Profs for Clerkships/SCOTUS at YLS? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Anon so as to avoid providing too much info about myself given the focus on one school

Do we have any YLS people on this board? Does anyone know which profs are most connected at SCOTUS? Inspired by the SCOTUS clerk answering questions thread--there is some stuff about profs at other schools in that thread so I figured I'd start a new one. Helpful to know which classes to take, who to try RA for, etc. Obviously, inside info is best but hearsay/rumor is also ok. I know the big names people throw around are like Gerken, Amar, Eskridge and a few others. Is that right?

[Anonymous User]

Those names are right. Also Resnik, Gluck, Chua, Greenhouse.

FWIW, I would encourage you to think hard about whether it’s worth organizing your law school experience around pursuing SCOTUS. The great thing about YLS is that you can do pretty much whatever you want with your time. Going all in on SCOTUS has a high opportunity cost, and I didn’t think it was worth it. But if working as a RA to one or more of the connected professors is something you genuinely enjoy, that’s great.

[Anonymous User]

I appreciate that; it would only be a marginal consideration at best.

Those are the names I've heard in the past. I'm curious if anyone knows where this received wisdom comes from? I just wonder how to know if this is reliable--it seems like the kind of thing that could be a self-perpetuating rumor. But it also could be that these are the profs who the justices actually take phone calls from and trust. Unlikely that anyone will have concrete info, so mostly a shot in the dark here.

[Anonymous User]

I’m not sure what to tell you. Trust me? It’s a small community. Everyone knows who the major recommenders are. For some of them (Greenhouse), their close connection to SCOTUS is obvious from their bio. For others (Amar, Eskridge), you’ll pick up on the incessant name-dropping as soon as you hear them speak/teach.

[Anonymous User]

The above info is correct, but also, honestly...stop worrying about SCOTUS right now. I'm not sure whether you are a 1L or an incoming student, but it sounds like you don't have a good sense of how YLS works right now. The truth is that yes, the previously mentioned names are "big deals," but your grades will matter a ton as well. No point in incessantly strategizing your life around a gold star that you may not have a good shot at.

At risk of repeating myself, I STRONGLY encourage you to consider why you think a SCOTUS clerkship is so important to you. There are very, very few positions where being a SCOTUS clerk is critical to employment. Nearly every professor at YLS will be able to help you in getting a fantastic clerkship that you will learn a lot from. But I think spending your three years here trying to set yourself up for SCOTUS in particular (a very, very unlikely outcome) will leave you miserable. Figure out what is important to you, do that, and if it just so happens that you crush it at YLS, then maybe you'll have a shot.

[Anonymous User]

Former YLS and SCOTUS clerk here. (Mods are welcome to contact me to verify this, but for obvious reasons, I am going to be vague about anything personally identifying beyond that I went to YLS and clerked for a feeder judge.)

I was not the OP of the original SCOTUS clerk thread but agree with almost all of what he/she said, including about the YLS process. More the anything, the important thing to remember is that getting a SCOTUS clerkship is 9/10ths luck. All but the most arrogant clerk recognizes the long odds they faced and the immensely great fortune they had in winning the SCOTUS lottery. Despite this, I think most clerks would say that there are few things they would have done differently even if they hadn't gotten the clerkship in the end, because the reality is that the reasons most of us wanted the job of SCOTUS clerk are the same reasons why we did the resume-building activities that positioned us for it in the first place: we love reading case law (and legal scholarship), debating open-ended legal issues, and developing novel arguments about important legal questions of first impression. As the OP of the original SCOTUS clerk thread intimated, shaping one's life choices in law school in pursuit of a possible SCOTUS clerkship is a bit like Don Quixote tilting at windmills: you'd be best advised to enjoy the adventure along the way, regardless of whether you slay the dragon in the end.

So, with that (giant) caveat out of the way, to the degree one can shape one's chances, you have to be extremely smart, extremely hard working, and -- this is important but something that is often overlooked -- extremely good at burnishing your reputation among your peers and professors. SCOTUS hiring is more social than you might expect, and it is not unheard of for a Justice to contact nearly every single professor on a student's transcript to ask about them. Some even ask their trusted colleagues to ask the people they know about the applicant in the event the colleagues don't know the applicant themselves. Think of this as "extreme vetting" on steroids. This is especially true of YLS applicants given the -ahem- opaque nature of the grading system.

