In last month's ATL / Lateral Link survey we asked you which holidays you worked on, or expected to work on, during 2007. About half of you reported that you had worked on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Last week, we asked you how you fared this year. Did you take the day off to honor a champion of civil rights, or did you make it a "day on"?

We received just under 1,300 responses, and 44% of you reported that you took the day off. Associates in New York, Los Angeles and Boston were most likely to celebrate the holiday, while associates in Chicago, Atlanta, the Bay Area, and Texas were most likely to be working. (Respondents in the Bay Area were also most likely to work over Christmas and New Year's. Is it time for them to get New York bonuses?)

How did it break down on a firm by firm basis? DLA Piper, Milbank, Sidley & Austin, Dechert, Hunton & Williams, Jones Day, Latham, Mayer Brown, McDermott, Hughes Hubbard, McGuire Woods, Morgan Lewis, Nixon Peabody, Paul Hastings, and Sullivan & Cromwell each had multiple happy associates who reported that they had taken the day off. Kirkland & Ellis, Baker Botts, Dewey & LeBoeuf, O'Melveny & Myers, Weil, and Winston & Strawn each had mixed responses. Associates at Skadden, however, uniformly reported that they had worked the holiday, as Martin Luther King Jr. day is a "floating" holiday for the firm.

Of those who spent the day at the office, about 54% reported that they weren't actually asked to work the holiday, but had things they needed to get done. About a quarter reported that their offices were open. Another quarter said that partners told them to work on the holiday. About 8% were asked to work by clients. A surprising number of respondents wrote in that other associates had told them to work on the holiday.

A little over a third of respondents who worked on the holiday thought that the work did not justify the sacrifice.

Last month, Morgan Lewis & Bockius issued a bonus non-announcement -- a placeholder memo, indicating that bonus news would be forthcoming.

Perhaps MLB associates have reason to be optimistic. The firm must be saving some money, since it's making associates pay their own way on the ski trip of Business and Finance Practice Group. Our tipster observes: "[T]his is yet another reflection of Morgan Lewis' caring attitude."

When law firms hold "destination events" -- e.g., the Boies Schiller firm meeting in Jamaica, the Kirkland & Ellis retreat at the Hotel Hershey, and other retreats mentioned here -- they often pay for their associates to attend. But there's no rule holding that they must do so, especially if attendance is voluntary (which is the case here).

And hey -- at least the firm has negotiated a special ML&B discount!

(ML&B ski trip memo, after the jump.)

Where have all the bonus announcements gone? Have firms stopped issuing them? Or have you stopped sending them to us? For information about the many ways you can submit bonus memos to us, see here.

In the meantime, we bring you another bonus non-announcement, similar to those previously issued by Kirkland & Ellis and McDermott Will & Emery. This one is from Morgan, Lewis & Bockius.

Check it out, after the jump.

We regularly receive all kinds of wacky gossip related to the fall recruiting process. Some of these rumors are true, and some of them aren't.

We found this rumor, about the Chicago office of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, quite amusing:

"I heard from a friend there that during summer associate callbacks, only students from 'good schools' get lunch. E.g., Harvard, Northwestern, University of Chicago."

"Students from Illinois, DePaul, etc. must starve. You should look into this."

Loyola (of Chicago) 2Ls: What say you?

We looked into this rumor. Alas, it appears to be untrue.

More after the jump.

The latest post in our series on perks / fringe benefits isn't a "perk" per se. But it is, like true perks, a non-monetary factor that some people may take into account when choosing between law firms.

The topic: eco-friendliness, or how "green" a law firm is. From a tipster:

I think you should do a feature on which law firms are promoting eco-friendly office environments / business practices. With the country's increased environmental awareness, I think it could help both law students and attorneys decide where to work. Here are two examples:

1. Arnold & Porter: Details of their "green office" policy appear here.

2. Morgan Lewis & Bockius: They described their "program to promote an eco-friendly workplace" in a recent memo (reprinted after the jump).

We offer commentary on that memo after the jump.

Getting Law Firms to Boot Up to Green [Legal Technology News]

We're pressing on with our series of open threads on Vault 100 law firms. We know that some of you are eager to discuss firms ranked in the 70's, and we don't want to disappoint you.

And a quick word from one of our sponsors, ATL's Career Partner, Lateral Link:

"Lateral Link provides free access to the Vault firm information/career guides. Readers can get free access to the full information on our site as part of our career center."

Without further ado, here are the five firms for this afternoon (in Vault 100 order, prestige scores in parentheses):

41. King & Spalding LLP (6.183)
42. Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP (6.099)
43. Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges LLP (6.080)
44. Baker & McKenzie (6.079)
45. Baker Botts LLP (6.061)

Please discuss them in the comments. Thanks.

