Judicial law clerks have all sorts of special conditions attached to their continuing employment in chambers, and it seems that accepting the honorary title of “Lawyer of the Year” falls outside of those eligibility requirements. We were recently made aware that Ryan Protter, the clerk who took home the most votes in our 2024 contest, will be declining the award.
That said, it is now time to announce the brand new winner of Above the Law’s annual Lawyer of the Year competition.
We are bestowing that honor upon Aliza Shatzman, founder and president of the Legal Accountability Project. Shatzman can add our Lawyer of the Year title to her collection of awards from various legal organizations for bringing meaningful change to chambers for law clerks.
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In what seemed like a Hurculean task, she made a great deal of progress for federal law clerks this year. After what required a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, Shatzman launched the Centralized Clerkships Database, essentially a “Glassdoor for Judges,” a tool meant to empower clerkship applicants with much-needed transparency and inside information from former clerks about judicial work environments. “I strongly endorse Aliza, as her work on the Legal Accountability Project has been immensely valuable and she is more than deserving,” Protter told Above the Law. Click here to read some of her excellent columns on this topic.
Congratulations to Aliza Shatzman — Above the Law’s official 2024 Lawyer of the Year — on achieving what many once considered to be nigh impossible for federal law clerks in the United States.
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.