Best and worst judges to clerk for Forum

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 4:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:37 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 2:31 am
General Question: what is the order of the prestige/career outcome bump of the federal circuits. I know the DC/2/9 are the most prestigious, but could someone perhaps rank all of them? And any basis that supports the ranking would be noteworthy. Or perhaps they are all equal after the aforementioned ones?

Hopefully this will help me and others decide what circuits to shoot for.
I fundamentally disagree with the idea of circuit ranking in the first place. I think the idea that 2/9/DC are more prestigious confuses two factors. First, 2/9/DC tend to have a lot of (especially liberal) feeders, but feeders are already ranked, so when we are talking about circuits, presumably we are talking about clerkships with non-feeders. Secondly, 2/9/DC tend to be more desirable because lots of people want to live/practice in NY, LA, and SF, but its not clear why that fact would make a judge in Idaho or Vermont more prestigious than a judge in Wyoming or New Hampshire.

Therefore, you shouldn't be worried about "circuit" rankings. Try to find a well-regarded judge in a place you want to live, but other than that, just apply broadly and see what you get. If you don't have the grades for a feeder, the idea that anyone is going to care about the difference between a non-feeder in San Diego and a non-feeder in Atlanta seems highly unlikely. And if you have the grades for a feeder, the idea of turning down someone like Kethledge or Barron for a 2/9/DC non-feeder doesn't make much sense.
I mostly agree with this but would push back a little on the idea that circuit "prestige" doesn't exist or doesn't matter. Anon because I've been involved in hiring at two lit boutiques. Having a 2/7/9/DC clerkship - any of them - was generally viewed as a plus over, say, a CA11 clerkship. (Of course, absent SCOTUS, clerking in our home circuit was the biggest plus, and I totally agree with what's been said already about clerking in the place you want to work unless you're in feeder contention.) There was some granularity in that to the extent that we were aware of which judges were harder "gets" in our home circuit, but not as much as you might expect, and we obviously had less insight into how competitive the non-feeders outside our home circuit are.

Any circuit "prestige" effect is at least partly just proxy for applicant quality overall, so it's hard to say how much this actually matters. But it is the sort of thing that comes up, sometimes explicitly and sometimes obliquely - e.g. someone saying that a candidate has "good clerkships" when those clerkships are in a 2/7/9/DC circuit, and not saying the same when a candidate's clerkships are in flyovers.

That all said, I ultimately agree with these takeaways even while disagreeing that circuit prestige "exists". In particular, which individual judge you clerk for, and whether they're a good boss and someone who will care about your professional development, matters so much more IMO than any incremental boost in hiring at snobby employers. Yes, it's hard to figure that stuff out and that often requires calling former clerks and just doing harder work than "this judge is on a 'prestigious' circuit so they're better." But doing that work is worth it and should outweigh any circuit "prestige" concerns.
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:05 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 4:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:37 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 2:31 am
General Question: what is the order of the prestige/career outcome bump of the federal circuits. I know the DC/2/9 are the most prestigious, but could someone perhaps rank all of them? And any basis that supports the ranking would be noteworthy. Or perhaps they are all equal after the aforementioned ones?

Hopefully this will help me and others decide what circuits to shoot for.
I fundamentally disagree with the idea of circuit ranking in the first place. I think the idea that 2/9/DC are more prestigious confuses two factors. First, 2/9/DC tend to have a lot of (especially liberal) feeders, but feeders are already ranked, so when we are talking about circuits, presumably we are talking about clerkships with non-feeders. Secondly, 2/9/DC tend to be more desirable because lots of people want to live/practice in NY, LA, and SF, but its not clear why that fact would make a judge in Idaho or Vermont more prestigious than a judge in Wyoming or New Hampshire.

