Jerome Kowalski, a legal consultant who tracks the New York Market discusses why major law firms are shrinking with LBN host Scott Drake. Kowalski says “The mood at White & Case — and at probably 15 or 20 more firms in New York — is kind of like sitting at a deathbed and watching a close relative wither away. It’s like you’re right there in the I.C.U. with the patient and you know that the condition is terminal.”
(NY Times)
While the legal industry is hardly battling the existential threat that is facing, say, the newspaper trade, Big Law — especially in competitive New York — is facing a potential paradigm shift as fundamental as the one that has hit investment banks and the auto industry. Big, as a business model (let alone as an expression of the national mood), seems bound for obsolescence.
The Hildebrandt index found, for example, that at the nation’s 20 top-grossing law firms — 12 of which are in New York — average profit per partner and revenue per lawyer both dropped in the first quarter of 2009, for the first time since 1991.
At the root of the law-firm crisis, legal experts say, is the credit crisis, which has pulverized the need for traditional practice areas like structured finance, mergers and acquisitions and private-equity transactions — the very things that have always kept a high gleam of polish on the city’s whitest shoes. The downward trend has been unrelenting: fewer Wall Street deals mean fewer Wall Street lawyers.
“I hear the stories all the time,” Mr. Kowalski, the consultant, said. “Real estate lawyers are honing their skills playing solitaire. Younger lawyers are gossiping all day and scaring the crap out of one another. The head of the corporate department of a major firm just told me that he hasn’t billed a minute’s worth of work in the last two weeks,” he added.
This is a video of noted aviation attorney Charles M. Brewer discussing his career as a jet rated pilot, a review of his personal jet but more importantly the safety devices and improvements in aviation that have resulted from the hard work and diligence of trial lawyers such as Charles Brewer in litigating cases that improved safety. Learn more about the Cessna Citation jet, but also get a glimpse at this world class trial lawyer as he does a walk around of the cockpit, the jet and then discusses the improvements in aviation safety.
Part One of the Charles Brewer Jet walk around.
Part two of the Charles Brewer Jet walk around discussing past cases in Arizona aviation law.
(Boston Globe) A class-action lawsuit that seeks to repay Massachusetts Turnpike toll-payers hundreds of millions of dollars and provide future relief from what their lawyers call "illegal taxes" now includes 1,650 plaintiffs from 21 states, according to the lead attorney.
The plaintiffs, who include residents from 212 Massachusetts cities and towns, argue that their tolls are unfairly being used to pay for the Big Dig, rather than for the cost of using the turnpike, said Jan R. Schlichtmann, who gained fame through the book and film "A Civil Action."
Schlichtmann's legal team has also expanded to include Scott Harshbarger, a former state attorney general; Daniel B. Winslow, the chief legal counsel to former governor Mitt Romney, and Donald Griswold, a Washington-based partner in the international law firm Reed Smith LLP.
"This is a simple case of fairness and equity," Harshbarger said yesterday. "It's time for the courts, the Legislature, and the governor to fix this inequity and provide financial relief to toll-payers."
The lawsuit, filed last month in Middlesex District Court, argues that the Massachusetts Turnpike Author ity must reimburse as much as $300 million to toll-payers and change how it uses the tolls it collects. The lawsuit asserts that 58 percent of Mass. Pike tolls are used to finance Big Dig roads.
To pay for the returned tolls, the state would have to choose between raising taxes, imposing tolls on Interstate 93, or requiring the Turnpike Authority to sell some of its real estate, they said.
"We have to figure out how to make amends for the past," Schlichtmann said.
Turnpike Authority officials declined to comment.
Harshbarger and Winslow said they were drawn to the case because they think toll-payers who commute from the west and the North Shore have unfairly borne the brunt of Big Dig costs.
"The turnpike's diversion of toll receipts is part of a disturbing trend we're seeing across the country," Griswold said. "This is another desperate cash-strapped state using illegal and unconstitutional means to raise badly needed revenues."
The lawyers are calling for Beacon Hill to pass reforms that would mandate that the turnpike's tolls be used for maintenance, capital expenditures, and operating expenses of the road on which they are collected.
Such a provision has been approved by the House in a budget amendment, but it was not included in the final version of the bill the Senate passed. The differences are being worked out by a conference committee.
"Without this provision, the legislative efforts to reform are mostly moving boxes around on the organizational chart," Winslow said.
Next week, the lawyers will argue in court that the judge should attach all the authority's real estate assets to the lawsuit, so they cannot be sold or liquidated before the case is resolved.
Scott Drake interviews Jan Schlichtmann in this video:
Valley police met recently to brainstorm how to build a system to extradite hundreds of felony suspects arrested in other states before the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office stops transporting prisoners in July.
The Sheriff's Office announced this month that 19 law-enforcement agencies from Phoenix to Wickenburg would have to find a way to handle the task without the support of deputies, who provided the service for decades. The decision forces cash-strapped agencies to fetch the prisoners or create a task force to share extraditing more than 700 fugitives annually. Citing its own budget woes, the Sheriff's Office estimated the county could save part of the $1.5 million it spent on extraditions in 2008 by freeing employees from performing the non-mandated duty.
