Can the NJ Supreme Court's 2024 AI Guidelines Actually Be Enforced Against You?

When the New Jersey Supreme Court released its "Preliminary Guidelines on New Jersey Lawyers' Use of Artificial Intelligence" on January 24, 2024, a lot of NJ attorneys read the headline and filed it under "good to know." Some skimmed it. Many did not read it at all.

That's an understandable reaction to what sounds like a soft advisory document. But treating these guidelines as purely aspirational is a mistake, and the reason why is worth unpacking carefully.

What the guidelines actually are

The NJ Supreme Court issued the Preliminary Guidelines through its AI and the Courts working group. The document addresses three main areas: accuracy and verification of AI-generated content, confidentiality of client information, and transparency with courts and clients. It explicitly frames itself as "preliminary," acknowledging that the law in this area is moving fast and that more formal guidance will follow.

Here's what matters: the NJ Supreme Court is the body that governs attorney conduct in New Jersey. It promulgates the Rules of Professional Conduct. When that same court issues a formal statement telling attorneys how it expects them to use AI, a practicing NJ attorney who disregards that statement and ends up before a disciplinary panel is not in a comfortable position.

The guidelines don't create new rules on their own. But they signal how the Court reads existing rules in the AI context. Ignoring a signal from the rule-maker is a different kind of risk than ignoring a blog post from a bar association committee.

The RPC hooks are already there

The Preliminary Guidelines don't float in a vacuum. They connect directly to RPCs that are enforceable today.

NJ RPC 1.1 requires competent representation, which includes the legal knowledge, skill, thoroughness, and preparation reasonably necessary for the representation. The guidelines make clear the Court views verification of AI output as part of what competent use looks like. An attorney who submits AI-generated legal research without checking it isn't just cutting corners; under this framing, they may be falling below the RPC 1.1 standard.

NJ RPC 3.3(a)(1) prohibits a lawyer from making a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal. The guidelines address accuracy directly. An attorney who files a brief containing a hallucinated citation, without having taken reasonable steps to verify it, is exposed not just to judicial sanction but to a conduct complaint grounded in RPC 3.3.

NJ RPC 1.6 covers confidentiality of client information. The guidelines flag the risk of inputting client data into AI tools without understanding where that data goes. Again, the underlying RPC obligation exists independently, but the guidelines tell you the Court is paying attention to this specific application.

What "preliminary" actually means here

Some attorneys have taken comfort in the word "preliminary." The thinking goes: if the guidelines are preliminary, they're not final, so maybe they're not serious.

That reading has it backward. "Preliminary" means the Court hasn't finished thinking through all the implications yet. It does not mean the Court has no expectations in the meantime. The guidelines are the Court's current, published position. Courts, including New Jersey's, do not issue documents on official letterhead that they expect everyone to ignore until further notice.

The ACPE has not, as of this writing, issued an AI-specific ethics opinion. The guidelines from the Supreme Court are currently the most direct, NJ-specific formal statement on how lawyers in this state should be using AI. That makes them the starting point for any serious compliance analysis, not a footnote.

The practical enforcement question

A fair question is: has anyone actually been disciplined in New Jersey for AI-related conduct? As of this writing, no publicly reported NJ disciplinary decision specifically cites AI misuse as the basis for sanction. But that's a thin reed to lean on for two reasons.

First, the disciplinary system operates on a lag. Conduct happens, complaints are filed, investigations take time. The guidelines are barely 18 months old.

Second, AI-related failures in court are already generating judicial responses nationally, and NJ judges are aware of what their counterparts elsewhere are doing. A NJ attorney who files a brief with fabricated citations is far more likely than they were two years ago to face not just a court sanction but a referral to the OAE.

What I recommend

Start by reading the Preliminary Guidelines directly. They're publicly available on the NJ Courts website and they're not long. Note every place the Court ties a guideline to an existing RPC obligation, because that's where your exposure is concrete.

Second, build a one-page verification checklist for any AI-assisted work product before it leaves your office. Every case citation pulled from an AI tool gets checked against Westlaw, Lexis, or a free court database before filing. This is not optional; it's what the guidelines and RPC 3.3 together demand.

Third, review whatever AI tool you're using and confirm that client data you enter isn't being used to train the model. Many consumer-facing AI products do this by default unless you opt out. The guidelines flag confidentiality as a concern, and NJ RPC 1.6 makes that concern an enforceable obligation.

Finally, document your process. If a complaint is ever filed, your ability to show a disciplinary panel that you had a verification workflow, a confidentiality check, and awareness of the Court's guidelines puts you in a materially different position than an attorney who has no record of thinking about any of this.

The Preliminary Guidelines are the NJ Supreme Court telling you, in writing, what it thinks responsible AI use looks like. That's worth treating seriously now, before the "preliminary" label gets dropped.

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What the rule requires

The NJ Supreme Court's Preliminary Guidelines on New Jersey Lawyers' Use of Artificial Intelligence (January 24, 2024) direct attorneys to verify the accuracy of AI-generated content, protect client confidentiality when using AI tools, and be transparent with tribunals and clients about AI use. NJ RPC 1.1 requires the legal knowledge, skill, thoroughness, and preparation reasonably necessary for competent representation. NJ RPC 3.3(a)(1) prohibits making a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal. NJ RPC 1.6(a) prohibits revealing information relating to the representation of a client unless the client gives informed consent or disclosure is otherwise permitted by the RPCs. The ACPE has issued no AI-specific ethics opinion.

What I recommend

Read the Preliminary Guidelines in full and map each guideline to the RPC it implicates. Create a written verification checklist for AI-generated work product, covering every citation and every factual assertion before filing. Confirm that any AI tool you use for client matters does not use your inputs for model training by default, and document that you checked. Keep a written record of your verification process on each matter where AI played a role. These steps are not just good hygiene; they're the foundation of a defensible record if a disciplinary complaint ever arises.