Sullivan and Cromwell (DC) vs. Williams & Connolly Forum

[Anonymous User]

Choosing between the two for 2L summer, I'm interested in litigation and in potentially going into government/policy work medium/long-term. S&C seems to be a smaller environment (and more excited about bringing me in) and may be more helpful in the clerkship process (applying on plan), but the overall prestige of W&C seems hard to turn down... I'm also not sure where I fall on the trial/appellate spectrum and wonder whether it might be easier to try both at S&C. I'm also curious whether there's any meaningful difference in the types of litigation matters the firms get (e.g. does S&C do more finance/tax stuff).

[Anonymous User]

Not so sure SullCrom is more helpful than W&C in the clerkship process. At least at my school, I'm not sure I know of any future litigators who would have chosen SullCrom over W&C, unless maybe someone was deadset on New York over DC.

Culture at W&C also seems much better from the outside. People I knew going there were much easier to get along with than those going to SullCrom. This would be an easy choice for me.

[Anonymous User]

Appellate gunners would probably consider S&C over W&C, especially if they were specifically recruited for that group by Jeff Wall. A call from Jeff Wall would be a significant boost for clerkships, and my impression is that he does that for at least some appellate summers. I haven’t heard of W&C specifically recruiting for appellate as aggressively as S&C does. It sounds like OP is more interested in general litigation though, in which case W&C is probably the way to go.

[Anonymous User]

Appellate gunners would probably consider S&C over W&C, especially if they were specifically recruited for that group by Jeff Wall. A call from Jeff Wall would be a significant boost for clerkships, and my impression is that he does that for at least some appellate summers. I haven’t heard of W&C specifically recruiting for appellate as aggressively as S&C does. It sounds like OP is more interested in general litigation though, in which case W&C is probably the way to go.

I cannot speak to Wall making calls for summers that do appellate work at S&C but consensus at my school was that W&C does not really recruit 2L for appellate. The impression I get from friends who are at W&C or in the DC appellate scene is that it is very difficult to do appellate work at W&C without clerking and that the people who do appellate work at W&C are almost universally people who started at W&C, clerked and came back.

[Anonymous User]

W&C is a no brainer here, unless your gut is screaming to do otherwise at you