Therefore, you shouldn't be worried about "circuit" rankings. Try to find a well-regarded judge in a place you want to live, but other than that, just apply broadly and see what you get. If you don't have the grades for a feeder, the idea that anyone is going to care about the difference between a non-feeder in San Diego and a non-feeder in Atlanta seems highly unlikely. And if you have the grades for a feeder, the idea of turning down someone like Kethledge or Barron for a 2/9/DC non-feeder doesn't make much sense.
I mostly agree with this but would push back a little on the idea that circuit "prestige" doesn't exist or doesn't matter. Anon because I've been involved in hiring at two lit boutiques. Having a 2/7/9/DC clerkship - any of them - was generally viewed as a plus over, say, a CA11 clerkship. (Of course, absent SCOTUS, clerking in our home circuit was the biggest plus, and I totally agree with what's been said already about clerking in the place you want to work unless you're in feeder contention.) There was some granularity in that to the extent that we were aware of which judges were harder "gets" in our home circuit, but not as much as you might expect, and we obviously had less insight into how competitive the non-feeders outside our home circuit are.

Any circuit "prestige" effect is at least partly just proxy for applicant quality overall, so it's hard to say how much this actually matters. But it is the sort of thing that comes up, sometimes explicitly and sometimes obliquely - e.g. someone saying that a candidate has "good clerkships" when those clerkships are in a 2/7/9/DC circuit, and not saying the same when a candidate's clerkships are in flyovers.

That all said, I ultimately agree with these takeaways even while disagreeing that circuit prestige "exists". In particular, which individual judge you clerk for, and whether they're a good boss and someone who will care about your professional development, matters so much more IMO than any incremental boost in hiring at snobby employers. Yes, it's hard to figure that stuff out and that often requires calling former clerks and just doing harder work than "this judge is on a 'prestigious' circuit so they're better." But doing that work is worth it and should outweigh any circuit "prestige" concerns.
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Given this conversation, does it make sense to clerk for a non-name-brand judge in, say, the Sixth Circuit if you are just interested in appellate work generally? Or would it be better to wait/gun for the opportunity to work in the circuit where I'm planning to later work in?

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:36 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:05 pm

Given this conversation, does it make sense to clerk for a non-name-brand judge in, say, the Sixth Circuit if you are just interested in appellate work generally? Or would it be better to wait/gun for the opportunity to work in the circuit where I'm planning to later work in?
What would change that would make you more competitive as time passes? I know some of the SDNY/EDNY judges like clerks with a couple years work experience, but I'm not sure that applies to the 2nd Circuit, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't apply to most judges on the 9/DC. Unless you have some reason to think you will be more competitive later on, I would take the bird in hand. Any COA (unless they are a terrible boss) is both a strong credential and a helpful learning experience.

However, I would also caution that without a feeder and preferably SCOTUS clerkship, actually making a career of appellate work is a heavy lift (although I am sure you can get an offer at Gibson/Kirkland etc. and get some appellate experience as an associate). If you want to make partner at a biglaw or even midlaw firm, you might want to content yourself with the prospect of general commercial/securities/white collar lit (although this last will likely require time at a US Attorney's Office) now.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 2:06 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:36 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:05 pm

Given this conversation, does it make sense to clerk for a non-name-brand judge in, say, the Sixth Circuit if you are just interested in appellate work generally? Or would it be better to wait/gun for the opportunity to work in the circuit where I'm planning to later work in?
What would change that would make you more competitive as time passes? I know some of the SDNY/EDNY judges like clerks with a couple years work experience, but I'm not sure that applies to the 2nd Circuit, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't apply to most judges on the 9/DC. Unless you have some reason to think you will be more competitive later on, I would take the bird in hand. Any COA (unless they are a terrible boss) is both a strong credential and a helpful learning experience.

However, I would also caution that without a feeder and preferably SCOTUS clerkship, actually making a career of appellate work is a heavy lift (although I am sure you can get an offer at Gibson/Kirkland etc. and get some appellate experience as an associate). If you want to make partner at a biglaw or even midlaw firm, you might want to content yourself with the prospect of general commercial/securities/white collar lit (although this last will likely require time at a US Attorney's Office) now.
Appellate work isn't that hard to break into, but biglaw appellate is very, very hard to break into because biglaw has no real advantage vs. small firms in appellate, it's not very profitable, etc. so practices are small. You just need to do government or a regional firm, and at the latter you'd almost certainly not be a pure appellate specialist, though some exist (lots on TX #appellatetwitter like Raffi Melkonian for example).

