Is the use of persuasion techniques—for example, primacy, storytelling, ethos—unethical? According to one author, professor Dane S. Ciolino, the answer is “yes.” The article, “Harmonizing Legal Ethics Rules With Advocacy Norms,” 36 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 199 (2023) (hereafter “Harmonizing”), begins with the story of when “Clarence Darrow famously inserted a straight wire into a cigar and smoked the cigar during trial until the ash grew and grew but never fell, fixating jurors and causing them to pay little attention to his opponent’s argument.” It then posits some unequivocal assertions:

“Legal ethics rules and adjudication regulations … flatly prohibit advocates from doing much of what they currently do and have long done.”

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