The Vault Top 100 Law Firms [Vault]

Earlier: Vault 1-5; Vault 6-10; Vault 11-15; Vault 16-20; Vault 21-25; Vault 26-30; Vault 31-35; Vault 36-40

It's a Friday afternoon. So of course we have associate pay raise news to report.

First, some West Coast developments, from the Legal Pad:

Add Morgan, Lewis & Bockius to the list of Cal Law 25 firms that now pay associates on the $160,000 scale.

The only real holdouts now are Bingham McCutchen and Reed Smith, both huge firms with big California presences and fairly high profits that could probably absorb the raise.

Firms lower on the list with lower profits per partner like Littler Mendelson and Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold likely won’t match.

Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner and Townsend and Townsend and Crew are the only two firms that could seemingly go either way. Townsend had high profits last year, but the firm said that was due in large part to a big one-time contingency fee. Thelen’s profits per partner last year, $850,000, weren’t bad, but it would become the Cal Law 25 firm with the lowest PPP to raise associate salaries.

Update: From a commenter: "The partnership at Bingham should be embarrassed; even the media is calling you out."

Second, some news from DLA Piper in Chicago. Memo, plus some commentary, after the jump.

We're a little behind in our coverage of associate pay raises at large law firms. This post will attempt to bring everyone back up to speed.

Listed below are firms for which we have announcements that have been (1) confirmed and (2) not previously posted on ATL. We treat an announcement as confirmed only if we have received an email about it, from a source that we can verify as working at the firm in question. You don't have to email us from your work account (and probably shouldn't); but if you email us from a personal account, please tell us your real name, so we can look you up on the firm website. (We will keep you anonymous, unless you request attribution; but we do need to know who you are so we can verify your identity.)

If you have some pay raise news that you'd like to be reported in these pages, you need to email us. Rumors reported in the comments -- which we no longer read through completely, due to their sheer volume -- are not treated as confirmed. If we see an interesting rumor in the comments, sometimes we will nostra sponte reach out to our sources for confirmation; but we don't always have the time to do that.

New and Confirmed Pay Raise Announcements (in alphabetical order)

1. Dechert LLP (Palo Alto)

2. Katten Muchin Rosenman (Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, DC)

3. Morgan Lewis & Bockius (Chicago, Washington, DC, and San Francisco)

Update: Please note the addition of Morgan Lewis in Chicago to the list. It was not mentioned in the first version of this post, but we have now confirmed their move to $160K.

Surely this list is incomplete. But we're not adding to it until we get confirmations by email (preferably with memos, if available). We have been burned before by false information, and we would rather be slow and accurate than fast and wrong.

Memos for the Dechert and Katten announcements appear after the jump.

The latest round of associate pay raises is coming to a close. Most of the biggest shops have already announced, and the salary scales in the different cities are become fairly clear. The pace of announcements is also slowing down -- a sign that we're in the endgame.

Even though things are winding down, we are still happy to receive and publish compensation memos and emails. Please send announcements to us by email.

After the jump, we reprint some confirmed announcements from different offices of Morgan Lewis & Bockius. We thank the various tipsters who sent them in to us.

We've reached the end of another exciting day in the salary wars.

Okay, exciting may be an overstatement. But it's obvious that reader interest in this subject remains high.

After the jump, we reprint a pair of non-announcements -- or perhaps they could be called "placeholder announcements" -- from DLA Piper and Morgan Lewis & Bockius. We also provide space for you to chime in on the latest compensation news, argue over pay differentials in different cities, and bitch about your hours.

To quote Hillary Clinton: "Let the conversation begin!!!"

From government to academia:

* The brilliant Michelle Boardman is returning to teach at George Mason University School of Law. Professor Boardman had been on leave, serving as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel.

From government to private practice:

* Sue Ellen Wooldridge, assistant attorney general for environment and natural resources, resigned from the Justice Department earlier this week, stating that she plans to return to the private sector.

(Interestingly enough, her alleged beau, J. Steven Griles -- a former deputy secretary of the interior, who Interior Department sources say has been dating Wooldridge -- has been notified that he's a target in the Jack Abramoff corruption investigation.)

* Bankruptcy Chief Judge Melanie Cyganowski (E.D.N.Y.) is resigning to become chair of the bankruptcy litigation practice of Greenberg Traurig (NY).

From private practice to government:

* Steven M. Cohen, a partner at Cooley Godward Kronish, has been selected by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo as his new chief of staff.

Lateral moves:

* White-collar defense lawyers John Moscow and Jack Blum, to Baker Hostetler (NY), from New York boutique Rosner Moscow & Napierala. Moscow and Blum are gurus of the law of money laundering.

* Litigators Michael Armstrong, Paul Rooney, and William Purcell, to the newly opened New York office of Howrey. They come from, respectively, Cooley Godward Kronish, solo practice, and K&L Gates.

