Seems another state is wrestling with the issue of whether non-lawyers can provide legal advice to folks without lawyers. In a case recently filed in South Carolina, the local conference of the NAACP and others sued seeking to enjoin state officials from interfering with a program to train and deploy lay advocates who would help low-income renters facing eviction in housing court, claiming protection under the Constitutional rights of free speech and association. This follows a similar suit filed last year in New York seeking similar relief in a program where an entity called UpSolve would train law providers of legal advice in housing cases. The New York NAACP filed a brief in support. A temporary injunction was entered, though it was appealed to the Second Circuit by the state and remains pending.

The issue in both cases, and generally everywhere else, is whether these lay advocates would be practicing law without a license. I don't think there's any doubt about that, but the approach in both matters seems to be that because lawyers simply aren't doing this work, except for a few badly underfunded legal aid folks, and because housing is (or should be) a basic human right, something had to give, and the rights of individuals to speak and meet about important issues should trump the right of a professional monopoly to control the conversation.