Washington D.C.

How Much Do D.C. Lawyers Make? A Washington Lawyer Salary Survey

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What are the differences between Washington lawyers and New York lawyers? One broad generalization — crude, but largely accurate — is that D.C. attorneys are all about power and prestige, and NYC attorneys are all about money.

It’s certainly true that, in the Biglaw world, New York-based law firms generally enjoy higher profits per partner than Washington-based firms. But D.C. attorneys aren’t doing too badly for themselves.

The latest issue of Washingtonian magazine, available now on newsstands, is the salary survey issue. It’s all about who makes what in the D.C. metro area, from the president to police officers to pediatricians.

And given the proliferation of lawyers in the nation’s capital, there’s a whole section on lawyers and judges. Thankfully for us, Washingtonian has made this portion available online….

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Burger Business Busted By Biglaw Will Keep On Truckin’ Cookin’

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Steptoe: No soup burgers for you!

As previously covered in these pages, earlier this week a D.C. Superior Court judge ordered Rogue States Burgers to cease grilling operations at its Dupont Circle location. This news was met with sadness by burger lovers in the nation’s capital, but by relief from the employees of Steptoe & Johnson. Steptoe had sued Rogue States, claiming that fumes and smells from the burger purveyor were a nuisance requiring abatement.

Rogue States complied with Judge John Mott’s order. But this may not be the final act in the drama….

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Lawyerly Lairs: McDermott Will Move to New D.C. Digs

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500 North Capitol Street (click to enlarge).

One of our odd obsessions around here: real estate. Just take a spin through our Lawyerly Lairs archives, which chronicle the adventures of attorneys in the world of real property, residential and commercial. We may not be as real obsessed as the folks over at Curbed, but we’re getting there.

As a former resident of Washington (2006 to 2008), I take a particular interest in D.C. developments. And not just litigation between law firms and burger joints.

So I was interested to learn about McDermott Will & Emery’s big move — to a building that will be named after the law firm. How many law firms get naming rights?

(Not many. The most prominent example might be the Paul Hastings Tower in Los Angeles, which had a cameo in the Transformers movie.)

News of MWE’s move even made the pages of the Washington Post….

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Biglaw Beats Back Burgers: Steptoe Steps on Dupont Circle Burger Emporium

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Steptoe pwns burger joint.

This afternoon brings some major news for hamburger lovers in the nation’s capital. In the lawsuit brought by Steptoe & Johnson against Rogue States Burgers, in an effort to stop Rogue States’ rogue smells from infiltrating law firm airspace, Big Law has triumped over big beef patties. Judge John M. Mott of D.C. Superior Court just ruled that the burger fumes from Rogue States must be abated immediately.

Judge Mott ordered Rogue States to stop its grilling operations by the end of today. Due to the unavailability of easy solutions to the smell problem — an alternate ventilation plan has been nixed by the building landlord — Judge Mott “effectively issued a death sentence for the Dupont Circle burger joint,” as noted by Tim Carman of the Washington City Paper.

A disconsolate reader emailed this reaction to us: “sad. i am pleading to obama, burger lover president, to intervene.”

(Don’t hold your breath. Despite his willingness to talk to them without preconditions, Obama isn’t known for his love of Rogue States. We’re not talking about Ben’s Chili Bowl.)

It would be easy to snark on a large white-shoe law firm — represented by another large law firm, Pillsbury Winthrop — going to court to beat up on a local burger joint. But Steptoe might be a more sympathetic plaintiff than some might think….

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Highlights From the Masters Conference

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This week, while taking a break from my favorite pastime — hanging out with strippers and snorting coke with federal judges — I attended the Masters Conference in Washington, DC. For those of you who aren’t familiar with this conference, it has carved out a significant niche for itself in the e-discovery universe. The Masters Conference is a gathering of legal technology thought leaders from all over the world, who come together every year at this time to talk about all things e-discovery. The yearly meeting was the brainchild of entrepreneur extraordinaire Robert Childress, president of Wave Software.

After attending last year’s Masters Conference, I thought I knew what to expect again this year: a small meeting (certainly not on the level of a LegalTech or an ILTA Annual Meeting), with the usual suspects, and similar — if not the same — topics of discussion.

