FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 23, 2004
CONTACT
Judith Berrett
Director of Member and Community Relations
206-727-8212
judithb@wsba.org
Washington State Bar Association General Counsel Robert Welden
Elected Fellow of American Bar Foundation
Seattle Washington, June 23, 2004 — Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) General Counsel Robert Welden has been elected Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, an independent, nonprofit national research institute.
The objective of the Foundation is the improvement of the legal system through research concerning the law, the administration of justice, and the legal profession.
The Fellows is an honorary organization of attorneys, judges, and law professors whose professional, public, and private careers have demonstrated outstanding dedication to the welfare of their communities and to the highest principles of the legal profession. Fellows are nominated by Fellows in their jurisdiction and elected by the Board of the American Bar Foundation.
Welden has served as general counsel for the WSBA since 1988; previously he was a staff attorney for the WSBA from 1981 to 1988. Prior to coming to the WSBA, he was in private practice with Smith, Welden, Kaplan, Young and Withey, and staff attorney for Seattle Indian Center Legal Services and the Seattle-King County Public Defender's Office. Since 2002 he has been administrator of the Washington Practice of Law Board. From 1998 to 2001, he was vice president of the National Client Protection Organization. Welden has been a member of the American Bar Association (ABA) Standing Committee on Client Protection since 1999, serving as chair 2003-2004, and was a member of the ABA Access to Legal Services Committee and the ABA Task Force on the Model Definition of the Practice of Law.
Welden earned his J.D. in 1970 from the University of Washington, and is licensed to practice law in Washington, the United States District Courts for the Western and Eastern Districts of Washington, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court.
The Washington State Bar Association is a private, nonprofit organization authorized by the Washington Supreme Court to license the state's 28,200 lawyers. The WSBA both regulates lawyers under the authority of the Court and serves its members as a professional association — all without public funding. As a regulatory agency, it administers the bar exam, provides record-keeping and licensing functions, and administers the lawyer discipline program. As a professional association, the WSBA provides continuing legal education for attorneys, in addition to numerous other educational and member-service activities.
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