Police agencies could also work with the U.S. Marshals Service to use the Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation System, known as "Con Air," to return suspected criminals to face charges in Maricopa County. "That would most likely be more cost-effective than transporting them ourselves," said Phoenix police Cmdr. Frank Milstead, who is part of the group meeting today in Chandler. Milstead estimated that Phoenix could pull officers from its Fugitive Apprehension Team to travel in two-man teams to transport prisoners from outside Arizona, though that would leave additional staffing questions. "It will take some of the officers off the streets, but we'd try to overstaff to compensate," Milstead said.
With officers projected to travel nearly every week of the year, Phoenix is researching how much it will cost to buy last-minute airfare, provide per diem expenses and purchase items like shackles for prisoners. Local officers would need additional training and could possibly be cross-deputized as U.S. marshals to transport prisoners over state lines.
In this interview, Phoenix police Commander Frank Milstead discusses the controversy, as well as the benefits of Arizona’s speed cameras.
Brad Bannon's writes about the Sotomayor confirmation hearings in this commentary from US News and World Report:
Scott Drake interviews Brad Bannon in the accompanying video.
Brad Bannon is president of Bannon Communications Research, a political consulting and polling firm that works for Democrats, labor unions, and progressive-issue groups.
Sonia Sotomayor is exactly the person that the Supreme Court needs. She is a distinguished jurist and will be the first Latina to serve on the Supreme Court. As a bonus, she will improve female representation on the Court and, because of her background as a poor kid from the Bronx, she will give voice to the millions of Americans who are struggling economically to keep their heads above water.
President Obama's appointment of Judge Sotomayor to the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court will also begin the culture wars in earnest.
Actually, the first shot in the culture wars was President Obama's response to antiabortion advocates who boycotted his appearance at Notre Dame University's commencement ceremony. In his speech, the president tried to find common ground between the pro-choice and pro-life forces. His attempt to moderate the culture war contrasts with his economic program, where the president has gone full steam ahead without compromises that would lessen Republican opposition.
The contrast between the president's approach to social and to economic policy reflects Democratic confidence in its strength on bread-and-butter issues and a defensiveness on cultural issues.
Even though Democrats usually win battles on the economic front, their track record in culture wars are not nearly as good. Since the 1960s, Republicans have successfully used the social issues to drive a wedge between blue-collar union members and the Democratic Party with a steady diet of guns, God, and gays. And even now, after getting Congress to pass his stimulus program, the president not been able to prevent NRA supporters in the Senate from attaching pro-gun riders to important pieces of legislation.
But after three months of focusing on the economy like the proverbial laser beam, the Sotomayor confirmation hearings will force the president to fight the culture wars whether he wants to or not. Since Massachusetts legalized gay marriage four years ago, the focus of the culture wars has moved from abortion to gay rights.
This week, the California Supreme Court upheld the voter ban on gay marriage that passed last year. This case is likely to get to the Supreme Court, so the Republicans in the Senate will probably focus on Judge Sotomayor's positions on same-sex marriage. The judge will probably be noncommittal on the subject to avoid prejudicing future cases, but the left and right will press her on the ramifications of the California case.
The GOP is chomping at the bit for a fight over Judge Sotomayor, even though Republicans know they will lose the confirmation battle. They will fight the nomination anyway because it energizes the base, helps them raise money, and puts Democrats, including the president, on the defensive. So expect the Senate Republicans to fight Judge Sotomayor tooth and nail.
But the GOP should be wary of the demons that fly out of Pandora's box during the confirmation hearings. Although the culture wars have not been kind to the Democrats in the past, they may become an advantage for the party.
Support for gay marriage has increased significantly in the last few years and a clear majority of Americans under 40 support same-sex marriage. As the millennial voters make up more of the electorate, support for gay marriage will increase. Voters under 30 voted for Barack Obama last year, and the GOP is in danger of losing a group that could give Republicans fits for a whole generation. Young voters are very liberal socially and GOP opposition to gay marriage will drive a wedge between the party and the fasting-growing segment of the voter pool.
Gay marriage has been legal in Massachusetts for four years and it clearly has not shaken the cultural foundations of the state. As more and more states like Vermont and Iowa legalize same-sex marriage, more and more voters will get used to the idea.
Cultural issues have backed the GOP into a corner. The problem for Republicans is that the party's base is shrinking because of moderate defections. As moderates leave the party, it becomes even more conservative, which in turn causes the GOP to lose even more moderates. So the GOP's focus on cultural issues during Judge Sotomayor's confirmation battle will make the party appear even more conservative and drive even more millennial voters out of the party.
If Republicans don't stop this vicious circle and get their act together, they party will go into the wilderness where Democrats have spent most of the last 40 years. The GOP's challenge starts with its handling of confirmation battle over Judge Sotomayor.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 at 1:43PM 
Jerome Kowalski, a legal consultant who tracks the New York Market discusses why major law firms are shrinking with LBN host Scott Drake. Kowalski says “The mood at White & Case — and at probably 15 or 20 more firms in New York — is kind of like sitting at a deathbed and watching a close relative wither away. It’s like you’re right there in the I.C.U. with the patient and you know that the condition is terminal.”