Otherwise agreed, though. I don't think--and my (top school) clerkship office certainly didn't think--that there's that much of an advantage beyond personal convenience to doing an appellate clerkship where you plan to practice. (Though there's a bigger one for trial courts.) And there's not much reason to suspect you'll be competitive for feeders in the future if you're not now. You can try to do the double-appellate thing if you really want to once you secure one too, though unless you can somehow snag a feeder it's a waste of time.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 3:24 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 4:15 pm

I mostly agree with this but would push back a little on the idea that circuit "prestige" doesn't exist or doesn't matter. Anon because I've been involved in hiring at two lit boutiques. Having a 2/7/9/DC clerkship - any of them - was generally viewed as a plus over, say, a CA11 clerkship. (Of course, absent SCOTUS, clerking in our home circuit was the biggest plus, and I totally agree with what's been said already about clerking in the place you want to work unless you're in feeder contention.) There was some granularity in that to the extent that we were aware of which judges were harder "gets" in our home circuit, but not as much as you might expect, and we obviously had less insight into how competitive the non-feeders outside our home circuit are.

Any circuit "prestige" effect is at least partly just proxy for applicant quality overall, so it's hard to say how much this actually matters. But it is the sort of thing that comes up, sometimes explicitly and sometimes obliquely - e.g. someone saying that a candidate has "good clerkships" when those clerkships are in a 2/7/9/DC circuit, and not saying the same when a candidate's clerkships are in flyovers.

That all said, I ultimately agree with these takeaways even while disagreeing that circuit prestige "exists". In particular, which individual judge you clerk for, and whether they're a good boss and someone who will care about your professional development, matters so much more IMO than any incremental boost in hiring at snobby employers. Yes, it's hard to figure that stuff out and that often requires calling former clerks and just doing harder work than "this judge is on a 'prestigious' circuit so they're better." But doing that work is worth it and should outweigh any circuit "prestige" concerns.
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Anon you're responding to. I would prefer not to name the specific firms, but I would be surprised if you would describe them as middle-of-the-road (think: W&C, MTO, KVN, Bartlit, etc.), unless we have a very different definition of "middle-of-the-road." In any event, the question from the previous anon was about comparing non-feeders in 2/7/9/DC vs non-feeders in CA11/etc., which definitely excludes judges like Bill Pryor -- I think even true "middle-of-the-road" firms are or should be aware that he is a big-time feeder.

In any event, I agree (as my last post concluded) that individual judge effects still outweigh any "circuit prestige" effect writ large. But my experience is nevertheless that circuit prestige still "exists" in some meaningful sense w/r/t clerkship portability. It can both be true that all else equal, CA2/7/9/DC carry more cache than a circuit clerkship elsewhere (unless trying to practice in a specific circuit after clerking), and that in general, all else is rarely equal because it often matters more which judge it is, both for portability and for how meaningful a clerkship will be for someone's professional development.

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nixy

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by nixy » Sun Feb 07, 2021 4:29 pm

I think perhaps something else to note is that even if 9/2/DC have a certain prestige that the others lack (which I think tends to correlate more with 1) proximity to traditional centers of power in the legal profession and 2) competitiveness resulting from desirability of location, rather than really anything about the nature of the experience), it doesn't follow that there is any kind of neat hierarchy that the rest of the circuits fall into. I would say that after 9/2/DC, you have everyone else and there's no point trying to parse 3rd v. 11th v. 6th or so on.

(To the extent it's not really about the judge, which is what I really think.)

