SCOTUS clerk taking questions about federal clerkships Forum

[Anonymous User]

But at a much closer margin, say, 12 Hs and 2 Ps and 2 DSes versus 16 Hs versus 14 Hs, 1 P, and 1 DS? It doesn't really matter for anyone but the Chief, who hates Ps and Bs with almost an allergy. Then again, several Justices like to see that a clerk has an exceptional talent for some area of law. Especially if that clerk wants to go into academia.

So say the close case goes to all Hs. But no serious concerns either way, until you get into the 8 DSes, 7 Ps realm.

A few related questions from your answers to these new questions:
1) Do any justices actively look for/wants clerks that want to go into academia? You mention that "exceptional talent" might be important to several justices.

2) I've noticed that some law professors will take a leave to clerk on the Court. Is the game for them different? If so, what matters when they apply? Are their academic writings/personal connections more important than their circuit clerkship or grades (e.g. Orin Kerr who wasn't on LR and clerked for Garth on the 3rd Cir., but had really good articles right out of the gate as a professor)?

3) You mentioned some YLS specific qualities in their game above on this page (i.e. they're really good at rallying around top people, etc, etc). Can you talk a bit about how HLS and SLS play the game as well?

This is OP.

1) Yes. Especially Breyer, Scalia, and Kagan. Note that I said exceptional talent in a defined area.

2) This is too infrequent of an occurrence to generalize. My instinct is that grades would matter less and faculty/judge recommendations more, and scholarship more as well. But small sample size. Very small.

3) I don't know how I can answer this without giving away too much. But I'll think about it. Speaking very broadly, I think YLS is better at concentrating its institutional support on fewer people. This is obviously because YLS has fewer people in part.

[Anonymous User]

Feel free to generalize so as not to out yourself, but is there a lot of socializing across chambers? Lot of camaraderie among SCOTUS clerks?

This is OP. This is easy to answer generally. Year over year the clerks consistently socialize across chambers. You bond most closely with your co-clerks. But the whole set tends to interact quite a lot. There are weekly happy hours, etc. Justices often attend. It's easy to befriend everyone else. In fact, if you don't, you're both probably weird and incredibly foolish. Imagine the reputational capital and connections you can get by having a year to befriend 30+ other Supreme Court clerks. Who know things only you also know. Having those experiences and connections is probably half or more of the job's value.

[Anonymous User]

Where in the building do you work? What's it like in chambers in terms of the building?

Are you one of the people that brings a million things to the justices on the bench right before argument?

This is OP. I'm happy to answer this as long as you don't take my use of tense to either deny (or affirm) that I am a current/former clerk.

The chambers are scattered across the four quadrants of the building. It is a VERY big building on the inside, and 3/4 of it or so is "off limits" even to tours. The building is magnificent. The stairways go up for forever. You look like you're ascending into a palace. It's not called the Marble Palace for no reason. It truly evokes feelings of awe and humility.

I don't understand your second question. Are you asking the role of a SCOTUS clerk or if I was particularly worried before sittings?

[Anonymous User]

Any advice for people thinking of doing a district court clerkship before trying for a feeder COA? Assume grades would be good enough for a feeder COA (not HYS but meets qualifications you mentioned for T7-25). Any judges particular that we should look at other than the obvious ones on SDNY and DDC?

[Anonymous User]

What do you make of the district judge feeder phenomenon? It looks like it's a set of two or three judges, so probably not enough to generalize from, but it's interesting for being so unusual.

[Anonymous User]

This is OP.

"Why doesn't the Supreme Court take more clerks from the circuit it has to constantly reverse for getting patent law wrong?"

At the risk of being disrespectful, I invite you to draw your own conclusion.

Former CAFC clerk here. At the risk of being defensive, I think that the OP's insinuation is off the mark.

I don't think that the Supreme Court's reversals of the CAFC's decisions have anything to do with the lack of CAFC clerks on SCOTUS. Note that both Fletcher and Reinhardt on the Ninth Circuit get reversed frequently and yet still place clerks on SCOTUS. Clerks of CAFC judges have a slim chance at SCOTUS for the same reason that clerks of regional circuit non-feeder judges have a slim chance: the justices don't know the CAFC judges well and generally don't respect the credentials of the clerks they hire. The typical CAFC clerk looks very different than, say, the typical CADC clerk. The typical CAFC clerk has two to three years of experience as a patent litigator, perhaps some pre-law work experience in a technical field, and good (but usually not elite) law school grades.

It's not an accident that the one CAFC clerk to make it to SCOTUS came from Judge Dyk, who has a different background (and different hiring patterns) than most of his fellow CAFC judges. Dyk was a SCOTUS clerk himself and was a general appellate practitioner for years. He is friends with Justices Ginsburg and Scalia. Unlike many CAFC judges, Dyk has a preference for HYS grads, cares a lot about law school grades, and generally hires students coming right out of law school.

