Brokeback Lawfirm: A Walk Down Memory Lane
We love our tipsters. You’re the best research team anyone could ask for.
Several years ago, we read Lincoln Caplan’s excellent book, Skadden: Power, Money, and the Rise of a Legal Empire. Unfortunately, we don’t remember as much from the book as we might like.
(Our memory problems, as well as our typing skills, have gotten worse with increased blogging. Someone should conduct research into blogging and what effect it has on your attention span, concentration, and overall brain functioning.)
Fortunately, one of you does have a better recall of the book’s contents. A tipster directed us to this interesting excerpt, from page 89 of Skadden:
Our source comments:
I thought that it was pretty amazing that a 1993 book about another law firm would have two separate references about Sullivan’s negative reputation toward gay attorneys. I’ve attached the first page from Skadden that mentions it; the second comes much later in the book (and is along the same lines, but a different occassion).
Very interesting. Perhaps proof that the more things change, the more they stay the same?
(Yes, David Braff: We know that you and several other gay partners are very very happy over at S&C.)
Update: Please don’t read too much into our bringing this excerpt to your attention. You can draw whatever conclusions you like from it.
We’re just agreeing with our tipster that it’s interesting. That’s all.
Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of Charney v. Sullivan & Cromwell (scroll down)
(30) Comments
Comments
This post is too interesting for me to spoil with an L2L comment.
Does this anecdote show anti-gay bias, or just that S&C partners are a**holes?
The S&C lawyer who committed suicide was closeted. Would the failure of partners to attend his funeral represent hostility towards gays? Or just general indifference by S&C partners to associates who don't make partners?
(Also, it's not established that his suicide was related to his sexual orientation. Maybe he was primarily upset over not making partner.)
2:18, since when have pesky things like the facts you pointed out slowed ATL's anti-S&C campaign one bit?
2:18, since when have pesky things like the unaddressed issues that you pointed out slowed ATL's anti-S&C campaign one bit?
Lat - you don't know what you are talking about. S&C these days is as gay friendly as it gets. Gay partners and associates show up to firm events with their significant others. While this may not have been true 20 years ago, it is certainly true today.
Charney is a lunatic and everyone who works or has worked in the recent past at S&C knows it. He is counting on public opinion among the general uninformed public to put a nice severance payment in his pocket.
2:18, since when have pesky things like the unaddressed issues that you pointed out slowed ATL's anti-S&C campaign one bit?
Lat,
Why don't you start reading A Law Unto Itself. Tough to find copies (it is out of print) but it is a WHOLE book about S&C.
This story is of a piece with what we already know about S&C. It's not biased against gays; it's just full of raging a**holes (probably more than the average top firm).
It's like what the NY mag piece said about Krautheimer and Korry. They're not anti-gay; they just treat everyone like crap.
Here is an Amazon link to A Law Unto Itself.
http://www.amazon.com/Law-Unto-Itself-Sullivan-Cromwell/dp/0688048889/sr=8-1/qid=1172605442/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-3236439-1081548?ie=UTF8&s=books
If you find ATL so biased, why do you visit? It's like left-wingers who read Michelle Malkin. What purpose does that serve, other than to raise your blood pressure?
Here's a link to Krautheimer's NYT wedding announcement:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D04E0DB1F3FF935A25756C0A96F958260
2:31 -- when i interviewed for a summer associateship at S&C (in the fall of 99), i had a partner give a lengthy speech on how when he started, S&C was not the nicest place for jews to work, but now it is fine and very accepting of jews. (i am obviously jewish from my name, if not my face... the partner, too, was jewish.)
i was shocked that in that day & age any firm would feel the need to explain that it wasn't really all that anti-semitic any more. maybe it was just one partner who felt the need, but still.
i bet that the gay partners at S&C will be giving similar speeches this fall...
When I was interviewing at Paul Weiss for a summer position, I mentioned that I also was considering S&C but exploring other options. The PW partner made some oblique comments to the effect that he "understood" that I might find PW's culture more welcoming etc. In other words, a not so subtle suggestion that S&C was not welcome of anybody except WASPs.
I ended up going to S&C (unrelated reasons). The PW was totally wrong. But given that those sorts of comment are made, it might explain the defensiveness of some at S&C.
Here's a link to Braff's house. Come on Lat you are slipping. This was an easy Google find for your continuing series on lawyers' lairs.
http://www.16east11thstreet.org/history.html
There was no reason to post that 3:01. It has Braff's home phone number. Now Loyola 2L is going to start calling him at home for a job.
Interestingly it also has the name of Braff's life partner.
If you ever want to do a Lawyers' Lair piece about me, I can show you around my cardboard box.
I was just wondering if anyone knew whether any Boston firms increased their salaries?
Yeah Ropes raised to 195000 for first years
Lat - you don't know what you are talking about. S&C these days is as gay friendly as it gets. Gay partners and associates show up to firm events with their significant others. While this may not have been true 20 years ago, it is certainly true today.
Posted by: Anonymous | February 27, 2007 02:31 PM
S&C is so gay friendly that gay partners and associates who up at to firm events with their significant others and perform public sex acts in front of everyone. Charney, as a closet case, was upset that Braff asked to tongue his anus at the annual 4th of July softball game.
haha
S&C sounds like such a horrible place... at least that M&A group.
One thing that strikes me about this whole affair is how Charney never came out of the closet when he was at Columbia law. Is Columbia really so uptight a place that closet gays feel pressured to stay in the closet?
My law school is about as gay friendly as I can imagine. Not surprisingly several people have come out here, after staying in the closet all through college. Perhaps it helps that we have several gay people in our administration (not the least of whom is our associate dean).
Until reading about Charney, I took for granted that all law schools were equally friendly to gays. I guess the truth is they are not.
5:23, how exactly does it follow from ABC being a closet case while at CLS that it was somehow related to CLS rather than ABC's own flaws?
So what was Charney supposed to do to "come out of the closet" folks? Don a feather boa? Get real.
Bowie was passed over for partner at S&C, that's why he moved to Skadden. On a sad note, he later died of AIDS.
So is S&C just hell, or is all biglaw like this? I was a SA at a large NYC firm and I can't imagine partners acting this way. Do partners just act civilly for the summer? Or is S&C just terrible?
It's not just that partners treat you better during the summer, the firms often try to insulate SAs from the more "difficult" partners.
Your SA experience will probably bear little relation to your work environment as a permanent associate. You may well be assigned to a partner or team (even within your department of choice) whom you've never met and who won't feel compelled to be nice to you. You've already been successfully recruited, so it's on to the next class.
Comparing being a summer associate to being an actual Biglaw associate is like comparing that time you ate noodles at Vietnamese Garden to a tour of duty in 'Nam. It's comparing a stuffed panda to a rabid grizzly.
Alienating summers, who will go back to their schools and law review admin boards and share stories, is simply not done. They quarantine the nutjobs from the summers.
And yes, everyone thinks they already know all there is to know about a firm by the end of the summer. And no, no one has a clue till they really start.
L2L 3:10 PM--"Cardboard box?...you're lucky..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=656KldeywUs (The Four Yorkshiremen)
The summer exp has no relation to reality. Coudert had the higest ranked summer program the year before it dissolved.