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I had a question about law clerks receiving recruiting letters from firms. I was interning for a judge recently and the law clerks received a lot of recruiting letters from law firms.

I talked with other law clerks and they weren't getting as many or any letters.

How do law firms even get law clerks' names?
How do they decide whom to give the letters to?
Do recruiting letters mean anything in terms of actually showing that the firm might be interest in you? Or is it just like spam that really doesn't mean they're necessarily super interested in you?

Thanks.

Anonymous User wrote:I had a question about law clerks receiving recruiting letters from firms. I was interning for a judge recently and the law clerks received a lot of recruiting letters from law firms.

I talked with other law clerks and they weren't getting as many or any letters.

How do law firms even get law clerks' names?
How do they decide whom to give the letters to?
Do recruiting letters mean anything in terms of actually showing that the firm might be interest in you? Or is it just like spam that really doesn't mean they're necessarily super interested in you?

Thanks.

The letters go to "term clerk in Judge X's chambers." They don't need to know who you are, and it's spam.

(At least, the only ones I've received. For all I know, there may be a higher level of these things I'm not getting that are more personalized, especially if a firm has a personal connection to the judge. But I'd assume they're all spam. The amount of spam probably depends on the desirability of the position - I'm a district court clerk in flyover country, I'd imagine clerks for someone like Kozinski get a lot more letters.)

A. Nony Mouse wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:I had a question about law clerks receiving recruiting letters from firms. I was interning for a judge recently and the law clerks received a lot of recruiting letters from law firms.

I talked with other law clerks and they weren't getting as many or any letters.

How do law firms even get law clerks' names?
How do they decide whom to give the letters to?
Do recruiting letters mean anything in terms of actually showing that the firm might be interest in you? Or is it just like spam that really doesn't mean they're necessarily super interested in you?

Thanks.

The letters go to "term clerk in Judge X's chambers." They don't need to know who you are, and it's spam.

(At least, the only ones I've received. For all I know, there may be a higher level of these things I'm not getting that are more personalized, especially if a firm has a personal connection to the judge. But I'd assume they're all spam. The amount of spam probably depends on the desirability of the position - I'm a district court clerk in flyover country, I'd imagine clerks for someone like Kosinski get a lot more letters.)

Hmm, interesting. The letters I saw were all personalized.

The Second Circuit, at least, has a professional group, the Federal Bar Council, who publishes a reference book called the "Redbook," which lists not only the judges in every court in the Circuit and their biographies but also the names of their clerks. I imagine there are similar groups in other circuits, although the Second is obviously a big one.

Anonymous User wrote:Hmm, interesting. The letters I saw were all personalized.

Well, like I said, I'm in flyover country, so it just may be no one's been interested in finding out my name.

(There are other leadership directory-type things that provide clerks' names, too.)

(There are other leadership directory-type things that provide clerks' names, too.)

Yeah this

I think 9th cir clerks get a number of them

But I wouldn't know, I'm in flyover country too

Some districts also post the law clerks' names and schools on the judge's bio pages. And even if those letters are spam, it has to be a good sign that the firm isn't totally repulsed by the idea of hiring a clerk from that court, right?

nevdash wrote:Some districts also post the law clerks' names and schools on the judge's bio pages. And even if those letters are spam, it has to be a good sign that the firm isn't totally repulsed by the idea of hiring a clerk from that court, right?

Oh, definitely. I just called them spam because I never got any addressed to me, personally (and feel pretty sure they'd laugh at my application! But that's me, not the court ).

For the first time ever, I feel bad for NOT getting spam.

Maybe its because I started at a strange time of the year, but I didn't get a single letter in my D.Ct.