Clerkships, Fabulosity, Federal Judges, Feeder Judges, Gay, Gay Marriage, Law Schools, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Supreme Court Clerks

Supreme Court Clerk Hiring Watch: That's So Gay

Can you imagine knowing the outcome of Supreme Court decisions before their public announcement? These people will get that privilege.

By  
on

Readers of Above the Law aren’t the only people interested in Supreme Court clerk hiring. Televangelist Pat Robertson — a graduate of Yale Law School, and winner of our reader poll for YLS’s most disgraceful graduate — recently wondered if Justice Anthony Kennedy might have been swayed by gay law clerks when he struck down part of the Defense of Marriage Act.

(We’re everywhere! Even the Vatican!)

For the record, I don’t know the sexual orientations of Justice Kennedy’s outgoing law clerks — well, not all of them — and I don’t intend to go digging for such info. But in fairness to Robertson, before you yell at him for making a big deal out of gay SCOTUS clerks, please note that the topic has made headlines recently. Indeed, it would be interesting to look back on his historic Term for gay rights from the perspective of a lesbian or gay clerk. Perhaps we’ll hear from such a clerk in the future (although the absence of leaks about the big rulings suggests that this group is an impressively tight-lipped bunch).

If I were selected to serve as a law clerk to a justice of the United States Supreme Court, I would be gay — as in very, very happy. Let’s look at the brilliant young lawyers who have been hired as SCOTUS clerks for the next two Terms of the Court….

It has been several months since our last SCOTUS clerk hiring update, so let’s cut to the chase. Perhaps we’ll have color commentary on these clerk classes in a future post.

Here are the Supreme Court clerks selected for October Term 2013 and October Term 2014 thus far. For a list of law clerks for October Term 2012 — i.e., the clerks who are about to finish serving (and about to collect six-figure signing bonuses at law firms) — click here.

Sponsored

We know there are many hires we haven’t heard about yet. All the justices are done for OT 2013 — the clerk classes change over next month — but we still have a few blanks. And many of the justices are done for OT 2014, suggesting that nobody has plans to retire (at least not yet).

So if you have additions or corrections to our clerk lists, please email us (subject line: “SCOTUS clerk hiring”). Thank you!

OCTOBER TERM 2013 SUPREME COURT CLERK HIRES (as of June 28, 2013)

Chief Justice John G. Roberts
1. Morgan Goodspeed (Harvard 2012 / Kavanaugh)
2. Michael Huston (Michigan 2011 / Kethledge)
3. Judson O. Littleton (Texas 2008 / Randolph)
4. Matthew Shapiro (Yale 2012 / Wilkinson)

Justice Antonin Scalia
1. Katherine Mims Crocker (UVA 2012 / Wilkinson)
2. Kevin King (Northwestern 2010 / Niemeyer / Randolph)
3. Paul Mezzina (Harvard 2008 / Kavanaugh)
4. Ryan Walsh (Chicago 2012 / O’Scannlain)

Sponsored

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
1. Greg Dubinsky (Yale 2011/Kavanaugh/Feinerman (N.D. Ill.))
2. Matthew X. Etchemendy (Stanford 2012 / Garland)
3. Katherine Meeks (U. Penn. 2012 / Kozinski)
4. Michael Murray (Yale 2009 / O’Scannlain)

Justice Clarence Thomas
1. Andrew Pinson (Georgia 2011 / Sentelle)
2. Brian Schmalzbach (UVA 2010 / Wilkinson)
3. Katherine Yarger (Duke 2008 / Gorsuch / Eid (Colo.))
4. ?

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
1. Kelsi Brown Corkran (Chicago 2005 / Tatel)
2. Devi Rao (Columbia 2010 / McKeown)
3. Daniel Rubens (Harvard 2008 / Rakoff (S.D.N.Y.) / Katzmann)
4. Burden Walker (Harvard 2010 / S. Williams)

Justice Stephen G. Breyer
1. Mark Savignac (Harvard 2011 / Posner / Feinerman (N.D. Ill.))
2. Thomas Schmidt (Yale 2011 / Garland)
3. Julia Sheketoff (NYU 2010 / Sentelle / Gleeson (E.D.N.Y.))
4. Sara Aronchick Solow (Yale 2011 / Scirica / Baylson (E.D. Pa.))

