§34-3-20. Duties of attorneys.

It is the duty of attorneys:

(1) To support the Constitution and laws of this state and of the United States.

(2) To maintain the respect due to courts of justice and judicial officers.

(3) To employ for the purpose of maintaining the causes confided to them such means only as are consistent with truth and never to seek to mislead the judges by any artifice or false statement of the law.

(4) To maintain inviolate the confidence and at every peril to themselves to preserve the secrets of their clients.

(5) To abstain from all offensive personalities and to advance no fact prejudicial to the honor or reputation of a party or a witness, unless required by the justice of the cause with which they are charged.

(6) To encourage neither the commencement nor continuance of any action or proceeding from any motive of passion or interest.

(7) Never to reject for any consideration personal to themselves the cause of the defenseless or oppressed.

(Code 1852, §738; Code 1867, §872; Code 1876, §791; Code 1886, §864; Code 1896, §590; Code 1907, §2985; Code 1923, §6250; Code 1940, T. 46, §43.)