TodayGaming uncovers an ethical loophole
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Editorial
Article RatingIt seems as though we’re constantly talking about issues regarding the liberalization of gambling in Pennsylvania.
The latest controversy regards the “revolving door” between government and private enterprise. The Associated Press reported last week that a former top lawyer for the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board went to a law firm whose clients include two slot-machine casinos. Only three months separated his employment by the two entities.
This appears to go against a provision of the law establishing slots casinos that requires former top and midlevel employees of the gaming board to wait a full year before taking employment in the gaming industry. That’s also a part of the Pennsylvania ethics code governing all state employees.
But a past decision of the state Supreme Court has ruled that such provisions do not apply to lawyers, because lawyers are regulated separately by the Supreme Court.
It remains unclear whether that provision applies to Kevin Hayes, the lawyer mentioned above who was the former director of gaming operations for the board. The court decision applied to the state ethics code, which applies generally across all state departments. But the one-year prohibition was written directly into the law authorizing slot machine gambling.
We could see a court case involving this issue, especially since Hayes was just the latest of several lawyers to make the transition from the gaming board to the gaming industry. But we could just as easily see the state Supreme Court upholding its own precedent here.
This isn’t the first time the court has asserted its authority over lawyers to frustrate common-sense legislation. Attempts to regulate lobbying activity ran afoul of the court on the grounds that lobbyists tend to be lawyers.
We thought at the time that was a tenuous connection. Lobbyists aren’t attorneys. Nor are they acting as officers of the court when they’re trying to convince a legislator to vote their client’s way. If a commercial bus driver in Pennsylvania also held a law degree, would that mean he can’t have his license lifted for poor performance behind the wheel unless the Supreme Court weighs in first?
While we don’t have the job description handy for the director of gaming operations, we’re willing to stipulate that specific knowledge of the law is an aid to carrying out the duties of the position. Indeed, it may even be a requirement. But again, we doubt he was acting as an officer of the court in his capacity with the gaming board.
We see the court’s authority over lawyers as a disciplinary tool wielded against individual offenses. There is no reason that legislators cannot set a baseline standard of ethical behavior affecting all state employees regardless of position, and it is institutional elitism for the court to carve out exceptions for its particular professional specialty — especially when they clearly fall short of the standards written into law for everyone else.