Perhaps other CAFC judges with CADC-ish credentials (maybe Taranto?) will position themselves to hire and groom potential SCOTUS clerkship candidates. But until that happens, you're probably not going to see CAFC clerks on SCOTUS. The soundness of the CAFC's substantive decisions on patent law aren't really a factor, imo.

[Anonymous User]

You kinda touched on this already when you did the listing of qualified/not qualified candidates but generally speaking, is it even possible a person who is only cum laude at HYS to get a SCOTUS clerkship?

Alternatively, what about a sharp increase in grades? As in bombed first year but absolutely fabulous 2L and 3L?

[Anonymous User]

You kinda touched on this already when you did the listing of qualified/not qualified candidates but generally speaking, is it even possible a person who is only cum laude at HYS to get a SCOTUS clerkship?

Alternatively, what about a sharp increase in grades? As in bombed first year but absolutely fabulous 2L and 3L?

There's at least 1 clerk for OT 2014 that graduated HLS cum laude.

[redsox]

Tag.

[Doorkeeper]

You kinda touched on this already when you did the listing of qualified/not qualified candidates but generally speaking, is it even possible a person who is only cum laude at HYS to get a SCOTUS clerkship?

Alternatively, what about a sharp increase in grades? As in bombed first year but absolutely fabulous 2L and 3L?

There's at least 1 clerk for OT 2014 that graduated HLS cum laude.

Who is that? HLS doesn't seem to keep the history of latin honors on their website.

Edit - nevermind, just found him. That's very weird.

[Anonymous User]

This is OP.

It matters much more at the SCOTUS level than the COA level, but it still matters for many feeders. Many. There are some feeders that just go for best all-around athletes, e.g. Kavanaugh. But O'Scannlain cares, Garland, Posner, Tatel, Sentelle, Boudin, Reinhardt, Kozinski, Pryor, Gorsuch, Easterbrook, Jones, Ginsburg, Tymkovich care, in fact, much of CADC cares, Wilkinson sort of cares... many, many of the "name-brand" judges care. A lot. It may not fit exactly with left/right politics, but they care. Shouldn't they? Granted, maybe 80-90 don't care. The vast majority don't care! But if you weighted the votes by SCOTUS clerk placement, yes, a vast supermajority care.

That said, SCOTUS isn't everything. Most COA judges do not care that much. It's just nice to know you're on the same side as your judge as a matter of worldview, if you can help it.

One of the people that Judge Kavanaugh hired for the 2015-16 term from HLS was non-law review and graduated cum laude (somewhere outside the top 10%). I don't think that would be considered "best all-around athlete." Though this might just be the exception to the rule, I don't know.

[Anonymous User]

What kind of grades are we talking about for top 5% at HLS?

Also, the school treats two Hs as the same as a DS and P for gpa purposes - do the justices view them that way too, or is there some number of Ps that's just too many, even with off-setting DSs?

This is OP.

Essentially all Hs.

A highly qualified candidate will be literally all Hs with a few DSes.

Quick follow up - would it be better / worse / the same to have, say, 8 ds, 7 p, the rest h, or all h with only one ds?

This is OP. This is an extreme example. I would say better all Hs with one DS because SCOTUS is fundamentally a generalist's job. Someone with 8 DSes and 7 Ps reads like a person that is excellent when he cares and average when he does not. That's a risky clerk. 14 Hs and one DS says consistency. Justices like consistency.

But at a much closer margin, say, 12 Hs and 2 Ps and 2 DSes versus 16 Hs versus 14 Hs, 1 P, and 1 DS? It doesn't really matter for anyone but the Chief, who hates Ps and Bs with almost an allergy. Then again, several Justices like to see that a clerk has an exceptional talent for some area of law. Especially if that clerk wants to go into academia.

So say the close case goes to all Hs. But no serious concerns either way, until you get into the 8 DSes, 7 Ps realm.

Interesting. All Hs means barely magna cum laude, so barely 10%.
What would you have to say about something like 4 Ps and 9 DSes, with the rest being Hs, at HLS?

[Anonymous User]

Quick follow up - would it be better / worse / the same to have, say, 8 ds, 7 p, the rest h, or all h with only one ds?

This is OP. This is an extreme example. I would say better all Hs with one DS because SCOTUS is fundamentally a generalist's job. Someone with 8 DSes and 7 Ps reads like a person that is excellent when he cares and average when he does not. That's a risky clerk. 14 Hs and one DS says consistency. Justices like consistency.

But at a much closer margin, say, 12 Hs and 2 Ps and 2 DSes versus 16 Hs versus 14 Hs, 1 P, and 1 DS? It doesn't really matter for anyone but the Chief, who hates Ps and Bs with almost an allergy. Then again, several Justices like to see that a clerk has an exceptional talent for some area of law. Especially if that clerk wants to go into academia.

