External Legal Counsel and the SEC M&A Comment Letters

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB; Board) maintains that constituent feedback plays an essential and dynamic role in its audit standard-setting process. We examine a major source of constituent feedback, responses to standard-setting questions, using a sample drawn from the original proposals of fourteen PCAOB auditing standards. We find that after receiving comment letter feedback to the standard-setting questions, the Board revises approximately half of its guidance tied to those questions before it finalizes auditing standards-a finding consistent with the Board's assertion that it carefully considers constituent perspectives as it develops new regulation. We also explore the related comment letters of eight professional auditing firms subject to the PCAOB's annual inspection program and discover varying levels of opposition to and support for the PCAOB's proposed authoritative guidance. We observe PCAOB revision to authoritative guidance highly contested by the firms in more than three-fourths of cases of standard-setting questions and PCAOB non-revision to guidance highly supported by the firms in more than ninety percent of cases.

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Constitutional and Institutional Developments

Leiden Journal of International Law ◽

10.1017/s0922156596000118 ◽

1996 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 163-165

Author(s):

Stephen H. Schwebel

Keyword(s):

Legal Counsel ◽

Law Faculty ◽

Mcgill University ◽

The Law ◽

The Moment ◽

Oil Company

Andrés Aguilar Mawdsley had a national and international career of the highest distinction. After his studies in Venezuela and at McGill University in Montreal – where more than the law he found the lovely wife who was at his side until the moment of his death – he began his career as a teacher of law, early attaining the rank of professor and dean of the law faculty in Caracas. By the age of thirty-four, he was appointed Minister of Justice. He subsequently served as the legal counsel of the Venezuelan national oil company and in many other positions of responsibility in Venezuela.

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The Economics of Rights: Does the Right to Counsel Increase Crime?

American Economic Journal Economic Policy ◽

10.1257/pol.20160027 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 9 (2) ◽

pp. 1-27 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Itai Ater ◽

Yehonatan Givati ◽

Oren Rigbi

Keyword(s):

Legal Reform ◽

Legal Counsel ◽

The Right

We examine the broad consequences of the right to counsel by exploiting a legal reform in Israel that extended the right to publicly provided legal counsel to suspects in arrest proceedings. Using the staggered regional rollout of the reform, we find that the reform reduced arrest duration and the likelihood of arrestees being charged. We also find that the reform reduced the number of arrests made by the police. Lastly, we find that the reform increased crime. These findings indicate that the right to counsel improves suspects ' situation, but discourages the police from making arrests, which results in higher crime. (JEL K10, K41, K42)

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THE ADJUDICATION OF HOMICIDE IN COLONIAL GHANA: THE IMPACT OF THE KNOWLES MURDER CASE

The Journal of African History ◽

10.1017/s0021853711000089 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 52 (1) ◽

pp. 85-104 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

ROGER GOCKING

Keyword(s):

Criminal Justice ◽

Gold Coast ◽

The Other ◽

Government Official ◽

Jury Trial ◽

Legal Counsel ◽

Capital Crimes ◽

The Right ◽

Colonial Government ◽

The Impact

ABSTRACTIn keeping with the law in place in the Colony of Ashanti in 1928, Dr Benjamin Knowles was tried and convicted for the murder of his wife without the benefit of a jury trial or the assistance of legal counsel. His trial and sentencing to death created outrage in both colonial Ghana and the metropole, and placed a spotlight on the adjudication of capital crimes in the colony. Inevitably, there were calls for reform of a system that could condemn an English government official to death without the benefit of the right to trial by a jury of his peers and counsel of his choice. Shortly after the Knowles trial, the colonial government did open up Ashanti to lawyers, and introduced other changes in the administration of criminal justice, but continued to refuse the introduction of jury trial. Nevertheless, the lasting impact of the Knowles trial was to make criminal adjudication in Ashanti, if anything, more lenient than the other area of colonial Ghana, the Gold Coast Colony.

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