I cannot speak for every clerk ever hired, but in my knowledge and experience, the proximate cause for most hiring is not, in fact, law professors. Rather, it's an applicant's lower court judge(s); a well connected former boss (such as a senator or the Solicitor General in the case of Bristow Fellows); a social network (i.e., FedSoc in the case of some of the conservative justices); or a family friend or other connection from one's pre-law school past. Indeed, the nomenclature "feeder" judge is not misplaced. Having gone through the process myself, and having clerked for such a "feeder" judge, I was surprised to realize just how savvy and influential the handful of "feeder" lower court judges are at positioning their clerks to be favorably considered by the Justices. It is no accident that some judges have dozens of former clerks who have clerked on the Court - those judges are passionate and zealous advocates for their former clerks and they put a lot of effort and energy into helping them in their careers. (And for that same reason, even if a SCOTUS clerkship doesn't work out, clerking for a "feeder" judge will help you pursue other terrific legal opportunities, because those judges are generally amazingly devoted to helping their former clerks develop professionally.)

So in that sense, I would say the approach of thinking about which recommenders to pursue for a potential SCOTUS application is putting the cart before the horse. The professors have much more influence in aiding your application to feeder judges than to the Justices, so to the degree they can be most helpful to you, it's first and foremost in helping you get hired by lower court judges. And note that many (though not all) SCOTUS clerks these days will have done two clerkships before they start at One First, either two appellate clerkships or, more common these days, a circuit and a district clerkship. (This is generally truer for clerks hired by center and left Justices than some of the conservative Justices.)

With that being said, I *still* would advise against seeking out mentors at YLS for the sole reason of chasing a SCOTUS clerkship. The folks OP and others have mentioned are brilliant, thoughtful, and wonderful mentors; they are also smart and savvy and can discern when a prospective mentee is simply angling for a recommendation letter. And this is just as true for anything else one wants to pursue in life as it is for a SCOTUS clerkship application. It also, in my opinion, severely misses the point. To the degree you have the chance to hear Greenhouse read the tea leaves about likely origins of a surprising recent SCOTUS decision; Amar recite lengthy, novel constitutional arguments off the top of his head; Eskridge perform his imitations of Scalia and Guido; or Resnik rattle off every gaping inconsistency in the Court's federal jurisdiction jurisprudence at 150 words per minute, you should avail yourself of those opportunities because they're terrific opportunities in and of themselves -- not because they will yield a recommendation letter. The farther out of law school I get, the more appreciative I am of the opportunities YLS affords you while you are there. It's truly like drinking from a fire hose of brilliant (thought sometimes self-important) legal minds.

One other thing that both relaxes and elevates the stakes: most of the aforementioned professors are, as Dean Gerken has said in public settings, "vicious meritocrats." They're not just going to recommend you because you took a class with them and said something memorable once during a cold-call. Almost all of them shadow grade with great specificity, so you need to ace their exams, write papers that make genuinely novel contributions to the field, or produce RA work that can be directly imported into their latest book or article because it's that good. I have read a number of recommendation letters from most of the aforementioned professors, and almost all of those letters also speak heavily to an applicant's social and collegial qualities as well, so it's not just about being a law robot, but being a likeable, personable law robot. Probably the best (and yet totally unhelpful) advice is that of a well known philosopher when asked how to achieve success in their field: "be brilliant."

One additional but important thing to remember: these professors are, first and foremost, humans. What I mean by that is that they have their own personality quirks, particular proclivities, and obscure passions. You may not hit it off with a particular professor that your classmate does, and vice versa -- and that's ok! No one is entitled to a mentor relationship, and trying to force a square peg in a round hole is uncomfortable for both the peg and the hole. But also remember that while almost every applicant needs at least one well connected recommender to get their application noticed for any given opportunity, some of the most zealous recommenders and thoughtful mentors in 127 Wall St. are not the fanciest names. More than anything, I would encourage OP (and other readers) to avail themselves of as many opportunities to get to know as many faculty as possible, not simply because faculty X will give them the best chance at credential Y, but because the knowledge, experience, and passion in that building is so vast, one would be well advised to soak up as much of it as possible in the three years you're there. If you do that, a possible SCOTUS clerkship will be icing on what is already a very outstanding cake.

I am happy to take further questions, but as I said at the outset, I am not going to say anything that would tend to identify myself, and beyond the level of details provided in this post, I will not go into detail about how one might try to work with any given professor. (Among other things, to paraphrase Kant, people should be treated not as means to an end but as ends in themselves.) And I should also warn that I may be slow to respond. Thanks!

[Anonymous User]

I’m the poster who provided the additional faculty names. As context, I’m a YLS alum currently clerking for a feeder judge. I haven’t applied to SCOTUS and don’t plan to. As should be self-evident, the above answer is excellent. I gave you the names because when I was entering YLS, I certainly wanted to know who the top recommenders were. But having been through the YLS experience, I highly encourage you to cultivate the mentality that the above poster describes. It’s the healthy approach.

