Best and worst judges to clerk for Forum

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu May 19, 2022 1:20 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:21 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 9:56 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
I hear Wilkinson is not a very tough clerkship.
Seconded. He has a quirky personality but it’s generously a 9 to 5 job.
Including the daily 3 mile runs?

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu May 19, 2022 3:28 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:20 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:21 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 9:56 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
I hear Wilkinson is not a very tough clerkship.
Seconded. He has a quirky personality but it’s generously a 9 to 5 job.
Including the daily 3 mile runs?
Honestly, I wish more judges were that into exercise. It would probably help their sanity.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu May 19, 2022 3:41 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 3:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:20 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:21 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 9:56 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
I hear Wilkinson is not a very tough clerkship.
Seconded. He has a quirky personality but it’s generously a 9 to 5 job.
Including the daily 3 mile runs?
Honestly, I wish more judges were that into exercise. It would probably help their sanity.
FWIW, I heard from a clerk that he's too old to do that now. But he writes romance novels.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri May 20, 2022 1:07 pm

I meant which Trump judges make their clerks work the longest hours

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun May 22, 2022 3:27 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Fri May 20, 2022 1:07 pm
I meant which Trump judges make their clerks work the longest hours
Speaking only for CA9, I'd say Bress

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun May 22, 2022 5:08 pm

This might be extremely stupid/naive, but I am going into a clerkship with a judge described in this thread as working clerks extremely hard.

Can I not simply complete all of my work efficiently and leave earlier than average? As compared to my law school peers, I write very quickly and have a lot of writing/editing experience from previous work.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun May 22, 2022 5:35 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun May 22, 2022 5:08 pm
This might be extremely stupid/naive, but I am going into a clerkship with a judge described in this thread as working clerks extremely hard.

Can I not simply complete all of my work efficiently and leave earlier than average? As compared to my law school peers, I write very quickly and have a lot of writing/editing experience from previous work.
Not necessarily, no. You are assuming that the description “all of my work” refers to some fixed set of material. It doesn’t. Even if you are miles better than your co-clerks, the judge will recognize that and will assign you the harder/longer decisions or memos, or even reallocate work.

You are also assuming that every opinion that gets released is 100% perfect and polished in each Judge’s view. That is also not necessarily correct. Say the Judge has to spend 10 minutes per page to get an an average draft to “passable” status. That doesn’t mean the Judge will do nothing if your drafts are “passable” to begin with. There is always room to improve, especially in busier chambers.

In other words, if the Judge wants the clerks to be busy, they will be.

Now, there are many chambers where you could realize the efficiencies that you believe yourself capable of. But the Judges known for being busy almost by definition don’t fit that description.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by The Lsat Airbender » Sun May 22, 2022 7:23 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun May 22, 2022 5:35 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sun May 22, 2022 5:08 pm
This might be extremely stupid/naive, but I am going into a clerkship with a judge described in this thread as working clerks extremely hard.

Can I not simply complete all of my work efficiently and leave earlier than average? As compared to my law school peers, I write very quickly and have a lot of writing/editing experience from previous work.
Not necessarily, no. You are assuming that the description “all of my work” refers to some fixed set of material. It doesn’t. Even if you are miles better than your co-clerks, the judge will recognize that and will assign you the harder/longer decisions or memos, or even reallocate work.

You are also assuming that every opinion that gets released is 100% perfect and polished in each Judge’s view. That is also not necessarily correct. Say the Judge has to spend 10 minutes per page to get an an average draft to “passable” status. That doesn’t mean the Judge will do nothing if your drafts are “passable” to begin with. There is always room to improve, especially in busier chambers.

In other words, if the Judge wants the clerks to be busy, they will be.

Now, there are many chambers where you could realize the efficiencies that you believe yourself capable of. But the Judges known for being busy almost by definition don’t fit that description.
Bolded is exactly right. Some dockets are busier than others, obviously, but an individual judge's "taskmaster" reputation is more about the cultural expectations in their chambers than about the absolute volume of work coming through the front door.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun May 22, 2022 8:44 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun May 22, 2022 5:08 pm
This might be extremely stupid/naive, but I am going into a clerkship with a judge described in this thread as working clerks extremely hard.

Can I not simply complete all of my work efficiently and leave earlier than average? As compared to my law school peers, I write very quickly and have a lot of writing/editing experience from previous work.
Here are a couple of examples from courts I clerked on of judges keeping their clerks busy:

One judge had a rule that their clerks couldn't leave before they did. When there wasn't much going on, the judge would sit down at 4:45 and start reading the NYT in their office and read the whole damn thing. (This was a court known very much for 9-5 work so not quite comparable to the situation you're describing, but one example of how judges can approach things.)

