W. Bradley Wendel (Cornell Law) provides a useful counterpoint to a set of chapters focused on mapping the connection between the current regime of legal services regulation and access to justice. His chapter is a passionate defense of the traditional lawyer’s role as a defender of key public values and a bulwark of rule of law. His chapter elegantly reminds readers that lawyers and the legal profession sit at an important crossroads as essential defenders of rule-of-law values that are under attack and yet waning in their market and cultural power.

Genevieve Lakier (University of Chicago Law) examines Upsolve v. James, where a district court enjoined the application of New York state’s unauthorized practice of law statutes to the Justice Advocates that the nonprofit organization, Upsolve, planned to train, to assist low-income New Yorkers file for bankruptcy. The opinion represents a clear victory for the access-to-justice movement. But it also represents a potentially significant change in how courts understand the First Amendment to apply in unauthorized-practice-of-law cases. Although the decision may be overturned on appeal, the logic of the opinion thus makes clear the promise that what critics have sometimes described as a “Lochnerized” First Amendment holds out to access-to-justice advocates, as well as some of its perils. In this chapter, Lakier explains why the decision is significant, embeds it within a broader story of doctrinal transformation, and spells out some of the benefits and costs of using a Lochner-like First Amendment to promote access to justice.

This chapter deals with the use of Large Language Models (LLMs) in the legal sector from a comparative law perspective, exploring their advantages and risks, the pertinent question as to whether the deployment of LLMs by non-lawyers can be classified as an unauthorized practice of law in the US and Germany, what lawyers, law firms and legal departments need to consider when using LLMs under professional rules of conduct - especially the American Bar Association Model Rules of Professional Conduct and the Charter of Core Principles of the European Legal Profession of the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe, and, finally, how the recently published AI Act will affect the legal tech market – specifically, the use of LLMs. A concluding section summarizes the main findings and points out open questions.