional conduct and competence, ensuring cooperation between the courts and the Bar, promoting respect for the law among the public, promoting the application of the knowledge and experience of the profession to the public good.

The Keller Rule

In 1990, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Keller v. State Bar of California, 499 US 1, 111 SCt 2228 (1990) that an integrated bar's use of compulsory dues to finance political and ideological activities violates the 1st Amendment rights of dissenting members when such expenditures are not germane to the bar's purpose, which the Court identified as regulating the legal profession and improving the quality of legal services. The Court recognized that it was not drawing bright lines:

The difficult question, of course, is to define the latter class of activities.

Precisely where the line falls between those State Bar activities in which the officials and members of the Bar are acting essentially as professional advisers to those ultimately charged with regulation of the legal profession, on the one hand, and those activities having political or ideological coloration which are not reasonably related to the advancement of such goals, on the other, will not always be easy to discern. 499 US 1 at14.

Keller does not prohibit integrated (mandatory) bars from using member dues to advance political or ideological positions that are not germane to the bar's purpose; however, it requires that dissenting members receive a refund of the portion of dues attributable to the non-germane activity. The OSB process for a member to challenge the use of dues is set out in BOG Policy 11.900.

Oregon Election Law

ORS 260.432(1) and (2) prohibit public employees (the Board has concluded that OSB staff are within the statutory definition of public employees) from promoting or opposing the adoption of a measure "while on the job during working hours." This does not mean that public employees must remain silent on measures pending before the voters. The Attorney General has concluded that public bodies may use public funds to inform voters of facts pertinent to a measure, so long as the information is not used to lead voters to support or oppose a particular position in the election.

Any expenditure of public funds must be related to the purpose for which the public body exists. If it is not, the public officials (BOG members are public officials) who permit the unauthorized expenditure may be subject to personal liability under ORS 294.100.

Divisive Issues

The Bar's guidelines for legislative and policy activities require that the BOG "endeavor to respect the divergent opinions of subgroups within the profession" and make reasonable effort to "avoid committing bar funds to issues which are divisive or result in creating factions within the profession."