So say the close case goes to all Hs. But no serious concerns either way, until you get into the 8 DSes, 7 Ps realm.

Interesting. All Hs means barely magna cum laude, so barely 10%.
What would you have to say about something like 4 Ps and 9 DSes, with the rest being Hs, at HLS?

Not OP, but just to clarify: is that what you graduated with?

[Holly Golightly]

On West Wing, the liberal Chief Justice would always hire one conservative clerk to argue with him. Does anyone (liberal or conservative) do that in reality?

[Anonymous User]

On West Wing, the liberal Chief Justice would always hire one conservative clerk to argue with him. Does anyone (liberal or conservative) do that in reality?

Scalia does. One of his clerks is always a liberal (according to him)

[Anonymous User]

On West Wing, the liberal Chief Justice would always hire one conservative clerk to argue with him. Does anyone (liberal or conservative) do that in reality?

Scalia does. One of his clerks is always a liberal (according to him)

He used to do this (see Professor Barkow at NYU) but no longer still follows this practice.

[Anonymous User]

Posted a bit ago but am interested in seeing how grade improvement over the 3 yrs of law school factors into the decision.

Meaning, do shitty 1L year but really really good 2L and 3L. Is it treated like something positive or is it automatically DQing because of one bad year.

[Anonymous User]

On West Wing, the liberal Chief Justice would always hire one conservative clerk to argue with him. Does anyone (liberal or conservative) do that in reality?

Scalia does. One of his clerks is always a liberal (according to him)

He used to do this (see Professor Barkow at NYU) but no longer still follows this practice.

Didnt he just give a talk (with Ginsburg) to C-span or NPR or something (dont remember) and he say he likes to hire one lib to argue with?

[Anonymous User]

Posted a bit ago but am interested in seeing how grade improvement over the 3 yrs of law school factors into the decision.

Meaning, do shitty 1L year but really really good 2L and 3L. Is it treated like something positive or is it automatically DQing because of one bad year.

I assume it depends on how shitty your 1L year was and how really really good your 2L and 3L year was, what law school you went to, and what your rank ended up being (in addition to all the rest, recommendations, etc.). Can you be more specific?

[Anonymous User]

On West Wing, the liberal Chief Justice would always hire one conservative clerk to argue with him. Does anyone (liberal or conservative) do that in reality?

Scalia does. One of his clerks is always a liberal (according to him)

He used to do this (see Professor Barkow at NYU) but no longer still follows this practice.

I've heard the same - that he "used to" do this. Does this mean Scalia now never hires liberals, or just that he no longer carves out a token liberal spot?

[Anonymous User]

You've talked a lot about "institutional support" in this thread. In your experience, does that mostly begin at the SCOTUS application stage, or do you think T14 schools typically push hard for their top students to get feeder clerkships? In other words: I know individual professors/recommenders make calls and write letters throughout the application process, but I'm wondering if deans and administrators tend to get involved at any point before the SCOTUS stage. Is there a difference between HYS and the rest of the T14 in this regard?

I ask as a T14 (non-HYS) student wondering if I should be trying to leverage my school's administrative support in applying for COA clerkships, or if that's not standard until one applies for SCOTUS (and has a realistic shot). Thanks for any insight!

[canoe]

Thanks for this OP. Much appreciated.

You mentioned how HYS internally calculate their #1 students for clerkship purposes. Since HS have grades beyond just H, such as DS or book awards, I can see how this would be possible. But for Y, since they don't have any grades beyond H, what happens when there are multiple students with all H's? I can imagine dean minow calling up judges and selling the fay diploma recipient but wouldn't this be harder to do at Yale since Yale's grade system leads to less distinction between the top 5-10 students who have all H's?

I've always theorized that b/c of this, it's 'better' (at least for SC clerkship purposes) to go to harvard if you know you can become the top student. Of course, this is faulty thinking b/c you can't ever know how well you will do at any one law school.

[Hutz_and_Goodman]

This is a great thread. OP what do you think the school/grade breakdown is for a court of appeals clerkship? (If you have any insight...I assume a lot of people do COA before scotus).

[09042014]

Would just barely getting cum laude at NW then working a few years in big law doing IP lit make me anywhere near competitive for fed cir.?

[Anonymous User]

Any advice for people thinking of doing a district court clerkship before trying for a feeder COA? Assume grades would be good enough for a feeder COA (not HYS but meets qualifications you mentioned for T7-25). Any judges particular that we should look at other than the obvious ones on SDNY and DDC?

This is OP.

It depends on your goals. I would focus more on the district than the judges. N.D. Ill., S.D. Cal., N.D. Cal. also good choices. Some people like E.D. Va ("the rocket docket") or E.D. Pa. (lots of MDLs and class action stuff) but I don't think those provide as much of an advantage for getting feeders. But definitely huge real-world experience/practical use.

I think that net net I would support anyone who had the time to spare doing both a COA and a dist ct.