Professor Deborah Rhode was quoted in a Los Angeles Times story about California Chief Justice Ronald George's involvement in UC Irvine's hiring of a new law dean:

Stanford University law professor Deborah Rhode, director of the Center on Ethics there, said George's involvement was "clearly not a violation of any ethical standards."

But under the state judicial ethics canon, he is obliged not to create an appearance of impropriety and perhaps should have consulted the entire court before providing the letter to the Irvine committee, she said.

"The appearance of impropriety is very much in the eye of the beholder, and different people could take a different view on the facts of this case," Rhode said.