Ben Adlin

* Adam Feldman uses BriefCatch, a powerful new tool from legal writing guru Ross Guberman, to find the best writers in the Supreme Court bar — and some of the top advocates might surprise you. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Prominent First Amendment litigator Charles Glasser makes the (compelling) case in favor of a federal anti-SLAPP statute. [Daily Caller]

* Jeff Hauser, executive director of the Revolving Door Project, argues that the Trump Justice Department’s installation of Trump allies as interim U.S. attorneys “represent[s] a test of civil society’s ability to fight back against threats to the rule of law” — and so far, “the test is going poorly.” [Slate]

* Speaking of the Trump DOJ, Ben Adlin breaks down the latest federal-state fight — and explains why it’s not as simple as just citing the Supremacy Clause. [Leafly]

* “Bring me a case!” Reflections from Joel Cohen and Bennett L. Gershman on using litigation to bring about social change. [Law.com]

* What can legal marketers learn from… a man using a cat as his hat? [Shana Douglas]

Commentators are chastising Justice Scalia for screwing with a lawyer before him, but Scalia was only trying to help.

* Downton Abbey has inspired a new bill making its way through the House of Lords, who apparently watched the show and figured out for the first time that women get screwed by the law of entail. Now if they can just pass a law that would keep Bates out of prison in the first place. [The Atlantic] * Ben Adlin reminisces about the era when the Supreme Court actually cared about oral arguments. [Summary Judgments] * An interesting infographic on where Superlawyers went to school. Finally a ranking where NYU can top Yale. [Online Paralegal Programs] * Another installment of classic ads ruined by lawyers. [Vice] * Fifth Circuit judges aren’t the only ones to tell their colleagues to shut up; here’s some fun news from the Philippines. [Manila Times] * French cities have banned performances of a comedian with a history of racking up hate speech fines. I mean, since when has anti-Semitism been a problem in Europe? [Al Jazeera] * If you think conservative arguments against the Affordable Care Act are dumb, check out liberal columnists arguing that Obama screwed up by not pushing for single-payer. [Lawyers, Guns & Money]

Justice Scalia tells us what he REALLY thinks of Judge Posner's controversial review of Reading Law, the new book by Justice Scalia and Professor Bryan Garner.