The other judge I'm thinking of handled all the discovery stuff in chambers rather than passing it off to the magistrate, held hearings on every motion, wrote published orders on basically everything, and had a particular format for their orders that meant their orders were about 3x as long as they needed to be. They and their clerks worked till 7 pm every day and every Saturday. It didn't really matter how efficient you, personally, were, you'd just get more work handed to you b/c there always was more work. (And, frankly, this was largely self-imposed; in my chambers the career clerk was shutting off the lights and kicking everyone out at 5:02 pm and we got everything done just fine. In some courts, however, it's just the result of the volume of cases.)

My first example is just ridiculousness, but it is an example of how one judge handled clerks' hours. I think, though, the second example is the much bigger issue wrt judges working their clerks hard - there is always going to be more work, so if the judge expects you to stay till 8 pm every day (or whatever), finishing your work early doesn't mean you'll go home early, it means you'll get more work. Even if you can't do anything until the judge reviews what you've written, they could easily expect you to sit there and wait for them to turn around the draft. There are unpleasant judges who work their clerks hard and do no work themselves, but most of the judges who work clerks hard are working the same hours along with them, so it's difficult just to leave.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Mon Jun 06, 2022 10:41 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Apr 21, 2022 10:30 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Apr 21, 2022 10:03 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Apr 20, 2022 8:06 pm
Any under-the-radar SDNY/EDNY judges that have a reputation of being great to clerk for?
I don't think it's possible to be under the radar in those districts, but Karas probably qualifies because he's in White Plains, and he's wonderful.
Yeah I was going to say it’s a bit of an oxymoron but Karas is wonderful and is a good shout. I’ve also heard secondhand good things about Halpern and not great things about Briccetti, but I clerked in Manhattan so take those impressions with a lot of salt (though I’m confident in my recommendation of Karas).

In general, divisions matter a lot more than I realized before I clerked, though—White Plains judges don’t get any Manhattan cases and vice versa.

Some of the seniors are also excellent and might be somewhat under-the-radar, and SDNY seniors tend to be very active. Preska is one of the bubbliest people I’ve ever met, and is probably one of the best SDNY clerkships QOL-wise, and my judge regarded Castel, Kaplan, Keenan, and Stein highly. Cote and Rakoff as well, of course, but I don’t think they’re really “under the radar.” Avoid Berman for obvious reasons. McMahon is very well-connected but has a reputation for being personally difficult. Koeltl will seemingly never go senior and works very very hard, but that kind of comes with the territory with judges with full caseloads.
Does anyone have any additional information about Koeltl? I have similarly heard that he works extremely hard—but is he generally well regarded and/or otherwise a good boss? In researching SDNY judges, I was somewhat surprised that he hasn’t really fed to SCOTUS ever, just given his own background as a former SCOTUS clerk.

Also, any info about what Liman or Torres are like to clerk for?

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Tue Jun 07, 2022 8:03 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Jun 06, 2022 10:41 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Apr 21, 2022 10:30 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Apr 21, 2022 10:03 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Apr 20, 2022 8:06 pm
Any under-the-radar SDNY/EDNY judges that have a reputation of being great to clerk for?
I don't think it's possible to be under the radar in those districts, but Karas probably qualifies because he's in White Plains, and he's wonderful.
Yeah I was going to say it’s a bit of an oxymoron but Karas is wonderful and is a good shout. I’ve also heard secondhand good things about Halpern and not great things about Briccetti, but I clerked in Manhattan so take those impressions with a lot of salt (though I’m confident in my recommendation of Karas).

In general, divisions matter a lot more than I realized before I clerked, though—White Plains judges don’t get any Manhattan cases and vice versa.

Some of the seniors are also excellent and might be somewhat under-the-radar, and SDNY seniors tend to be very active. Preska is one of the bubbliest people I’ve ever met, and is probably one of the best SDNY clerkships QOL-wise, and my judge regarded Castel, Kaplan, Keenan, and Stein highly. Cote and Rakoff as well, of course, but I don’t think they’re really “under the radar.” Avoid Berman for obvious reasons. McMahon is very well-connected but has a reputation for being personally difficult. Koeltl will seemingly never go senior and works very very hard, but that kind of comes with the territory with judges with full caseloads.
Does anyone have any additional information about Koeltl? I have similarly heard that he works extremely hard—but is he generally well regarded and/or otherwise a good boss? In researching SDNY judges, I was somewhat surprised that he hasn’t really fed to SCOTUS ever, just given his own background as a former SCOTUS clerk.

