Category: News Feeds

Dear “Liberal” Colleagues:

I’m very pleased that you are happy with the election results. It makes me happy that you are happy. Although I’m not a member of any political football team, I do think things have been a bit sticky lately. However, now that President-Elect Joe Biden is on the scene, and your blood pressure is down, I thought I would inform you of a few things that will likely be going through my mind in the next four years.

You see, many outside and inside of legal academia will use your vote in favor of Biden as evidence that you are a “liberal.” Because, as I’m told, Democrats are “liberal” and Republicans are “conservative.” But I don’t buy labels. I look at action. And those actions might suggest something entirely different.

This goes beyond hypocrisy. Hypocrisy might be something like screaming at the TV and page refreshing your browser while you wait for the states to hurry up vote counts. AND then take two months to grade exams while complaining about students emailing you asking when grades will be posted.  That’s not necessarily a liberal thing. Although I’m sure your students will find it funny. Let’s run through some examples.

When you say that President Donald Trump’s supporters are all racist, I look at your faculty profile page. You see, it’s hard not to convince me of systemic racism regardless of party. I look at the numbers of minority professors in legal academia, and I have to say I’m not thrilled by our “diversity.” To me, it seems a bit like many members of the academy was accusing President Trump of doing overtly what the academy does more or less covertly. Or, as I like to call it, projection. I’m not saying you are to blame for your institution’s lack of diversity (unless you are), I’m saying you shouldn’t be selective as to where you see it.

But let’s not stop there. I’ll also see how you treat minority candidates, particularly those who do not hail from Yale, Harvard, or one of the other two schools from which your school hires. I’ll be watching to see how quick you are to attack their scholarship, torpedo their job talks, and then tout the remarkable scholarship of that white guy from Yale. Do you do this as someone who claims to be a big advocate of diversity, much like Trump claimed in terms of how “MAGA loves the Black people?” Did questions about VP-Elect Harris’ qualifications to be president outrage you all the while you were questioning whether a minority candidate would be a “good fit?”

I will look at your conduct on committees. Will you try to kill a minority faculty candidacy at the committee level like you’re Mitch McConnell and the candidate’s name is Garland?

When you berate Trump’s attack on Critical Race Theory, do you do it while saying excrement like “we can’t sacrifice quality for diversity”? Because that red herring has been in play in academia for a long time (it’s now a staple in diversity trainings) and it isn’t a Trumpian concept. Did you blow off diversity trainings or try to be clever with the trainers so you could dismiss what they were trying to teach you?

When you speak of how Harris has broken a glass ceiling, do you do so while reinforcing those within academia? The ones that relate to citation counts and scholarly impact? The ones that relate to disproportionate committee loads? The ones that make it more difficult for minority women to get tenure than anyone else? Is this a bad time for me to highlight Meera Deo’s book Unequal Profession in which you can read all about those barriers?

When you tell me that Trump treated citizens of blue states as second-class citizens, I look at how you treat nontenure-track faculty and staff. Are legal writing professors and clinical professors your “blue states?” How strongly have you advocated on their behalf? How often do you listen to them? Do you view their scholarship differently than your own?

When you complain that Trump has unfairly claimed minorities are cheats and liars, I ask whether you have disproportionately accused certain law students of violations of your school’s Honor Code? Do you even know your school’s stats? Your own? While we’re at it, did you bravely attack the bar examiners for their draconian measures without a moment of self-reflection about your own?

When you accuse Trump supporters of being a cult of personality, I’ll be watching whether you say things like, “SQUEE! I got cited by Cass!” Do you deify particular political players in the any branch of government, while ignoring all of their shortcomings? None? Not even Supreme Court justices?  Not a single one?

When you attacked Trump about cronyism, did you do so all the while trying to get your bestie a job at your law school? Perhaps you didn’t disclose that and savagely attacked a competing candidate during the hiring meeting? Or maybe had others do it for you?

Did you balk at the lack of diversity in Trump’s cabinet? If so, did you diversify your white manel by having a single white woman? Did you consider your efforts successful when it was a balance of white men and white women?

Sure, we could dismiss these all as just professors eagerly checking the privilege of others while ignoring their own, but I hear that voting Democrat makes you a “liberal.”  Liberals don’t just dismiss these concerns, right?

