The emergence of COVID-19 has disrupted much about our world, from the immense loss of life to how we connect with others to where we work and everything in between. The pandemic has been compounded in the United States by a civil rights movement and a massive recession. Democratic institutions are rightfully being evaluated on their response to these crises. The Rules Committee of the Connecticut Judicial Branch faces its own test this month in its deliberation over whether to adopt emergency diploma privilege in lieu of an online bar exam in October.

If you have not been following the issue closely, in-person bar exams in most states have been canceled because of their likelihood to spread the coronavirus. Several states—Utah, Washington, Oregon and Louisiana—created an emergency diploma privilege for their bar applicants. Diploma privilege is a means of licensing attorneys by virtue of their graduation from law school that includes a character and fitness evaluation and ethics requirements. Some states have postponed the bar exam indefinitely. Connecticut initially postponed its bar exam. We have since joined 18 other states, including New York, California, and Illinois, in holding the exam online on Oct. 5 and 6.

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