HELENA — Republican leaders in the Legislature have made reforming the judiciary and legal system a priority in the 2025 session and one of the first discussions on those topics came Tuesday morning. The president of the State Bar of Montana spoke to the Senate Judiciary Committee after GOP senators asked her to appear and answer questions about what they called “partisan attacks” at a recent legal conference.

The State Bar is the professional association of attorneys in Montana, and all attorneys licensed to practice law in the state must be members and pay dues.

Last month, 19 Republican senators led by Sen. John Fuller, R-Kalispell, sent a letter to the bar, complaining about comments made at a continuing legal education conference they organized in Bozeman last April. Jim Goetz, an attorney from Bozeman, was appearing on a panel when he made several heated comments criticizing a Montana Supreme Court ruling and laws passed by the Legislature. He referred to Gov. Greg Gianforte by a derogatory name.

The senators said since bar membership is mandatory, the association had a responsibility to “address Mr. Goetz’s offensive conduct at an event they paid for.” They asked the bar to apologize for the comments and ensure their future conferences had “a diversity of offered viewpoints.”

The letter also said they were asking the Office of Disciplinary Counsel, which investigates grievances filed against Montana lawyers, to investigate whether Goetz’s comments violated the ethical code for attorneys. They specifically attempted to draw a parallel between this situation and the recent recommendation from a state panel that Attorney General Austin Knudsen be temporarily suspended from practicing law. That recommendation originated fromstatements made during a dispute between the Legislature and the judiciary.

“The statements that Attorney General Knudsen made (or that others in his office made) that the ODC considers rule-breaking are much less inflammatory than Mr. Goetz’s own statements,” they wrote.

An adjudicatory panel of the Montana Commission on Practice recommended Knudsen receive a 90-day suspension. Knudsen’s attorneys submitted a response this week saying the panel was wrong to rule he had violated professional conduct rules, and that the proposed discipline was “draconian and disproportionate.”

State Bar president Toni Tease, an attorney from Billings, submitted a written response to the committee. In it, she said the bar is an independent, nonpartisan organization and that they do take diverse viewpoints into account when planning programs.

Tease also appeared before the committee over Zoom during Tuesday’s hearing. She said she was not president at the time of the April event and didn’t attend or have a role in planning it. She said the previous bar president, Stuart Segrest had apologized to the governor’s office for what was said about Gianforte.

“We cannot control comments made by folks who attend all of our CLE programs, or even folks who are panelists on or speakers at those events,” she said. “We don't necessarily endorse those views, and those folks are not in bar leadership or speaking officially on behalf of the State Bar.”

Tease said it was her understanding that Lt. Gov. Kristen Juras had told the previous bar president a formal apology was not necessary. The governor’s office told MTN afterwards that Juras had actually received a formal verbal apology, and that both she and Segrest “took the matter very seriously” and accepted the comments were not on behalf of the bar.

Tease declined to comment further about Goetz’s statements specifically, saying it’s now an active disciplinary matter because the senators referred the issue to the Office of Disciplinary Counsel. She said the State Bar is not involved in disciplinary proceedings and ODC is administratively separate.

Democrats on the committee said there wasn’t a legitimate legislative reason for making the bar come in and respond to Goetz’s comments.

“To call in an association to answer for that member's comments — to call them in to ask for an apology and to demand punishment is having us as the Senate forcing speech upon organizations,” said Sen. Andrea Olsen, D-Missoula. “This is beyond the scope of what we as the Senate should be doing in this committee.”

But Republicans said their questions about the bar would be relevant as they consider legislation later in the session.

“Although it was put in that letter than we were going to ask them to appear here, which the State Bar has agreed to do, it was not by subpoena. It was not forced,” said committee chair Sen. Barry Usher, R-Yellowstone County. “I appreciate the acceptance of that.”

Fuller is sponsoring a bill this session that would make membership in the bar voluntary, saying attorneys should have a First Amendment right not to associate with a group they may disagree with politically.

Tease said the bar does give attorneys an opportunity to ask for a refund of some of their dues if they object to the bar’s position on a specific piece of legislation.

On Tuesday, MTN asked Goetz for his comment on the senators’ letter.

“You’d think they would have better things to do,” he said.