Also, any info about what Liman or Torres are like to clerk for?
Re Koeltl, I have heard he is a great guy and a good boss, but not an "easy" boss if that makes sense.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:20 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.
I know people who clerked for both judges, and to be honest, I am not sure the above is accurate. Stras had a clerk quit last year because the experience was so bad, and the impression I got was that was not a crazy thing to have done given the situation in chambers. The Colloton clerks work hard, but they also seemed to get a ton out of their clerkship. There seem to be a few people on TLS who just didn't get along with Colloton or didn't like him, but I am not sure that is true of many, if not most, of the people who clerked for him.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Jun 09, 2022 3:31 pm

You definitely can't form an opinion based on any single person's experience. I'm currently clerking, and one co-clerk and I are having good experiences with our occasionally frustrating but otherwise likable judge. Another co-clerk hates the judge and is thinking of quitting. You'd get very different perspectives talking to each of us.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Jun 09, 2022 3:32 pm

As referenced in the prior post, a top clerkship school that used to regularly send clerks to Colloton has since blacklisted him despite the good relationship because the clerks had such bad experiences—and this is a good number of clerks, not one or two. (Some on here will know which school, it’s not much of a secret.)

I am fairly well-connected in the CA8 world, and while I know a Colloton clerk who had a good experience, I have heard enough bad things from enough independent sources that I would strongly encourage prospective applicants to consider closely. His abilities are unquestionable, though, and I’m sure you can learn a lot from him.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Jun 09, 2022 6:08 pm

The term 'blacklisted' has been thrown around for a few judges in this thread. What does it mean for a school to blacklist a judge, as in offering no support to an applicant or more like warning the applicant before they apply? Is there a list of these types of judges out there?

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Jun 09, 2022 6:17 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 6:08 pm
The term 'blacklisted' has been thrown around for a few judges in this thread. What does it mean for a school to blacklist a judge, as in offering no support to an applicant or more like warning the applicant before they apply? Is there a list of these types of judges out there?
At NYU I don't think there is an official blacklist or something (or if there is, I'm not privy to it), but when I was applying to judges and I told my professor I was interested in SDNY she said whatever you do under no circumstances should you clerk for Berman even if he is your only offer and I guess I would consider that like quasi-blacklisted.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri Jun 10, 2022 12:23 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 3:32 pm
As referenced in the prior post, a top clerkship school that used to regularly send clerks to Colloton has since blacklisted him despite the good relationship because the clerks had such bad experiences—and this is a good number of clerks, not one or two. (Some on here will know which school, it’s not much of a secret.)

