n 2014, the Conference of Chief Justices adopted Resolution 11: In Support of the Framework Created by the State Bar of Georgia and the Georgia Supreme Court to Address Issues Arising from Legal Market Globalization and Cross-Border Legal Practice. This Framework is often referred to as the “State Toolkit.” 

This article explains what the State Toolkit is, why it exists, and how each state can use the Toolkit to address issues related to foreign lawyers inbound to their jurisdiction. This section of the article includes statistics that show the degree to which globalization affects all U.S. states and the likelihood that – whether regulated or not - foreign lawyers are interacting with the citizens of each state. After introducing this background information, the article reviews the five methods by which foreign lawyers might actively practice within a state and the ABA policies that address these methods. (These ABA policies are often referred to as the “foreign lawyer cluster of rules.”) 

The second section of the article includes a map and chart that show each state’s status with respect to the foreign lawyer cluster of rules. It urges those states that have not done so to adopt all of these policies. 

The last part of the article explains how the Toolkit relates to the ongoing U.S.-EU trade negotiations known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership or T-TIP. This section also explains how the ABA’s policies and the Toolkit relate to the T-TIP “requests” that the CCJ and the ABA have received from the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE). Among other things, the CCBE has requested that EU lawyers be permitted to represent clients in the U.S. in connection with international arbitration or mediation proceedings.