Just wondering.

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LawProfBlawg is an anonymous professor at a top 100 law school. You can see more of his musings here. He is way funnier on social media, he claims. Please follow him on Twitter (@lawprofblawg) or Facebook. Email him at lawprofblawg@gmail.com.

While many discuss the coronavirus pandemic as a force that has dramatically reshaped workplaces in 2020, few note the extent to which it has revolutionized how lawyers interact with their colleagues and clients — and the new expectations clients now have when interacting with law firms.

Professionals of all stripes have become focused on efficient remote communications with clients and staff over the past six months, and many clients now expect to talk to their counsel — and even execute legal documents — in a far more streamlined and immediate manner.  

To help lawyers navigate this shifting landscape, the comprehensive case management platform MyCase has recently added 3 new features. The features draw on MyCase’s cloud-based functionality to enable lawyers to have streamlined and organized collaboration in a virtual office environment.

Notably, the new features come at no additional cost to MyCase users. Here, we provide an overview of the new additions. 

Manage Your Contracts With ESignature Templates and CounterSignature

MyCase eSignature templates and CounterSignature have streamlined the document-signing process. These features interact seamlessly with the broader case management system and eliminate the need to use disparate platforms. 

The tools allow you to set up templates that can be sent out on a regular basis without having to re-create the document from scratch. They also allow for multiple signers and countersigners to complete these forms simultaneously — all managed through a simple, user-friendly interface.  

ESignature templates and CounterSignature ease the document execution process for those who can’t have in-person meetings, or those who want a faster, more convenient document signing process. Additionally, when a document needs multiple signatures, it eliminates the need for an extensive procedure that could involve multiple mailings or other logistical difficulties.  

It’s also completely integrated into the rest of the MyCase platform, which users are already utilizing for areas as varied as internal communication, client communication and billing. If users need to review a contract, it’s right next to where they’d be reviewing notes and other documents, easing the management of the overall matter. 

Keep Your Clients Close With 2-Way Text

MyCase also offers 2-Way Text, so firm members can text their clients from their desktop or smartphone. With this feature, there’s no commingling of personal and client communications, or even sharing of personal contact information. 

Firm members just navigate to a specific case and text the client directly, with the message appearing on the client’s personal device as a regular text message.

All messages are organized by the case they are assigned to, and are also available in a general text message inbox. For added convenience, there is one-click access to track time spent texting for billing purposes, so you never miss billable time.

Additionally, when you’re not in the office or at your desktop, this functionality is connected to MyCase’s mobile application as well.

Communicate With Your Team Using Internal Chat

Finally, as chat platforms continue to make inroads in internal communications in a number of industries, MyCase now offers internal chat functionality to law firms.

The platform’s new Internal Chat enables firm members assigned to a case to instantaneously communicate with their colleagues in a manner that’s fully integrated with the rest of the case — eliminating the additional costs and inconveniences of switching between multiple systems.

MyCase users can find Internal Chat at the bottom right of their screen, no matter where they are in the software, so they never miss a message. 

Navigating the Pandemic

These new features, coming at no extra cost, directly address the challenges of today’s remote legal workplace. 

Virtual contract execution is a growing need as requirements for wet ink signatures ease. Texting is taking over as a primary means of instant communication, as response times for email become less certain. And the modern-day “shout down the hallway” often takes place within online chat software. 

If you want to experience MyCase’s virtual office environment, click here to sign up for a free trial (no credit card required). And if you’re already a MyCase customer, consider this a friendly reminder to explore how these new offerings can enhance your practice. 

Trump has lost a sufficient number of electoral votes to have lost the 2020 election.

There is no systemic fraud or grand conspiracy that explains this fact away. And it makes sense, because one candidate has fostered an out-of-control deadly pandemic to ravage the country and spark the greatest financial calamity since the Great Depression while the other… didn’t do those things. When conservative conspiracy-theorists wonder how so many people could have voted for Biden but not downballot Democrats — who had a terrible night — they’re answering their own question: because a sizeable chunk of Democrat-hating Republicans felt compelled to excise Trump from the White House. It’s just not that complicated.

