Model Rule 6.1: Voluntary Pro Bono Publico Service

When it applies

This comes up on the MPRE when testing whether pro bono service is mandatory or merely encouraged, and in practice it guides lawyers' professional responsibility to improve access to justice.

What the rule requires

• Every lawyer has a professional responsibility to provide legal services to those unable to pay.
• Lawyers "should" aspire to render at least 50 hours of pro bono legal services per year.
• A substantial majority of those hours should go to persons of limited means, or to organizations serving them, without expectation of fee.
• Any additional hours may go to several activities. One is free or substantially reduced-fee services to groups or individuals seeking to secure or protect civil rights, civil liberties, or public rights. Another is such services to charitable, religious, civic, community, governmental, or educational organizations furthering their purposes when standard fees would be inappropriate. A third is substantially reduced-fee services to persons of limited means. A fourth is activities improving the law, the legal system, or the legal profession.
• Separately and in addition to service hours, lawyers should voluntarily contribute financial support to organizations providing legal services to persons of limited means. The comments add that when direct service is not feasible, a lawyer may discharge the pro bono responsibility through financial support reasonably equivalent to the value of the hours that would otherwise have been provided.
• The rule uses "should," not "shall," signaling it is not enforceable through discipline.

Exceptions

• No exceptions in the traditional sense, since the rule imposes no mandatory duty; failure to perform pro bono work is not a disciplinary violation.

How the MPRE tests Model Rule 6.1

• Students often assume 50 hours is a mandatory minimum; it is only an aspirational target.
• Test questions may ask whether a lawyer can be disciplined for doing zero pro bono work in a year—answer is no, because the rule is precatory ("should") not mandatory ("shall").
• Distinguishing this from Rule 6.2 (which addresses declining court appointments) is a common confusion point.
• Some questions test whether financial contributions can satisfy the aspiration. The rule sets out financial support as a separate, additional aspiration. Under the comments, however, when direct pro bono service is not feasible, a lawyer may discharge the responsibility through financial support roughly equivalent to the value of the forgone hours.