Paralegal


A paralegal, also known as a legal assistant or paralegal specialist, is a legal professional who performs tasks that require knowledge of legal concepts but not the full expertise of a lawyer with an admission to practice law. The market for paralegals is broad, including consultancies, companies that have legal departments or that perform legislative and regulatory compliance activities in areas such as environment, labor, intellectual property, zoning, and tax. Legal offices and public bodies also have many paralegals in support activities using other titles outside of the standard titles used in the profession. There is a diverse array of work experiences attainable within the paralegal field, ranging between internship, entry-level, associate, junior, mid-senior, and senior level positions.
In the United States in 1967, the American Bar Association endorsed the concept of the paralegal and, in 1968, established its first committee on legal assistants. In 2018, the ABA amended their definition of paralegal removing the reference to legal assistants. The current definition reads, "A paralegal is a person, qualified by education, training, or work experience who is employed or retained by a lawyer, law office, corporation, governmental agency or other entity and who performs specifically delegated substantive legal work for which a lawyer is responsible."
The exact nature of their work and limitations that the law places on the tasks that they are allowed to perform vary between nations and jurisdictions. Paralegals generally are not allowed to offer legal services independently in most jurisdictions. In some jurisdictions, paralegals can conduct their own business and provide services such as settlements, court filings, legal research and other auxiliary legal services. These tasks often have instructions from a solicitor attached.
Recently, some US and Canadian jurisdictions have created a new profession where experienced paralegals are being licensed, with or without attorney supervision, to allow limited scope of practice in high-need practice areas such as family law, bankruptcy and landlord-tenant law in an effort to combat the access-to-justice crisis. The education, experience, testing, and scope of practice requirements vary widely across the various jurisdictions. So too are the number of titles jurisdictions are using for these new practitioners, including Limited License Legal Technician, Licensed Paralegals, Licensed Paraprofessionals, Limited Licensed Paralegals, Limited License Paraprofessionals, Allied Legal Professionals, etc.
In the United States, a paralegal is protected from some forms of professional liability under the theory that paralegals are working as an enhancement of an attorney, who takes ultimate responsibility for the supervision of the paralegal's work and work product. Paralegals often have taken a prescribed series of courses in law and legal processes. Paralegals may analyze and summarize depositions, prepare and answer interrogatories, conduct document review, draft procedural motions and other routine briefs, perform legal research and analysis, legislative assistance, draft research memos, and perform some administrative professional/quasi-secretarial or legal secretarial duties, as well as perform case and project management. Paralegals often handle drafting much of the paperwork in probate cases, divorce actions, bankruptcies, and investigations. Consumers of legal services are typically billed for the time paralegals spend on their cases. In the United States, they are not authorized by the government or other agency to offer legal services except in some cases in Washington State in the same way as lawyers, nor are they officers of the court, nor are they usually subject to government-sanctioned or court-sanctioned rules of conduct. In some jurisdictions paralegals are licensed and regulated the same way that lawyers are and these licensed professionals may be permitted to provide legal services to the public and appear before certain lower courts and administrative tribunals.

