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52 Stetson L. Rev. i (2022-2023)

handle is hein.journals/stet52 and id is 1 raw text is: STETSON LAW REVIEW VOLUME 52 FALL 2022 NUMBER 1 OPEN ISSUE ARTICLES Honor The Oath: Florida's Constitution and the Need for Bar Examiner Reform Keith W. Rizzardi 1 When it comes to bar admission, law students who aspire to join the profession can justifiably question whether Florida law means what it says. Serious tensions exist between the Rules of the Florida Supreme Court Regulating Admission to the Bar and the other transparency, free speech, privacy and judicial funding requirements of the Florida Constitution. The bar examiners have a long-standing, restrictive, and regulatory view of themselves as a constitutional safeguard protecting the public from potentially dangerous attorney aspirants, but the Supreme Court of Florida cannot and should not exempt its agents from the State Constitution. Open government initiatives, online announcements, and periodic reports can enhance transparency and public understanding. Vague character rules can be rewritten. Individual freedoms of speech and thought can be respected. Needless invasions of personal privacy can be avoided through reevaluation of the financial and mental health inquiries. Burdensome fees can be reduced, and the public at large should contribute to the bar admissions budget. Florida's principles of ethics and professionalism direct that the voices of the legal community should be heard in our effort to self-govern and administer the justice system. In most cases, today's bar applicant is tomorrow's lawyer. For these applicants, the actions taken by the Florida Board of Bar Examiners create first impressions of the entire legal system. A constitutionally-questionable process is not a good beginning. The Florida Supreme Court, its bar examiner agents, the members of the Florida Bar, the professors and institutions working in legal education - and yes, the future members of the profession - all need to honor our oaths. Prosecutorial Discretion, Justice, and Compassion: Reestablishing Balance in Our Legal System Anna D. Vaynman & Mark R. Fondacaro 31 The criminal justice system, wherein nearly all cases are resolved through a guilty plea, is tenuously balanced on prosecutorial discretion in the context of the plea- bargaining process. This shift in the balance of power away from judges and juries is particularly troubling given the lack of formal legal safeguards afforded to defendants engaging in plea bargaining rather than going to trial. The main issue is not prosecutorial discretion per se, or even overzealous prosecutors, but the lack of oversight of the plea-bargaining process and the imbalance of power itself, which threatens the legitimacy and stability of the criminal justice system. This Article argues for the importance of prosecutorial discretion as a potentially valuable tool and analyzes how and why it creates potential for abuse. The Article concludes with suggestions for recreating a balance of power, by addressing issues arising from unequal access to information throughout the plea-bargaining process, recentering a defendant's constitutional rights within the justice system, and implementing safeguards in the prosecutorial function prospectively. The Third Amendment in 2020 Michael L. Smith 55 This Article is the first in a series of yearly articles analyzing references, discussion, and applications of the Third Amendment in court, legal scholarship, and popular media and commentary. The Third Amendment's prohibition on quartering soldiers in houses during peacetime and its requirement that quartering during times of war be authorized by law is not typically discussed (or even known) by most in the legal field. This Article and its future iterations aim to address this neglect by surveying 1

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