Well, what a difference a year makes! The Masters Conference may only be in its fifth year of existence, but it seems to have just had its coming-out party. I’ll give you my three takeaways, after the jump…

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Latham & Watkins: 100% Offers to Summers in D.C.

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A week ago, we reported that Pepper Hamilton surprised its summer associates with 100% offers at a Friday lunch. Now this is a trend we hope catches on.

And maybe it will. Latham & Watkins surprised its D.C. summers during a rooftop extravaganza, yesterday. A tipster reports:

Last night (Thursday), Latham & Watkins’ D.C. office officially extended offers to 100% of its summer associates during an end-of-summer party on the rooftop of the Donovan House–one of the city’s swankiest spots. The offers came unexpectedly, as summers were under the impression that they would be waiting another week or so, until the conclusion of the programs at Latham’s other national offices, to hear about offers.

Well now, that should lighten the mood.

And Latham D.C. even provided a little extra incentive for summers who accepted their offers on the spot…

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Covington & Burling: Salaries Thawed in D.C.

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When I wrote the open thread on the Vault top ten, I wanted to say that none of the top firms froze salaries during the recession. But I couldn’t, because back in November Covington & Burling surprised many people by freezing associate salaries outside of New York.

But as we mentioned at the beginning of this month, salary shenanigans are so 2009. 2010 is the year of salary normalcy.

It appears that Covington received the memo…

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ATL March Madness: Best City to Practice Law (Regional Finals). East and South.

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We’re past the first round of our Best City to Practice Law, March Madness bracket. Last week saw a few upsets in terms of overall city population, but few true surprises:

This is good for ATL office pool participants Kash and Lat. They are both tied for first place having picked 7 of the 8 match-ups correctly in round one. Elie’s lagging behind, with only 6 of 8 correct — Elie has a whole new reason to hate the denizens of Houston who couldn’t even show some civic pride and vote for their stupid city. [If you want to check out how the real NCAA brackets are going, check here. Elie's in 30th (thanks Georgetown), while Kash is 21st and has "Kansas" losing to Michigan State this round anyway.]

Today we’re tackling our regional finals in the East and South. In one corner, we have two bastions of East Coast intellectualism (and elitism). In the other corner, we’ve got a high quality of life that is occasionally interrupted by truck nutz. It should be a spirited debate, let’s get to it…

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Divorce Lawyers: Washingtonian Ranks the Best of the Worst

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lumbergh.jpgMany moons ago, when I was a law student, I took Divorce Law based solely on the fact that the professor, who was a New York practitioner, brought in one of his celebrity clients to answer questions on the last day of class. My year, the professor rolled up with James Gandolfini, who, when asked how he could possibly justify going from The Sopranos to Surviving Christmas, intimated that a man had to pay his bills and that — sneaking a glance at the professor, corpulent and clad in horn-rimmed glasses, suspenders and an exquisitely form-fitting monogrammed Bill Lumbergh shirt — divorce is costly.

So how much are we talking about?

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Lawyerly Lairs: Cate Edwards’s Georgetown Pad

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Cate Edwards Georgetown mansion.jpgNo Gropius dorms for her, thank you very much. Harvard Law School student Cate Edwards, oldest daughter of prominent politician John Edwards, just purchased a million-dollar property in Washington’s tony Georgetown neighborhood.

From an item in Washingtonian:

Buyer: Harvard law student Cate Edwards.

Famous dad: Former presidential hopeful John Edwards.

Price: $1.3 million.

Amenities: Two bedrooms, five baths.

An NPR internship with Nina Totenberg doesn’t pay like a summer associate gig. Perhaps Cate was able to draw upon the fortune amassed by her father during his career as a top trial lawyer.

The property has two bedrooms and five bathrooms. A high bathroom-to-bedroom ratio is a token of a luxuriousness. But does Cate really need all those bathrooms? Does Papa Edwards — who might crash occasionally at Cate’s place, having sold his own mansion around the corner in 2006 (for $5.2 million) — really have that much ickiness to wash off?

The children of Senators Ted Kennedy and John Warner also snapped up some swank properties. Read about them over at Washingtonian.

Chips off the Old Blocks [Washingtonian]
No Conflict? NPR’s Nina Totenberg Takes on John Edwards Daughter As Summer Intern [NewsBusters.org]

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