By the mid-fourteenth century, professional associations of canon lawyers (legal advocates in Christian ecclesiastical courts, which dealt with cases involving marriage, inheritance, and other issues) had appeared in most of Western Europe, and a body of professional standards had been defined for them. One might expect that the professional associations would play enforcement, the initiative for disciplinary action apparently came from a dissatisfied client, not from fellow lawyers.
At first glance, there seem to be two possible explanations for the rarity of disciplinary proceedings. Medieval canon lawyers may have generally observed the standards of professional conduct scrupulously. Alternatively, it is possible that deviations from the established standards of behavior were not inefficient that most delinquents escaped detection and punishment.
Two considerations make it clear that the second of these explanations is more plausible. First, the English civil law courts, whose ethical standards were similar to those of ecclesiastical courts, show many more examples of disciplinary actions against legal practitioners than do the records of church courts. This discrepancy could well indicate especially since there was some overlap of personnel between the civil bar and the ecclesiastical bar.
Second, church authorities themselves complained about the failure of advocates to measure up to ethical standards and deplored the shortcomings of the disciplinary system. Thus the Council of Basel declared that canon lawyers failed to adhere to the ethical prescriptions laid down in numerous papal constitutions and directed Cardinal Cesarin to address failure of the disciplinary system to reform unethical practices were very common.
Such criticisms seem to have had a paradoxical result, for they apparently reinforced the professional solidarity of lawyers at the expense of the enforcement of ethical standards. Thus the profession’s critics may actually have induced advocates to organize professional associations for self-defense. The critics’ attacks may also have persuaded lawyers to assign nonprofessionals than to disciplining wayward members within their own ranks.
What this question is testing
Your task
Pin down exactly what the question asks about the passage — a detail, the author's view, the structure, or the main point — before looking at the choices.
Common trap
Answers that restate a true detail from the passage but don't answer the specific question being asked.
Winning move
Anticipate the answer in your own words from the passage, then find the choice that matches that prediction.
Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.