Counseling about More Than the Law

At the end of Professor Menkel-Meadow’s landmark article, she notes “the attraction of the problem-solving approach to negotiations is that it returns the solution of the problem to the client and forces the lawyer to perform her essential role in the legal system—that of solving problems” (p. 841). While most view this article as a call to change the mindset of lawyers to engage in the problem-solving method of negotiation, I want to focus on its underlying message—a lawyer’s essential role includes counseling about more than the law. In fact, as this article was being written in the early 1980s, the Kutak Commission added Model Rule 2.1, authorizing attorneys to counsel clients about the consequences of their actions beyond the law. Professor Menkel-Meadow gives us the road map to do that. Moreover, Professor Menkel-Meadow’s explanation is even more compelling, because it is based on a shift in mindset and is the first to utilize interdisciplinary literature....