Justice Samuel Alito
1. Zina Bash (Harvard 2007 / Kavanaugh)
2. Kyle Hawkins (Minnesota 2009 / E. Jones)
3. Paul Ray (Harvard 2011 / Livingston)
4. ?

Justice Sonia Sotomayor
1. Fred Smith (Stanford 2007 / Thompson (M.D. Ala.) / Parker)
2. Sparkle L. Sooknanan (Brooklyn 2010 / Vitaliano (E.D.N.Y.) / Calabresi)
3. Aaron Tang (Stanford 2011 / Wilkinson)
4. Daniel Winik (Yale 2011 / Reinhardt)

Justice Elena Kagan
1. Sophia Brill (Yale 2011 / Garland)
2. Ian Fein (Berkeley 2011 / W. Fletcher / J. Rogers)
3. Jason Murray (Harvard 2011 / Gorsuch)
4. Mitchell Reich (Harvard 2012 / Garland)

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor (retired):
1. Julia Malkina (Yale 2011 / Kavanaugh)

Justice David H. Souter (retired):
1. Ryan Park (Harvard 2010 / Rakoff (S.D.N.Y.) / Katzmann)

Justice John Paul Stevens (retired)
1. Aaron Zelinsky (Yale 2010 / Griffith)

OCTOBER TERM 2014 SUPREME COURT CLERK HIRES (as of June 28, 2013)

Chief Justice John G. Roberts
1. Kathryn Cherry (Yale 2013 / Kavanaugh)
2. Chris Michel (Yale 2013 / Kavanaugh)
3. Graham Phillips (Harvard 2013 / Griffith)
4. ?

Justice Antonin Scalia
1. Samuel Eckman (Chicago 2013 / Kozinski)
2. Benjamin Flowers (Chicago 2012 / Ikuta)
3. Judd Stone (Northwestern 2010 / Winfree (Alaska) / E. Jones)
4. Vivek Suri (Harvard 2013 / Sutton)

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
1. ?
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Clarence Thomas
1. ?
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
1. Ari Holtzblatt (Yale 2010 / Tatel),
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Stephen G. Breyer
1. Michael Gervais (Yale 2011 / Kozinski)
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Samuel Alito
1. ?
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Sonia Sotomayor
1. Michael Pollack (NYU 2011 / J.R. Brown)
2. ?
3. ?
4. ?

Justice Elena Kagan
1. Will Dreher (Harvard 2013 / Kavanaugh)
2. Daniel Hemel (Yale 2012 / Boudin)
3. Elizabeth Wilkins (Yale 2013 / Garland)
4. ?

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor (retired):
1. ?

Justice David H. Souter (retired):
1. ?

Justice John Paul Stevens (retired)
1. Travis Crum (Yale 2011 / Thompson (M.D. Ala.) / Tatel / Bristow Fellow)

Do you have a hire we haven’t reported yet, or an addition or correction to any of this information? Please email us (subject line: “SCOTUS clerk hiring”). Thanks!

Pat Robertson Wonders If Justice Anthony Kennedy Has Gay Clerks [Huffington Post]
Exhibit A for a Major Shift: Justices’ Gay Clerks [New York Times]
In Chambers: Stories of Supreme Court Law Clerks and Their Justices [Amazon (affiliate link)]
List of law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United States [Wikipedia]

Earlier: Who Is Yale Law School’s Most Disgraceful Graduate?
Supreme Court Clerk Hiring Watch: Sparkle Bright Like A Diamond
Prior ATL coverage of Supreme Court law clerks

Topics

, , , , , , , , , , , ,