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 5:21 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun Feb 07, 2021 3:24 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 4:15 pm

I mostly agree with this but would push back a little on the idea that circuit "prestige" doesn't exist or doesn't matter. Anon because I've been involved in hiring at two lit boutiques. Having a 2/7/9/DC clerkship - any of them - was generally viewed as a plus over, say, a CA11 clerkship. (Of course, absent SCOTUS, clerking in our home circuit was the biggest plus, and I totally agree with what's been said already about clerking in the place you want to work unless you're in feeder contention.) There was some granularity in that to the extent that we were aware of which judges were harder "gets" in our home circuit, but not as much as you might expect, and we obviously had less insight into how competitive the non-feeders outside our home circuit are.

Any circuit "prestige" effect is at least partly just proxy for applicant quality overall, so it's hard to say how much this actually matters. But it is the sort of thing that comes up, sometimes explicitly and sometimes obliquely - e.g. someone saying that a candidate has "good clerkships" when those clerkships are in a 2/7/9/DC circuit, and not saying the same when a candidate's clerkships are in flyovers.

That all said, I ultimately agree with these takeaways even while disagreeing that circuit prestige "exists". In particular, which individual judge you clerk for, and whether they're a good boss and someone who will care about your professional development, matters so much more IMO than any incremental boost in hiring at snobby employers. Yes, it's hard to figure that stuff out and that often requires calling former clerks and just doing harder work than "this judge is on a 'prestigious' circuit so they're better." But doing that work is worth it and should outweigh any circuit "prestige" concerns.
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Anon you're responding to. I would prefer not to name the specific firms, but I would be surprised if you would describe them as middle-of-the-road (think: W&C, MTO, KVN, Bartlit, etc.), unless we have a very different definition of "middle-of-the-road." In any event, the question from the previous anon was about comparing non-feeders in 2/7/9/DC vs non-feeders in CA11/etc., which definitely excludes judges like Bill Pryor -- I think even true "middle-of-the-road" firms are or should be aware that he is a big-time feeder.

In any event, I agree (as my last post concluded) that individual judge effects still outweigh any "circuit prestige" effect writ large. But my experience is nevertheless that circuit prestige still "exists" in some meaningful sense w/r/t clerkship portability. It can both be true that all else equal, CA2/7/9/DC carry more cache than a circuit clerkship elsewhere (unless trying to practice in a specific circuit after clerking), and that in general, all else is rarely equal because it often matters more which judge it is, both for portability and for how meaningful a clerkship will be for someone's professional development.
Fair enough. But after adding up the feeders, semifeeders, and well-known non-feeders (Harris, Motz, Hardiman...), you've already covered 1/3rd of the active judges in most non 2/7/9/D.C. circuits. I'll spot that firms may use circuit prestige to resolve ties between judges outside that group. (Even then, some D.C. firms favor 3rd circuit and 4th circuit clerks over 7th circuit and 9th circuit clerks however)

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 6:01 pm

The idea that the 7th circuit is more prestigious than other circuits has absolutely no validity (I bet the poster was talking about Bartlit Beck, and was confusing geographic proximity for a prestige boost). Look up the clerks at MTO: they have more people from the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 8th (for heavens sake! the 8th!), 9th (and the 9th dominated the 2nd/DC because geography trumps "prestige"), 10th, and DC circuit than the 7th. And it tied (at 1) with the 6th and 11th. W&C doesn't have a list but using a keyword search I only found like 3 7th clerks. The case for a 2/9/DC bump is weak. The case for a 7th bump (in Chicago its self-selection, not a prestige delta; just like the 9th and MTO; Susman Houston and the 5th Circuit; or the 2nd and NY firms) is comical.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Sun Feb 07, 2021 11:03 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sun Feb 07, 2021 6:01 pm
The idea that the 7th circuit is more prestigious than other circuits has absolutely no validity (I bet the poster was talking about Bartlit Beck, and was confusing geographic proximity for a prestige boost). Look up the clerks at MTO: they have more people from the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 8th (for heavens sake! the 8th!), 9th (and the 9th dominated the 2nd/DC because geography trumps "prestige"), 10th, and DC circuit than the 7th. And it tied (at 1) with the 6th and 11th. W&C doesn't have a list but using a keyword search I only found like 3 7th clerks. The case for a 2/9/DC bump is weak. The case for a 7th bump (in Chicago its self-selection, not a prestige delta; just like the 9th and MTO; Susman Houston and the 5th Circuit; or the 2nd and NY firms) is comical.
The 7th is generally more *selective* than the other circuits because it’s small, almost exclusively composed of judges stationed in the Chicago belt, and dense with highly-regarded judges. I don’t think it’s more *prestigious* really though. You could say the same for 1 to a lesser extent.

