A Supreme Solo No More

Posted on March 3, 2006 by Carolyn Elefant

As more law firm bloggers turn solo (including this one), Supreme small firm lawyer Tom Goldstein, bucks the trend with his recent announcement that he's moving on to join a large firm.  I've got mixed feelings about this one.  On the one hand, Tom's move is testament to my belief that solo practice can take you anywhere and create opportunities you'd have never had.  Prior to founding his firm in 1999, Tom worked at a large, then midsized firm where chances are, he'd have been lucky to argue one case before the Supreme Court.  On his own, as of May 2005, Tom has argued forteen, which has bought him unparalled experience that he's used to write his own ticket at a large firm.  No reason why Tom's model can't work for any other lawyer toiling at biglaw - you can leave, develop a niche practice area and return on your own terms.

On the other hand, after reading Tom's analysis of trends in Supreme Court litigation, I couldn't help but wonder about the prospects for solo and small firm lawyers to ever achieve the dream of a Supreme Court argument or whether a phenomenon like this one is really a once-in-a-blue moon event.  There's almost no way that a solo or small firm lawyer can compete with either biglaw or clinic law Supreme Court practice - the clinics, funded by law schools and powered by super smart students, can afford to take cases for free.  And with competition among large firms for a Supreme Court practice, they can also afford to offer bargain basement rates (or work for free) for clients who can't pay just to add another Supreme Court case to their roster.  (As anectodal evidence of this predatory trend, a solo colleague of mine is representing a client whose case was granted cert at the court and within hours, had received two calls offering to take the case for free, so long as the firm would argue it). 

None of this would be so bad, except that in most situations, many case wouldn't even be in play at the court were it not for the solo or small firm attorney who took it and pursued it to begin with.  Seems that there should be some options - like reasonably priced consulting or second chair service - that a solo or small firm lawyer can use if he wants to take his case to the next level.  I know that Goldstein's firm originally carved out this niche; I'm just not sure who's going to replace it.
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Comments (28) Read through and enter the discussion with the form at the end
Jennifer A. Stiller - March 4, 2006 10:47 AM

Cheer up! There are always government lawyers who have done plenty of Supreme Court arguments and -- who knows? -- one of them may decide to take his/her pension and go solo any time. There's also the precedent of Howard Bashman of How Appealing, who got his experience in BigLaw and then took his show on the road as a solo.

- March 5, 2006 6:28 PM

How about spell check and grammar check before posting a comment?

- March 5, 2006 6:31 PM

To be clear, I was commenting on Carolyn's editing skills, not the comment posted by Jennifer.

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