By: Steve Lash

Maryland attorneys who oppose a proposed requirement that they take continuing legal education courses might find kinship with Louisiana judges.

A proposed resolution in the Louisiana legislature would urge the state Supreme Court to develop a mandatory CLE course on family law for all of the state’s judges. The proposal states that nearly every legislator has received ”numerous phone calls, e-mails, and letters from constituents complaining about judicial application of laws on child custody and child support.”

Louisiana House Concurrrent Resolution No. 79 adds that “great confusion” continues to exist in the state judiciary fully 17 years after the state’s most recent change in child-custody laws and following recent alterations to the state’s child-support guidelines.

“[N]o other area of the law touches … citizens, including the children of our constituents, more intimately, directly, and often painfully, than the law of custody and child support,” the resolution notes. The legislature “desires that all members of the judiciary, not just the family and juvenile court judges, be apprised of the current status of all Louisiana laws, particularly those affecting the children of our state.”

The resolution, which the Louisiana House approved this month, awaits action by the state Senate.

Maryland judges are required to take 10 hours of CLE  courses annually. The state’s top court, the Court of Appeals, has not set a date for voting on a controversial proposal to require that Maryland attorneys also take 10 hours of CLE per year.

Is mandatory CLE for Maryland attorneys a good idea?

From our Generation J.D. blog: Mandatory CLE in Maryland?