Also, odds whoever it is is from Bartlit are very low given that Bartlit (a) is pretty tiny and (b) doesn’t really hire many CA7 clerks (mostly SCOTUS, feeders, or semi-feeders)

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by shoebox » Mon Feb 08, 2021 11:27 am

The number of employers that will hire you because you clerked at CA2 but wouldn't have if you clerked at CA3 (or whatever) is so small that it is not worth planning your career around. Beyond the judges with special name recognition, it is going to be far more valuable to focus on the region where you are going to be practicing than worrying about whether 0.00001% of the legal profession will find you more marketable for having clerked in one circuit versus another.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Mon Feb 08, 2021 12:12 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 4:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:37 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 2:31 am
General Question: what is the order of the prestige/career outcome bump of the federal circuits. I know the DC/2/9 are the most prestigious, but could someone perhaps rank all of them? And any basis that supports the ranking would be noteworthy. Or perhaps they are all equal after the aforementioned ones?

Hopefully this will help me and others decide what circuits to shoot for.
I fundamentally disagree with the idea of circuit ranking in the first place. I think the idea that 2/9/DC are more prestigious confuses two factors. First, 2/9/DC tend to have a lot of (especially liberal) feeders, but feeders are already ranked, so when we are talking about circuits, presumably we are talking about clerkships with non-feeders. Secondly, 2/9/DC tend to be more desirable because lots of people want to live/practice in NY, LA, and SF, but its not clear why that fact would make a judge in Idaho or Vermont more prestigious than a judge in Wyoming or New Hampshire.

Therefore, you shouldn't be worried about "circuit" rankings. Try to find a well-regarded judge in a place you want to live, but other than that, just apply broadly and see what you get. If you don't have the grades for a feeder, the idea that anyone is going to care about the difference between a non-feeder in San Diego and a non-feeder in Atlanta seems highly unlikely. And if you have the grades for a feeder, the idea of turning down someone like Kethledge or Barron for a 2/9/DC non-feeder doesn't make much sense.
I mostly agree with this but would push back a little on the idea that circuit "prestige" doesn't exist or doesn't matter. Anon because I've been involved in hiring at two lit boutiques. Having a 2/7/9/DC clerkship - any of them - was generally viewed as a plus over, say, a CA11 clerkship. (Of course, absent SCOTUS, clerking in our home circuit was the biggest plus, and I totally agree with what's been said already about clerking in the place you want to work unless you're in feeder contention.) There was some granularity in that to the extent that we were aware of which judges were harder "gets" in our home circuit, but not as much as you might expect, and we obviously had less insight into how competitive the non-feeders outside our home circuit are.

Any circuit "prestige" effect is at least partly just proxy for applicant quality overall, so it's hard to say how much this actually matters. But it is the sort of thing that comes up, sometimes explicitly and sometimes obliquely - e.g. someone saying that a candidate has "good clerkships" when those clerkships are in a 2/7/9/DC circuit, and not saying the same when a candidate's clerkships are in flyovers.

