Conference is American beauty

The American Bar Association Annual Conference offered the Law Society the opportunity to carve out a niche on the world stage, says Alison Hook

Hilary Clinton was there.

Rosalynn Carter was there.

So were almost 9,000 US lawyers, 60 English solicitors, and several Law Society representatives.

The place to be this month was not the Riviera, but Washington DC, venue for the 125th American Bar Association (ABA) Annual Conference.

Why did the Society brave the oppressive heat of DC in August? Two reasons.

Firstly, the ABA conference offers an unique opportunity to benchmark the Society and the English and Welsh profession against the biggest and most influential professional lawyers' organisation in the world.

The sheer size of the ABA, with its 400,000-plus members, inevitably means the event is buzzing with ideas on everything from alternative dispute resolution to utilities law.

Secondly, because it is such a big event it attracts participants from across the globe.

It is unrivalled as a networking event for the Society.

Therefore, it gives us a highly efficient and effective mechanism for raising the profile of the English and Welsh profession, so that more opportunities flow to our members.

And what did we achieve? We held profile-raising events for the profession attended by more than 300 people.

Through these events, we found individuals and firms willing to help the Society in its ongoing struggle to make it easier for solicitors to work in the US.

We met about 20 international bar presidents from New South Wales to Upper Canada, and many points in between, to discuss mutual issues of concern from multi-disciplinary partnerships post-Enron, competition in the profession, and requalification around the world.

We hosted a round-table debate with ten Commonwealth bar leaders, to discuss how we can make more of the heritage we share in the Commonwealth for the benefit of our members.

We sat down with English solicitors based in the US to discuss how we can serve them better.

We hope to start our first US- based 'local law society' as a result.

We picked up intelligence and ideas across the board, from a better understanding of the impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act on corporate responsibility, through to ideas for next year's National Pro Bono Week.

And we were not simply passive recipients of ideas from the US.

In some areas, the English profession can be proud of the fact that it is ahead of the game.

In the field of international human rights, the Society presented a host of ideas to the ABA, which is only now setting up a Centre for Human Rights.

Collaboration between our organisations will pay dividends in future, whether through joint action on behalf of lawyers whose human rights are threatened, or through increased influence on US states which continue to apply the death penalty to minors and the mentally retarded.

We were also able to use the conference to keep pushing actively on the door of practice rights in the US.

At a bilateral meeting, the Society president presented the incoming president of the ABA with a joint lobbying letter from the Society and the Paris bar.

This exhorted the ABA's House of Delegates to agree to new rules that would allow both American and foreign lawyers greater scope to move around the US.

The House of Delegates passed every one of the eight motions put to it on free movement of lawyers.

Although we cannot claim that it was our letter that swung the vote, or that the fight is over, we have clearly set out our stall to push for further action in future.

The English profession was undoubtedly the biggest foreign contingent at the ABA conference, but there is scope for us to make an even bigger impact, with solicitors giving more papers and participating in even greater numbers in future.

We got a great deal out of the conference but next year we will be looking to make the ABA work still harder for the benefit of the Society and the profession on this side of the pond.

Alison Hook is the head of the Law Society's international department