* Five litigators, to the new Houston office of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, from litigation boutique Edwards, Burns & Krider. Names here.

* Intellectual property litigator Richard Pettus, to King & Spalding (NY), from McDermott, Will & Emery (NY).

* Corporate lawyer Michael Nissim, to Vedder Price (NY), from McDermott, Will & Emery (NY).

Links after the jump.

From Biglaw to business:

* Another Wachtell Lipton partner is leaving the firm. Corporate partner Mitchell Presser recently left to join Fox Paine. We now hear that WLRK real estate partner Michael Benner may be leaving to become general counsel at real estate giant Tishman Speyer.

New Partners:

* Dorsey & Whitney: Banking lawyer Mark Jutsen.

Lateral Moves:

* Speaking of Dorsey & Whitney, they're closing their San Francisco office. Ten IP lawyers from that office are joining Morgan, Lewis & Bockius.

* With the Brown Raysman-Thelen Reid & Priest merger about to become official, two entertainment and IP lawyers are leaving Brown Raysman's L.A. office. Partner Brian Pass and associate Kevin Straw are joining the Century City office of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton.

NY Lawyers On the Move [NYLawyer.com]
As Firm's Outpost Sinks, 10 IP Attorneys Jump Ship [NYLawyer.com]
Firms' Merger Spurs More Exits [NYLawyer.com]

Hey, did you hear? Britney Spears is getting divorced!

Oh yes, notable promotions and moves within the legal profession. In addition to the new Wachtell Lipton partners, here are some other items worth noting:

Lateral Moves:

* Litigator Eugene Bannigan, litigator Dominick DeChiara, and private equity lawyer Bradley Vaiana, to Nixon Peabody. Bannigan came from Morgan Lewis & Bockius; DeChiara and Vaiana came from King & Spalding.

* Labor and employment attorney James Frank, to Epstein Becker & Green (NY), from Sills Cummis.

New Partners:

McCarter & English: Twenty-seven new partners (!), in three different offices. Names here.

In House:

* Sanoj Stephen, promoted to Senior Vice President and General Counsel, Sotheby's International Realty. (They're the folks responsible for so much mouthwatering real estate porn. Check out their site here.)

Speaking of in-house counsel, we need just a few more in-house counsel data points for Skaddenfreude; then we can publish. Please help us out; details here. Thanks!

NY Partners Switching Firms, NY Associates Making Partner [NYLawyer.com]
NY Lawyer Makes Partner [NYLawyer.com]
James S. Frank Joins Epstein Becker & Green's Labor & Employment Practice Group [press release]

Earlier: Musical Chairs: Wachtell Lipton's New Partners

Welcome to the latest installment of Legal Fee Voyeurism, in which we dish about how much lawyers are getting paid for their labors.

Today's subject: Amtrak, the federally subsidized passenger railroad that's a perennial source of bad news. From the AP:

Amtrak cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in unnecessary legal expenses, an independent investigator said Wednesday.

The legal department of the federally subsidized passenger railroad failed to properly manage its outside law firms, which charged $103 million from June 2002 through June 2005, according to a review by the Transportation Department's inspector general.

We knew Amtrak was expensive. We didn't know it was THAT expensive.*

Here are some of Amtrak's infractions:

The report found that Amtrak didn't review law firms' bills, didn't request budgets and didn't scrutinize bills. The railroad also hired expensive big-city law firms without requiring them to compete for its business, the report said.

Now you're wondering: Which major law firms had Amtrak bend over and grab its proverbial ankles?

Here's what various top firms billed Amtrak in the period from June 2002 to June 2005 (from the WSJ Law Blog):

* Landman Corsi Ballaine & Ford: $11,566.986.59
* Manatt, Phelps & Phillips: $7,381,430.82
* DLA Piper: $4,089,506.09
* Bonner Kiernan Trebach & Crociata: $3,535,246.22
* Anderson, Rasor & Partners: $3,086,981.63
* Morgan, Lewis & Bockius: $2,847,354.21
* Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman: $2,710,145.07
* Jackson Lewis: $1,353,357.76
* Vedder, Price, Kaufman & Kammholz: $1,146,223.37

Forget about the Acela. It's far more fun to ride the Amtrak Outside Counsel Gravy Train. ALL ABOARD!!!

* The high price of Amtrak tickets is one reason we risk life and limb by taking the Chinatown bus. It's tough to beat a $35 round-trip ticket between Washington and New York.

The Amtrak Report: Trouble Among the Legal Dispatchers [WSJ Law Blog]
Report: Amtrak Cost Taxpayers Millions [Associated Press]

Earlier: Prior editions of Legal Fee Voyeurism (scoll down)