Official definitions

Various professional organizations offer varying definitions of a paralegal.
  • From the National Federation of Paralegal Associations : "A paralegal is a person, qualified through education, training or work experience to perform substantive legal work that requires knowledge of legal concepts and is customarily, but not exclusively, performed by a lawyer. This person may be retained or employed by a lawyer, law office, governmental agency or other entity or may be authorized by administrative, statutory or court authority to perform this work. Substantive shall mean work requiring recognition, evaluation, organization, analysis, and communication of relevant facts and legal concepts."
  • From the National Association of Legal Assistants : "Legal Assistants are a distinguishable group of persons who assist attorneys in the delivery of legal services. Through formal education, training and experience, Legal Assistants have knowledge and expertise regarding the legal system and substantive and procedural law which qualify them to do work of a legal nature under the supervision of an attorney." This is the NALA's former 1984 definition. In 2001, the organization adopted the American Bar Association's definition of a paralegal/Legal Assistant.
  • From National Association of Legal Secretaries : "A Legal Assistant, qualified by education, training or work experience who is employed or retained by a lawyer, law office, corporation, governmental agency or other entity and who performs specifically delegated substantive legal work for which a lawyer is responsible."
  • From the American Association for Paralegal Education : "Paralegals perform substantive and procedural legal work as authorized by law, which work, in the absence of the paralegal, would be performed by an attorney. Paralegals have knowledge of the law gained through education, or education and work experience, which qualifies them to perform legal work. Paralegals adhere to recognized ethical standards and rules of professional responsibility."
  • From the Institute of Paralegals : "A paralegal is a non-lawyer who does legal work that previously would have been done by a lawyer, or if done by a lawyer, would be charged for."
  • From the Paralegal Society of Ontario : "A paralegal is an individual qualified through education or experience licensed to provide legal services to the general public in areas authorized by the Law Society of Upper Canada."
  • From the National Association of Licensed Paralegals : "A person who is educated and trained to perform legal tasks but who is not a qualified solicitor or barrister."

    Difference from legal secretaries

A legal secretary is generally a secretary who has a basic understanding of legal terminology and the specific formatting required by a particular court or government agency. Legal secretaries are also typically responsible for keeping case files organized and indexed, often taking on the duties of a file clerk. Although legal secretaries may be trained to prepare some basic legal papers and letters, they generally have little or no knowledge of particular legal doctrines, statutes or regulations, and typically have no training or experience in conducting legal research or drafting legal documents, pleadings, motions, briefs or other court papers. On the other hand, a typical paralegal in the United States can perform all of these tasks under an attorney or law office. Paralegals bill for their time at a higher rate than legal secretaries.
In Canada the title Legal Secretary is outdated. The recognized title of that position is Legal Administrative Assistant, or Legal Assistant.

Education, training, and certification

Though not required in most jurisdictions, many paralegals have completed a formal paralegal education program. Formal paralegal education programs may result in a diploma, higher diploma, advanced diploma, vocational education, associate degree, bachelor's degree, master's degree, or graduate certificate programs in the academic discipline of legal management and paralegal studies, or a paralegal professional certificate of continuing education. Others may enter through adjacent fields of study such as bachelor's, academic minors, master's, or graduate certificate degree programs in criminology and the sociology of law, political science, public administration, legal studies, sociology, literature and creative writing, history, philosophy, other fields in the social sciences, humanities, and liberal arts, or proof of higher education in any field of study or academic discipline. Many paralegals have completed all of their training or obtained a higher education degree in an adjacent field before entering the profession, while some, mostly those of the Baby Boomers Generation and some older Gen Xers unlike many Millennials, Gen Zers, and younger Gen Xers, have only on-the-job training, entering with only a high school diploma and no formal higher education which was a common phenomenon during that time, with others later completing their education while working their way up from some administrative assistance or secretarial positions in law firms, in-house legal departments, or government agencies where depending on the type of work completed may or may not have required a bachelor's degree level of specialized knowledge in a given field. Many paralegals take Continuing Legal Education, Continuing Education Unit, or Continuing Professional Development courses to fulfill the requirements of their firm, employer, government-appointed regulatory body, association, or to obtain and maintain a professional certificate or license to practice.

Economics

Paralegals exist precisely because they are not lawyers and thus can do the work more cheaply. Other than expertise, the main constraint on what work a paralegal can or cannot do tends to be local rules that reserve particular activities to lawyers. Some jurisdictions have a reserved activities list.
According to United States law, there are five specific acts which only a licensed attorney can perform:
  1. Establish the attorney–client relationship
  2. Give legal advice
  3. Sign legal papers and pleadings on behalf of a party
  4. Appear in court on behalf of another
  5. Set and collect fees for legal services
Beyond the five acts above, the paralegal can perform practically any other task, including legal research, legal writing, factual investigation, preparation of exhibits, and the day-to-day tasks of case management. The key is that attorneys are entirely responsible for the actions of their paralegals and, by signing and filing court documents drafted by paralegals, attorneys make those documents their own.