I am fairly well-connected in the CA8 world, and while I know a Colloton clerk who had a good experience, I have heard enough bad things from enough independent sources that I would strongly encourage prospective applicants to consider closely. His abilities are unquestionable, though, and I’m sure you can learn a lot from him.
Would you mind sharing your opinion on who the better CA8 judges are from a quality of life, workload, and intellectually interesting/worthwhile perspective? Sounds like Colloton might measure strongly on the last but maybe not so much on the first and second.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri Jun 10, 2022 7:57 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:20 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.
I know people who clerked for both judges, and to be honest, I am not sure the above is accurate. Stras had a clerk quit last year because the experience was so bad, and the impression I got was that was not a crazy thing to have done given the situation in chambers. The Colloton clerks work hard, but they also seemed to get a ton out of their clerkship. There seem to be a few people on TLS who just didn't get along with Colloton or didn't like him, but I am not sure that is true of many, if not most, of the people who clerked for him.
This is consistent with what I’ve heard. I spoke with former Colloton clerks who said they worked hard but no harder than other top COA clerks. They also said he was quite supportive of future prospects (made phone calls) and had a national reputation and really strong network of former clerks. None suggested his chambers were at all unpleasant. All in all, what you’d expect from a top-tier COA clerkship. I don’t know what school blacklisted him, but it definitely was not Harvard or Yale which should tell you something.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:05 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 10, 2022 7:57 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:20 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.
I know people who clerked for both judges, and to be honest, I am not sure the above is accurate. Stras had a clerk quit last year because the experience was so bad, and the impression I got was that was not a crazy thing to have done given the situation in chambers. The Colloton clerks work hard, but they also seemed to get a ton out of their clerkship. There seem to be a few people on TLS who just didn't get along with Colloton or didn't like him, but I am not sure that is true of many, if not most, of the people who clerked for him.
This is consistent with what I’ve heard. I spoke with former Colloton clerks who said they worked hard but no harder than other top COA clerks. They also said he was quite supportive of future prospects (made phone calls) and had a national reputation and really strong network of former clerks. None suggested his chambers were at all unpleasant. All in all, what you’d expect from a top-tier COA clerkship. I don’t know what school blacklisted him, but it definitely was not Harvard or Yale which should tell you something.
To be fair, I don’t think Yale officially, or quasi-officially, blacklists anyone. The school was sending students to Reinhardt and Kozinski until the end, even though it was known through individual word of mouth that those were not normal clerkships.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:08 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:05 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 10, 2022 7:57 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:20 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.
I know people who clerked for both judges, and to be honest, I am not sure the above is accurate. Stras had a clerk quit last year because the experience was so bad, and the impression I got was that was not a crazy thing to have done given the situation in chambers. The Colloton clerks work hard, but they also seemed to get a ton out of their clerkship. There seem to be a few people on TLS who just didn't get along with Colloton or didn't like him, but I am not sure that is true of many, if not most, of the people who clerked for him.
This is consistent with what I’ve heard. I spoke with former Colloton clerks who said they worked hard but no harder than other top COA clerks. They also said he was quite supportive of future prospects (made phone calls) and had a national reputation and really strong network of former clerks. None suggested his chambers were at all unpleasant. All in all, what you’d expect from a top-tier COA clerkship. I don’t know what school blacklisted him, but it definitely was not Harvard or Yale which should tell you something.
To be fair, I don’t think Yale officially, or quasi-officially, blacklists anyone. The school was sending students to Reinhardt and Kozinski until the end, even though it was known through individual word of mouth that those were not normal clerkships.
True, gotta keep US News and World Report happy.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:42 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 10, 2022 7:57 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:20 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 12:28 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 11:10 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 10:26 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 19, 2022 1:08 am
Among the big feeder judges on the right, which of them are taskmasters? I've heard Sutton and Pryor are tough but not sure about the Trump ones
These aren’t “big” feeders by any means, but on CA8 Colloton and Stras both work their clerks hard, and Colloton is also a very unpleasant man, so his clerks are generally miserable.

Staying in the Midwest, I’ve heard really good things about Sykes, and Easterbrook is personally quirky but a very relaxed clerkship.
What does it mean to "work clerks hard"? I know a lot of judges who are adored by their clerks but work the clerks 80 hours a week. Is this counted as working them hard? Or does that phrase imply that the judge is mean, demanding, etc?
The former, though I doubt that any judges actually work their clerks 80 hours per week. I’ve heard nothing bad about Stras personally, and he comes across as friendly and normal; Colloton does not, and recent clerks I know have been very unhappy with the experience. Colloton was also on my law school’s blacklist.
I know people who clerked for both judges, and to be honest, I am not sure the above is accurate. Stras had a clerk quit last year because the experience was so bad, and the impression I got was that was not a crazy thing to have done given the situation in chambers. The Colloton clerks work hard, but they also seemed to get a ton out of their clerkship. There seem to be a few people on TLS who just didn't get along with Colloton or didn't like him, but I am not sure that is true of many, if not most, of the people who clerked for him.
This is consistent with what I’ve heard. I spoke with former Colloton clerks who said they worked hard but no harder than other top COA clerks. They also said he was quite supportive of future prospects (made phone calls) and had a national reputation and really strong network of former clerks. None suggested his chambers were at all unpleasant. All in all, what you’d expect from a top-tier COA clerkship. I don’t know what school blacklisted him, but it definitely was not Harvard or Yale which should tell you something.
Speaking generally, clerks and former clerks will virtually never say anything bad their (former) boss when speaking to people casually, that doesn’t mean much. To get straight info, you usually need to know a clerk well or know someone who is not a clerk, and therefore doesn’t have the same career risks, who is nevertheless in a position to know (e.g. profs, appellate practitioners, clerkship staff, clerks in other chambers, etc.).

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sat Jun 18, 2022 10:23 am

Generally have heard bad things about the the SDFL Trump judges, in terms of hours and chambers culture.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sat Jun 18, 2022 6:49 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Jun 18, 2022 10:23 am
Generally have heard bad things about the the SDFL Trump judges, in terms of hours and chambers culture.
Elaborate and with names, if possible?

Seriously? What are you waiting for?

Now there's a charge.
Just kidding ... it's still FREE!


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