That all said, I ultimately agree with these takeaways even while disagreeing that circuit prestige "exists". In particular, which individual judge you clerk for, and whether they're a good boss and someone who will care about your professional development, matters so much more IMO than any incremental boost in hiring at snobby employers. Yes, it's hard to figure that stuff out and that often requires calling former clerks and just doing harder work than "this judge is on a 'prestigious' circuit so they're better." But doing that work is worth it and should outweigh any circuit "prestige" concerns.
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Pryor yes, but saying that about Grant and Newsom is absurd, they’re young and have good reputations but nothing beyond other good judges in other (often more competitive) places like Scudder, Flaum, Hamilton, Berzon, Gould, McKeown, Bress, Miller, Owen... let alone feeders and judges with considerable national renown like Dianes Sykes and Wood, Willy Fletcher, Friesland, or Sidney Thomas

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Quichelorraine » Mon Feb 08, 2021 4:18 pm

When I describe the clerkship concept to non-lawyers, there is no topic that provokes more "are you kidding me?" responses than the idea of Circuit prestige.

(Helped along by the fact that I know a former Sotomayor clerk who claims to have been negged in a boutique interview for the crime of not having clerked for Kagan, which is the apotheosis of performative snobbery and is also delicious, and which I will believe 'til my dying day because it confirms all of my priors.)

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Pennoyer v. Meh » Mon Feb 08, 2021 4:28 pm

Quichelorraine wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 4:18 pm
(Helped along by the fact that I know a former Sotomayor clerk who claims to have been negged in a boutique interview for the crime of not having clerked for Kagan, which is the apotheosis of performative snobbery and is also delicious, and which I will believe 'til my dying day because it confirms all of my priors.)
There is just no way that that is true. That is so ludicrous I cannot believe it.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Quichelorraine » Mon Feb 08, 2021 4:46 pm

ETA: A great example of not thinking before I post; given the small universe of people involved, I want to emphasize that this was a story told at a party, it is unclear how serious any of the people involved were, and it was presented as an amusing anecdote.

By contrast, at least in my circle, Circuit prestige seems to be something that arises for other people. I don't know how real it is outside of the toppermost.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by polareagle » Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:21 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 12:12 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Pryor yes, but saying that about Grant and Newsom is absurd, they’re young and have good reputations but nothing beyond other good judges in other (often more competitive) places like Scudder, Flaum, Hamilton, Berzon, Gould, McKeown, Bress, Miller, Owen... let alone feeders and judges with considerable national renown like Dianes Sykes and Wood, Willy Fletcher, Friesland, or Sidney Thomas
I think this more recent anon has hit the nail on the head. (After all how could we forget such universally well-known legal luminaries as Scudder or Hamilton, who I've definitely for sure heard of before this very moment.) This thread is called "best and worst judges to clerk for." I think we need to rank, at the very least, all 179 active circuit judges. I'll go first.

1. Merrick Garland

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Quichelorraine » Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:29 pm

polareagle wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:21 pm
I'll go first.

1. Merrick Garland
Too soon.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:31 pm

polareagle wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:21 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 12:12 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Pryor yes, but saying that about Grant and Newsom is absurd, they’re young and have good reputations but nothing beyond other good judges in other (often more competitive) places like Scudder, Flaum, Hamilton, Berzon, Gould, McKeown, Bress, Miller, Owen... let alone feeders and judges with considerable national renown like Dianes Sykes and Wood, Willy Fletcher, Friesland, or Sidney Thomas
I think this more recent anon has hit the nail on the head. (After all how could we forget such universally well-known legal luminaries as Scudder or Hamilton, who I've definitely for sure heard of before this very moment.) This thread is called "best and worst judges to clerk for." I think we need to rank, at the very least, all 179 active circuit judges. I'll go first.

1. Merrick Garland
2. J. Harvie Wilkinson

Kidding and sorry for feeding the monster. I agree the need to rank is fairly insane.

One on-topic point I'll make is that there is a 2/9 benefit, even if you clerk for a lesser-known judge far from the big cities, if you want to work in New York or California. I clerked for flyover judge on the 9th who, while well-regarded on the court, isn't a feeder or particularly "famous." I received invitations to interview/networking events for every firm with a significant appellate practice in San Francisco and LA. Those firms do a ton of work in the 9th circuit and like hiring 9th circuit clerks. And they may still have looked at hiring me if I had clerked on the 10th (e.g.) instead, but I don't think they would have been recruiting me in the same way.

