Lawyers across the country have been talking about New York’s new mandate requiring those seeking to join the bar to complete 50 hours of pro bono work.

New York will be the first state to institute such a requirement, which will take effect starting next year. New York Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman announced the requirement May 1.

Since then, lawyers have been discussing the pros and cons of the rule. Some say it won’t do anything to help needy clients and unnecessarily burden incoming lawyers. Others contend it will turn new lawyers on to pro bono service.

Bloomberg BNA asked lawyers around the country what they think.

Ben Trachtenberg, professor at the University of Missouri School of Law: “While I completely appreciate the motive behind Chief Judge Lippman’s plan, and there’s a tremendous access to justice problem, I don’t think this is a particularly effective or fair way to solve the problem.”

Michael Millemann, professor at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law: Chief Judge Lippman’s decision to require 50 hours of pro bono service for admission to the bar is a good step in the right direction.”

Robert N. Weiner, partner, Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C.: “The issue is whether there will be enough resources to ensure that the people doing the pro bono are getting supervised, and getting to represent the right clients, and actually serving their clients The existing infrastructure will need to be supplemented dramatically to have the capacity to accommodate all this pro bono service.”

Questions remain about the implementation and organization of the requirement (some lawyers even want to extend the rule to existing lawyers) and the New York State Bar Association has created a task force to address the issue. What impact New York’s move will have on other states also remains to be seen.

Do you think Maryland should make pro bono work a prerequisite for admission to the bar?

Welcome to the inaugural post for In-House Interrogatory, The Daily Record’s weekly blog for the in-house counsel community!

We want In-House Interrogatory to be a forum where in-house and corporate counsel can share challenges, strategies and views on the profession. Every week, we will feature a question and want to hear back from you about the topic. It’s a way for you to connect with other in-house lawyers — and, frankly, with me, so I can make sure I’m covering the issues you care about.

Since this is our first week, let the questioning begin!

Asked: Our weekly question to the In-House community

Our columnist H. Ward Classen, deputy general counsel for the Computer Sciences Corporation, wrote about hiring a few weeks ago.

Classen said when hiring attorneys for in-house jobs, people often just go for the academic pedigree or a candidate they know personally. Instead, Classen advocates choosing someone with good interpersonal skills and a desire to learn, even if they may know less about the practice area.

In the battle of personal skills vs. academic prowess vs. willingness to learn vs. knowledge of a specific practice area, what qualities win out when you are hiring an in-house attorney? Would you rather hire someone you know? Tell us what you think are the ideal qualities for an in-house counsel candidate.

Leave a comment below or email me.

Need to Know:

• Go Daddy’s general counsel announced she is leaving after a 10-year stint with the Internet domain registrar company
• The New York Racing Association named a new acting general counsel.
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• Want the latest on who’s been hired, fired or moving and shaking in between? Head to our Movers and Shakers page to find out.
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Today reminds me of a song by The Carpenters. But, alas, I digress. What follows is this week’s edition of the roundup.

– How prosecutors might proceed — if at all — in the JPMorgan case.

– Why you should marry after the initial public offering.

– What a Los Angeles County district attorney candidate is saying about giving conflicting testimony.

– Where defense attorneys for a fugitive vice president quit in protest.

An artist at the center of battles challenging peddling laws in Baltimore and Ocean City will be the center of attention at a Maryland Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts fundraiser Thursday night.

Spray-paint artist Mark Chase will be performing and donating his works to the fundraiser, “Fiesta de los Abogados y Artistes” in the courtyard at Baltimore’s Union Mill. (“Abogados” is Spanish for “lawyer.”)

Chase, the man behind Stellar Paintings, successfully challenged Ocean City’s regulations for street performers, which will be in effect if you’re walking on the Boardwalk this summer. (That’s his painting, “Jupiter Rising,” at left.)

In February, Chase was acquitted on charges of peddling without a permit in Baltimore when a federal judge ruled officers never saw him selling anything.

Chase also has plans to challenge Baltimore’s peddling restrictions much like he did Ocean City’s.

The George Washington University Law School is the latest to drop its enrollment as fewer people applied to law school for the upcoming academic year.

