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This is from the other thread I posted. These are "administrative courts"
The Federal Example
Another indication that individuals without bar approval can adequately render legal services is that most federal administrative agencies permit unlicensed practitioners to represent parties in cases before them, both adversarial and nonadversarial. According to the Results of the 1984 Survey of Non-Lawyer Practice Before Federal Administrative Agencies, published jointly in 1985 by the ABA Standing Committee on Lawyers’ Responsibility for Client Protection and the Center for Professional Responsibility, there have been few reports of problems with lay advocates.
The U.S. Patent Office administers a competency test that both attorneys and nonattorneys must pass before they can bring cases before the office. There is no evidence to suggest that the nonattorneys are any less capable than the attorneys in dealing with the complexities of patent law and procedure. And in the case of Sperry v. Florida Bar (1963), the Supreme Court rebuffed an attempt by the Florida bar to prevent a non-bar member from representing Florida clients in patent applications.
Accountants, who are usually not bar members, frequently advise their clients on tax matters, and "enrolled agents" are permitted to appear before the U.S. Tax Court on behalf of their clients in disputes with the Internal Revenue Service. Accountants usually understand tax law as well as or better than many lawyers. As Barlow Christensen argues in the American Bar Foundation Research Journal (1980):
The accountant who lives every day in the field of tax law almost surely has an understanding of that field comparable to a lawyer’s understanding. Indeed, a proficient accountant probably knows and understands the tax laws far better than does the general practice lawyer.
In Michigan, nonlawyers are permitted to represent parties in proceedings before the Michigan Employment Security Commission (MESC). That requires considerable knowledge of the relevant law, but there is no evidence that claimants or employers have been ill-served by nonlawyers. The Michigan bar in 1985 fought to have a slight ambiguity in the wording of the Michigan Employment Security Act interpreted in a way that would place MESC cases under Michigan’s UPL statute, but failed.
In many states, nonlawyer real estate agents have been successfully preparing legal conveyancing documents for years. In Arizona, for example, a state supreme court decision in 1961 ruled that such work constituted the "practice of law" and was therefore illegal (State Bar of Arizona v. Arizona Land Title & Trust Co.). The realtors mounted a campaign, vigorously opposed by the state bar, to overturn that decision by amending Arizona’s constitution. The public voted in favor of the amendment by almost four to one. Since the adoption of that amendment, no evidence of consumer harm from incompetent document preparation has come to light.
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