I imagine it's similar for NYC appellate and 2nd circuit clerks, and that you'd have a leg up clerking for Hall in VT over Howard in NH if NYC is your goal even though I'm guessing those clerkships would otherwise be equally great experiences.

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Iowahawk

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Iowahawk » Mon Feb 08, 2021 6:17 pm

polareagle wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:21 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 12:12 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Feb 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Different anon. At least in my experience, it's mostly middle-of-the-road firms that care about 2/7/9/DC. Truly "snobby" firms know the names (and reputations) of the best circuit judges. A clerkship with Bill Pryor, Kevin Newsom, or Britt Grant (11th circuit) comes more clout than a clerkship with all save a few 7th circuit/9th circuits judges.
Pryor yes, but saying that about Grant and Newsom is absurd, they’re young and have good reputations but nothing beyond other good judges in other (often more competitive) places like Scudder, Flaum, Hamilton, Berzon, Gould, McKeown, Bress, Miller, Owen... let alone feeders and judges with considerable national renown like Dianes Sykes and Wood, Willy Fletcher, Friesland, or Sidney Thomas
I think this more recent anon has hit the nail on the head. (After all how could we forget such universally well-known legal luminaries as Scudder or Hamilton, who I've definitely for sure heard of before this very moment.) This thread is called "best and worst judges to clerk for." I think we need to rank, at the very least, all 179 active circuit judges. I'll go first.

1. Merrick Garland
Hamilton has fed to SCOTUS and, at the risk of ranking, maybe is the second most-prominent liberal judge in the Midwest after Diane Wood. Not saying much given the composition of 6/7/8, but a highly desirable clerkship and definitely not obscure. Scudder is a new appointee, so it's understandable to not be familiar with him, but if you just search his name on this forum you will find lots of laudatory praise. They're perfectly normal comparators for Grant or Newsom, who aren't particularly known for anything yet beyond picking up some of Kavanaugh's clerks after he was elevated (for the former) and an adventurous writing style (for the latter).

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polareagle

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by polareagle » Mon Feb 08, 2021 6:42 pm

Iowahawk wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 6:17 pm
polareagle wrote:
Mon Feb 08, 2021 5:21 pm
I think this more recent anon has hit the nail on the head. (After all how could we forget such universally well-known legal luminaries as Scudder or Hamilton, who I've definitely for sure heard of before this very moment.) This thread is called "best and worst judges to clerk for." I think we need to rank, at the very least, all 179 active circuit judges. I'll go first.

1. Merrick Garland
Hamilton has fed to SCOTUS and, at the risk of ranking, maybe is the second most-prominent liberal judge in the Midwest after Diane Wood. Not saying much given the composition of 6/7/8, but a highly desirable clerkship and definitely not obscure. Scudder is a new appointee, so it's understandable to not be familiar with him, but if you just search his name on this forum you will find lots of laudatory praise. They're perfectly normal comparators for Grant or Newsom, who aren't particularly known for anything yet beyond picking up some of Kavanaugh's clerks after he was elevated (for the former) and an adventurous writing style (for the latter).
To be clear, I couldn't pick Grant or Newsom out of a lineup either and think I've only heard about them on here here. No offense intended to Hamilton or Scudder.

My somewhat sarcastically-made broader point was that aside from students currently applying for clerkships and appellate practitioners/nerds, individual circuit judges occupy very little space in the minds of practicing lawyers (even litigators like me). When hiring, I pay next to no attention to which judge you clerked for, unless it's one of the ones I clerked for. (To the extent you got a great clerkship because of great grades, I can see those. To the extent you got a great clerkship with sub-par grades, either there's something else special about you I can see, or you had a connection. In any event, I care far more about how you're going to be as a colleague at that point, which I assess based on your interview.)