While Trump’s media enablers stoke unsubstantiated claims of fraud — claims so absurd that ERICK FRIGGING ERICKSON is debunking them — his attorneys are filing specious lawsuits and his administration is abusing legal requirements to make the president feel better. At first, most people just pointed at this buffoonery and laughed.

But the Democratic Party is lousy with pearl-clutching worrywarts. The Secretary of Defense has resigned! Bill Barr says the DOJ will look into voter fraud! Maybe the Supreme Court really will decide the election just like Trump says they will! Are we watching a coup?!?!?

No… and yes.

Elie Mystal can walk you through all the reasons that Trump is going to be moving out of the White House in January no matter what. He’s keeping these lawsuits going as much out of a need to raise money to settle campaign debt — 60 percent of contributions to “stop the count!” just go to paying pissed-off vendors — as any genuine belief that he really won. It’s always a grift and as the saying goes, “an OANN viewer and his money are soon parted.”

While Trump will depart for Mar-a-Lago soon enough, the Republican Party itself is very much in long-run coup mode. Because these silly fraud arguments aren’t going to get them anywhere today because judges and the overwhelming weight of evidence will snuff those out. But for Republicans who spent years very expensively trying to prove voter fraud exists, stoking the idea that the election was “stolen” can serve as the next best thing. Creating an article of faith among the base can remove the need for elusive external evidence. It is now a circular argument: “election fraud exists because otherwise Trump would’ve won.” And, by forming such a circle, they’ll know that any new, restrictive voting laws have “improved” the sanctity of elections — as opposed to illegally suppressing democracy — if they produce results where Trumpists win.

Q.E.D.

The people who will be right there to assure them that they have the solution for this vague sense of fraud will be the Republican Party. They’ll propose more restrictive ID laws, require voters with “ethnic” names to re-register every election, close polling locations in known minority areas, and end early and mail-in voting entirely. And the places where they’ll ramp up these efforts first are Georgia and Texas.

The feeding frenzy is actually already underway in Georgia, where the two GOP Senate runoff candidates have attacked the Republican Secretary of State for administering an election where Democrats performed so well. Put another way, Loeffler and Perdue and miffed that the current Secretary failed to suppress the vote as much as his predecessor, current governor Brian Kemp. Despite the allegations of liberal partisans, Kemp didn’t “steal” his gubernatorial election in any overt way — but he did leverage the power of his old office to undermine faith in the process and to set up hurdles for the state’s increasingly Democratic electorate to clear. Those firewalls have been overcome and Republicans are mad. Unfortunately they have the unified government to redouble their efforts to suppress the will of the electorate to push Georgia voters down for a few more years.

Despite some Democratic hopes, Texas remains a Republican stronghold. But, like Georgia, it’s one that’s slipping. The governor already succeeded in applying the comically “fair” rule of having only one ballot dropbox per county regardless of whether of the county has 5 million residents or 1,700. With a slimming majority of voters in hand today, Texas Republicans will likely return to Austin to set up more onerous voting restrictions buoyed by the myth of widespread voter fraud.

So the moral of the story right now is that, no, Trump isn’t going to end up in the White House for four more years by flogging this fake voter fraud story. But that doesn’t mean people shouldn’t take this circus at the Four Seasons (Landscaping) deadly seriously. This is a slow motion assault on basic freedoms.

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Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

It’s November 10, and Thanksgiving is just two weeks away, which means that bonus season is right around the corner. Wouldn’t it be nice if your law firm gave you a little something extra to be thankful for this year? We sure think it would be!

As a little reminder — as if you really needed one — this is what last year’s Milbank bonuses (yes, Milbank; Cravath later followed along) looked like:

Class of 2019 – $15,000 (pro-rated)
Class of 2018 – $15,000
Class of 2017 – $25,000
Class of 2016 – $50,000
Class of 2015 – $65,000
Class of 2014 – $80,000
Class of 2013 – $90,000
Class of 2012 – $100,000
Class of 2011 – $100,000

These year-end bonuses are, of course, in addition to the appreciation bonuses that some firms handed out earlier this fall to thank their associates for their dedication during the coronavirus crisis. Davis Polk set the standard on those bonuses, which ranged from $7,500 to $40,000. This year, there will truly be different tiers set for compensation if not all firms offer additional bonus dollars to their associates on top of their standard bonuses to truly match the market.