GW Law plans to keep its enrollment below 450, compared to this year’s class of 474, the National Law Journal reports.

Law schools across the country are grappling with upcoming fall enrollment in the face of the declining number of people taking the LSAT and even fewer applying to law school.

The University of California Hastings College of the Law announced this year that it also plans to decrease enrollment. Albany Law School, Creighton University School of Law and Touro College Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center also reduced class sizes during the 2011-2012 school year.

GW Law saw its number of applicants fall 15 percent, Law Dean Paul Schiff Berman told the Journal. It will lose some tuition revenue but plans to recoup it in increased fundraising and introducing new programs for students outside the law school, Berman said.

Baltimore schools are experiencing the similar problems. The University of Baltimore School of Law told The Daily Record  in March that its applicant numbers were down 17 percent this admissions cycle, but University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law officials were less concerned.

If it’s Monday it must be … the start of a special General Assembly session — and, of course, the roundup.

– New York will require 50 hours of pro bono service in order to join the state bar.

– Maryland’s special session has mile-high company.

– Will lawyers invest in an online service designed to cut into their business?

– Don’t forget Rover when drafting your will.

While all of us here at The Daily Record celebrated the Top 100 Women across the state Monday, another woman on the other side of the country reached a milestone for women in the courts.

Jacqueline H. Nguyen of Los Angeles was confirmed as a judge on the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday. The appointment makes her the first Asian Pacific American woman judge on a federal appellate court.

Nguyen came to the United States in 1975 after fleeing Vietnam and studied during breaks while helping her parents at their donut shop in Hollywood, according to the Los Angeles Times.

She went to UCLA School of Law, was appointed to the Los Angeles County Superior Court in 2002 and was chosen by President Barack Obama as a federal judge for the Central District of California in 2009.

The Ninth Circuit Court, where Nguyen was appointed, has jurisdiction over the federal district courts in Hawaii, Alaska, Arizona, California, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands.

Welcome to the seventh day in May (not to be confused with the Fletcher Knebel/Charles W. Bailey II novel or Burt Lancaster/Kirk Douglas movie). The only coup this Monday would be if there were no roundup.

– It’s time for lawyers to be “true professionals.”

– These ravens are huge fans of L.A. (and federal) law.

– Lawyers who sued Nutella enjoy sweet victory.

– This field-hockey player might have a strong Title IX case.

(Image courtesy flickr.com/geishabot/)

Two of life’s greatest inconveniences — jury duty and traffic — collided this week in California.

A courthouse computer system in Auburn accidentally summoned 1,200 people for jury duty  Tuesday. Traffic was jammed on the way to the Placer County Courthouse as citizens tried to report at 8 a.m.

“I’m a very mellow guy so it didn’t bother me but you could see the disdain and frustration on the faces of some of the other people,” a potential juror told the Auburn Journal. “They have to do a lot of juggling in the work place and in some, they don’t pay you for jury duty and you have to take unpaid time off or vacation time.”

The computer system was supposed to alert 900 people that they were not to show up for jury duty, but the automated message told them they should appear in court instead. Some called in beforehand to the courthouse, but about 800 people are estimated to have headed to court that day.

“The alert failed to notify us yesterday afternoon, so the clerk failed to update the system,” assistant court executive officer Geoff Brandt told CBS Sacramento. “The system then goes into default mode, and we were unaware the default mode was to call in every jury panel we had scheduled for the week.”

WBAL-TV 11 News reported Tuesday that Baltimore Sun reporter Tricia Bishop passed out during the trial of the Werdesheim brothers this morning and that one of the defendants went to her aid.

Avi and Eliyahu Werdesheim, Orthodox Jewish and white, are accused of beating a black teen in an Baltimore neighborhood while Eliyahu was patrolling for an Orthodox Jewish watch group.

WBAL reporter Lowell Melser tweeted that Avi jumped out of his seat to administer aid when Bishop passed out. Bishop was OK when she was led out of the Mitchell Courthouse by emergency workers, according to Melser.

The trial has been going on since last week and has been drawing national attention due to its similarities to the Trayvon Martin case in Florida, where a black teen was shot and killed by a neighborhood watch patrolman.