I do think which judge you clerk for is vastly more important than what circuit you clerk on, but I also think it's not worth spending the time thinking about whether judge X, Y, or Z is the *most* prestigious/selective. Unless you've got a legit shot at SCOTUS (which very few do), it's far more important to focus on whether your judge is a good boss, a good career mentor, will take the time to help you develop good writing skills, will put you in touch with her/his network, etc.

(Not saying you disagree with any of this Iowahawk, just expanding because the reasoning underlying my sarcasm above wasn't exactly clear.)

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am

I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:35 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am
I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

Ugh I turned down a D.C. Circuit clerkship for a Ninth Circuit clerkship. I will forever regret this decision (95% joking).

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Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:50 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:35 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am
I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

Ugh I turned down a D.C. Circuit clerkship for a Ninth Circuit clerkship. I will forever regret this decision (95% joking).
#normalizeturningdownjudges

Anonymous User
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Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 3:40 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:50 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:35 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am
I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

Ugh I turned down a D.C. Circuit clerkship for a Ninth Circuit clerkship. I will forever regret this decision (95% joking).
#normalizeturningdownjudges
This. School clerkship offices will try to tell you that you can never turn down a judge, because when you do it looks bad for your school and may hurt their placement numbers over time. That is not your problem however. You shouldn't interview with (or ideally, even apply to) a judge that you don't want to work form, but if you get the wrong vibe during your interview you should walk away. I turned down an offer that didn't seem right for me and I have zero regrets about the decision.

Anonymous User
Posts: 428123
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 4:37 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 3:40 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:50 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:35 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am
I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

Ugh I turned down a D.C. Circuit clerkship for a Ninth Circuit clerkship. I will forever regret this decision (95% joking).
#normalizeturningdownjudges
This. School clerkship offices will try to tell you that you can never turn down a judge, because when you do it looks bad for your school and may hurt their placement numbers over time. That is not your problem however. You shouldn't interview with (or ideally, even apply to) a judge that you don't want to work form, but if you get the wrong vibe during your interview you should walk away. I turned down an offer that didn't seem right for me and I have zero regrets about the decision.
This especially isn't a thing with the Plan, right? I turned down two judges because I had three simultaneous offers, which I imagine is now pretty common because of the rush in June, and my clerkship office didn't care at all. And they're all supposed to keep offers open for 48 hours.

The ideal way to extricate yourself if you don't have a competing offer is to come up with some excuse to withdraw between the interview and the offer, though, to avoid violating the "norm." And generally if you get in a sticky situation with a judge I think you should ask your recommenders and clerkship office for help assuming that they're competent.
Last edited by Anonymous User on Thu Feb 11, 2021 4:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Anonymous User
Posts: 428123
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: Best and worst judges to clerk for

Post by Anonymous User » Thu Feb 11, 2021 4:43 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 3:40 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:50 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:35 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Feb 11, 2021 1:27 am
I agree that Circuit prestige is overblown, especially with regard to the 2nd, 7th, and 9th Circuits. In my observation, however, it is indeed real with regard to the DC Circuit and, in the more niche world of patent litigation, the Federal Circuit.

Ugh I turned down a D.C. Circuit clerkship for a Ninth Circuit clerkship. I will forever regret this decision (95% joking).
#normalizeturningdownjudges
This. School clerkship offices will try to tell you that you can never turn down a judge, because when you do it looks bad for your school and may hurt their placement numbers over time. That is not your problem however. You shouldn't interview with (or ideally, even apply to) a judge that you don't want to work form, but if you get the wrong vibe during your interview you should walk away. I turned down an offer that didn't seem right for me and I have zero regrets about the decision.
I was the above poster and I totally agree. I think that if you are honest with the judges about your preferences and handle the decision in a tactful way, you can turn down a judge without harming your school. But, if you tell a judge they are number one pick, and then turn down the offer, you are doing others a disservice.

Seriously? What are you waiting for?

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