For those of you who are wondering when your bank accounts will be a little more flush, here’s a list of the dates when year-end market bonuses hit Biglaw since 2006, the very first year Above the Law started publishing bonus news. Take a look:

With visions of bonus dollars dancing in your heads, it’s time to check in on how people are doing with their billable hours. There are eight weeks to go in 2020, and even though COVID-19 may have put a damper on your hours, hitting your target is still important. Some firms might make bank-busting payments, but not all associates will hit the hours mark necessary for the top dollar.

Still, with two months to go, there’s plenty of time to get on your hours. Don’t be surprised if attorneys start poking around for an extra discrete assignment or two — after all, some hours here and there could mean a world of difference.

So how are people doing during a pandemic that nearly paralyzed the legal profession? Take our poll, and get a sense of how many hours your peers are on pace to hit in 2020. While you’re at it, let us know when you think this year’s bonuses will drop, and whether they’ll be higher or lower than last year’s bonuses.

Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of important bonus updates, so when your firm matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Matches”). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.

And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks for all of your help!

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Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

WASHINGTON: President Trump has fired his latest Defense Secretary just days after the presidential election was called for Democratic rival Joe Biden, installing a little-known former White House and Pentagon official to take his place.

Christopher Miller, who has been “performing the duties” of the assistant secretary of Defense for special operations for several months, is now in the top spot, a move that leaves Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist in the cold. The deputy is normally next in line when the secretary is fired. It is also an extraordinary promotion for Miller. Many officials are senior to him and have more time in their jobs across the Pentagon.

In classic form, the president made the surprise announcement via Twitter this afternoon, saying bluntly “Mark Esper has been terminated.”

Trump’s action drew immediate criticism from a senior Republican defense expert, Kori Schake.

“It’s shockingly irresponsible for the President to disrupt the important work of defending our nation during a presidential transition this way,” Schake, director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute says. “Secretary Esper was serving our country ably and well as Defense Secretary.”

Rep. Adam Smith, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said firing Esper “out of spite is not just childish, it’s also reckless. It has long been clear that President Trump cares about loyalty above all else, often at the expense of competence, and during a period of presidential transition competence in government is of the utmost importance.”

Esper has kept a low profile since the summer, when he broke with Trump during protests that were sweeping across the country. Esper publicly said he didn’t support invoking the Insurrection Act which would allow active duty troops to be used to help quell the wave of protests across the country. The president had threatened to use the power to do just that. The break between the two was the most serious of Esper’s tenure, and by all accounts he never fully recovered.

That tension was compounded by the Pentagon’s clear frustration over Esper and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley being photographed with Trump crossing Lafayette Square just after it was violently cleared of protestors by law enforcement. 

The secretary has spent much of his time since then on the road, visiting allies and US troops at home and abroad, declining to speak on the record with the press. He also stopped what had become semi-regular press conferences at the Pentagon. Esper had made much of his efforts to reinstate those briefings, which have been a regular feature of the US military’s relations with the outside world for decades.

Miller has been at the Pentagon only since January, where he was sworn in as deputy assistant secretary for Special Operations and Combating Terrorism before later sliding over to the SO/LIC job earlier this year to take over after Owen West departed.

I have always been a pretty staunch First Amendment advocate. Everyone should have a right to say or write pretty much anything that can be put into words. And in a free society, citizens should have a right to express themselves in almost unimaginable ways. So long as no one is getting hurt.

As a layperson working in the legal industry for more than two decades, one cannot help but learn about the law. As a fan of our Constitution — and constitutions everywhere — I have learned a few things about fairness, equality, and the general rights of individuals.

Today, I think that no matter where you stand on the social or political spectrum, it is not hard for reasonable people to agree there are some societal issues that are troubling the citizenry. I would not presume to suggest that I have all the answers, but every once in a while a thought enters my mind that I cannot seem to shake.

What if we made it a crime to be racist?

I know, I know, we already have laws designed to deal with racist and discriminatory activities. The Fourteenth Amendment and the statutes legislatures have created, however, do not seem to go far enough. Indeed, we have created so-called immunities to protect violators of the Constitution. It is true that an individual or organization could be charged with violating someone’s civil rights. But how often does that work out?

