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foreclosing voluntary transactions.  Milton Friedman states

the case for certification this way:

The usual arguments for licensure, and in particu-

lar, the paternalistic arguments, are satisfied

almost entirely by certification alone.  If the

argument is that we are too ignorant to judge good

practitioners, all that is needed is to make the

relevant information available.  If, in full

knowledge, we still want to go to someone who is

not certified, that is our business; we cannot

complain that we did not have the information.

. . .  I personally find it difficult to see any

case for which licensure rather than certification

can be justified.99

Certification, unlike licensure, is subject to the test

of the market.  If a certifying organization made it very

costly to obtain its endorsement, it would encourage indi-

viduals to choose other means of advertising their abili-

ties, and perhaps spark the creation of a rival.  If a

certifying organization made its endorsement too cheap--that

is, so easily obtained that it had little power to predict

quality service--it would also suffer.  As Daniel Klein of

Santa Clara University has observed, "Career promisors build

and protect their reputations, sensing the truth in the

saying, Time wounds all heels.  When not prevented by gov-

ernment, voluntary institutions develop to give bite to the

saying, because that arrangement is preferred by all parties

except the untrustworthy."100  The reputation of a certifying

organization would be damaged if it certified as competent

practitioners who were not.

No state policy is necessary for voluntary certifica-

tion programs to arise.  Government should not be in the

certification business, but even if it were, it should not

be the exclusive certifying agency.  Private certification

programs must be free to compete.  Otherwise, political

pressure will build to make the government's certification

serve the same restrictive purpose that licensure does

currently.

Freedom of Contract

Freedom of contract should be the controlling principle

in the market for legal services.  An individual is almost

always the best judge of his needs and circumstances.  Some-

times people make mistakes and contract foolishly, but that

is no justification for infringing upon their right to make