The sad fact is that it is perfectly legal in the United States for hate groups to exist; to speak, write, and promote hateful ideas and activities. The only limit, according the Supreme Court, is the active promotion of immediate violence.

State and federal legislatures and their administrative agencies have enacted statutes, rules, and regulations designed to prevent or deter racism and other forms of discrimination. We even have circumstances in which prosecutors can designate behavior as a hate crime. But, for the most part, these laws add an aggravating factor to an existing crime. You tell me — have the current laws worked to deter the evil they are intended to eradicate?

What if we declared that it is a violation of the law for any individual, group, or organization to speak, write, or espouse racist views or opinions. What would be the objections to the crime of racism in the first degree?

I suppose the first and most principled objection to such a law would be on First Amendment free speech grounds. But we already place limitations on free speech, don’t we? The classic example is falsely yelling “Fire!” in a crowded movie theater. We also punish false and misleading speech; you cannot steal another person’s words or ideas; we have limits on obscenity; and you cannot threaten the president.

While I am certainly not the arbiter of what may or may not be constitutional, I’ve searched my conscience, my moral compass, and frankly, I am okay with placing additional limits on free speech in an effort to eradicate racism.

Others might object and argue that we already have laws to deal with this problem. But do we? And how has that worked out to date?

Other countries have laws than ban speech and behavior. In Germany, it is a crime to promote Nazi ideology. Some nations have criminalized denying the Holocaust and other genocides. Prominent nations have outlawed certain writings. In the U.K., it appears they have taken an intermediate step of permitting citizens to report to police a racial or discriminatory incident.

I was taught in school that laws generally have a foundation in evolving standards of morality. It has been suggested in more than one brief before the courts of civilized nations that the law needs to evolve with changing public opinion, interests, and policies. Given that there are clearly evolving thoughts on this issue, it is time we upgrade the legislation.

America has been dancing around this issue for hundreds of years. Whatever the cause of the reticence, it may be time we tackle the issue head-on. What have we to lose if we try it?

I honestly don’t know if making racism a crime will have an impact on racism in America or prevent or even reduce the wrongs faced by people of color still today, but maybe it is time that lawmakers take some bold steps to seriously attempt to address the issue.

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Mike Quartararo is the President of the Association of Certified E-Discovery Specialists (ACEDS), a professional member association providing training and certification in e-discovery. He is also the author of the 2016 book Project Management in Electronic Discovery and a consultant providing e-discovery, project management and legal technology advisory and training services to law firms and Fortune 500 corporations across the globe. You can reach him via email at mquartararo@aceds.org. Follow him on Twitter @mikequartararo.

You guys: Pfizer has the most amazing news.

The company said that the analysis found that the vaccine was more than 90 percent effective in preventing the disease among trial volunteers who had no evidence of prior coronavirus infection. If the results hold up, that level of protection would put it on par with highly effective childhood vaccines for diseases such as measles. No serious safety concerns have been observed, the company said…. By the end of the year it will have manufactured enough doses to immunize 15 million to 20 million people, company executives have said.

* The University of Dayton now has a five-year B.A./J.D. program. This makes Doogie Howser look kind of unimpressive… [University of Dayton]

* There is growing discomfort at law firms representing the Trump Campaign in post-election lawsuits. [New York Times]

* The first black district attorney has been elected in New Mexico following last week’s election. [U.S. News]

* President Trump’s voter fraud legal team is purportedly being led by nonlawyers. [Forbes]

* CNN quoted from Alan Dershowitz’s memoir when moving to dismiss Dershowitz’s defamation lawsuit. That’s a bold strategy. [Law and Crime]

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Jordan Rothman is a partner of The Rothman Law Firm, a full-service New York and New Jersey law firm. He is also the founder of Student Debt Diaries, a website discussing how he paid off his student loans. You can reach Jordan through email at jordan@rothmanlawyer.com.

Ed. Note: Welcome to our daily feature Trivia Question of the Day!

According to Vault’s 2021 practice area rankings, which Biglaw firm tops the Labor & Employment list?

Hint: This 75-year-old Biglaw firm has over 1,500 lawyers worldwide.

See the answer on the next page.