[nixy]

SCOTUS clerk, thank you for posting that - it was really great (and fascinating even for someone like myself, who's never going to clerk for SCOTUS).

[Anonymous User]

Former YLS and SCOTUS clerk here. (Mods are welcome to contact me to verify this, but for obvious reasons, I am going to be vague about anything personally identifying beyond that I went to YLS and clerked for a feeder judge.)

I was not the OP of the original SCOTUS clerk thread but agree with almost all of what he/she said, including about the YLS process. More the anything, the important thing to remember is that getting a SCOTUS clerkship is 9/10ths luck. All but the most arrogant clerk recognizes the long odds they faced and the immensely great fortune they had in winning the SCOTUS lottery. Despite this, I think most clerks would say that there are few things they would have done differently even if they hadn't gotten the clerkship in the end, because the reality is that the reasons most of us wanted the job of SCOTUS clerk are the same reasons why we did the resume-building activities that positioned us for it in the first place: we love reading case law (and legal scholarship), debating open-ended legal issues, and developing novel arguments about important legal questions of first impression. As the OP of the original SCOTUS clerk thread intimated, shaping one's life choices in law school in pursuit of a possible SCOTUS clerkship is a bit like Don Quixote tilting at windmills: you'd be best advised to enjoy the adventure along the way, regardless of whether you slay the dragon in the end.

So, with that (giant) caveat out of the way, to the degree one can shape one's chances, you have to be extremely smart, extremely hard working, and -- this is important but something that is often overlooked -- extremely good at burnishing your reputation among your peers and professors. SCOTUS hiring is more social than you might expect, and it is not unheard of for a Justice to contact nearly every single professor on a student's transcript to ask about them. Some even ask their trusted colleagues to ask the people they know about the applicant in the event the colleagues don't know the applicant themselves. Think of this as "extreme vetting" on steroids. This is especially true of YLS applicants given the -ahem- opaque nature of the grading system.

I cannot speak for every clerk ever hired, but in my knowledge and experience, the proximate cause for most hiring is not, in fact, law professors. Rather, it's an applicant's lower court judge(s); a well connected former boss (such as a senator or the Solicitor General in the case of Bristow Fellows); a social network (i.e., FedSoc in the case of some of the conservative justices); or a family friend or other connection from one's pre-law school past. Indeed, the nomenclature "feeder" judge is not misplaced. Having gone through the process myself, and having clerked for such a "feeder" judge, I was surprised to realize just how savvy and influential the handful of "feeder" lower court judges are at positioning their clerks to be favorably considered by the Justices. It is no accident that some judges have dozens of former clerks who have clerked on the Court - those judges are passionate and zealous advocates for their former clerks and they put a lot of effort and energy into helping them in their careers. (And for that same reason, even if a SCOTUS clerkship doesn't work out, clerking for a "feeder" judge will help you pursue other terrific legal opportunities, because those judges are generally amazingly devoted to helping their former clerks develop professionally.)

So in that sense, I would say the approach of thinking about which recommenders to pursue for a potential SCOTUS application is putting the cart before the horse. The professors have much more influence in aiding your application to feeder judges than to the Justices, so to the degree they can be most helpful to you, it's first and foremost in helping you get hired by lower court judges. And note that many (though not all) SCOTUS clerks these days will have done two clerkships before they start at One First, either two appellate clerkships or, more common these days, a circuit and a district clerkship. (This is generally truer for clerks hired by center and left Justices than some of the conservative Justices.)

With that being said, I *still* would advise against seeking out mentors at YLS for the sole reason of chasing a SCOTUS clerkship. The folks OP and others have mentioned are brilliant, thoughtful, and wonderful mentors; they are also smart and savvy and can discern when a prospective mentee is simply angling for a recommendation letter. And this is just as true for anything else one wants to pursue in life as it is for a SCOTUS clerkship application. It also, in my opinion, severely misses the point. To the degree you have the chance to hear Greenhouse read the tea leaves about likely origins of a surprising recent SCOTUS decision; Amar recite lengthy, novel constitutional arguments off the top of his head; Eskridge perform his imitations of Scalia and Guido; or Resnik rattle off every gaping inconsistency in the Court's federal jurisdiction jurisprudence at 150 words per minute, you should avail yourself of those opportunities because they're terrific opportunities in and of themselves -- not because they will yield a recommendation letter. The farther out of law school I get, the more appreciative I am of the opportunities YLS affords you while you are there. It's truly like drinking from a fire hose of brilliant (thought sometimes self-important) legal minds.

One other thing that both relaxes and elevates the stakes: most of the aforementioned professors are, as Dean Gerken has said in public settings, "vicious meritocrats." They're not just going to recommend you because you took a class with them and said something memorable once during a cold-call. Almost all of them shadow grade with great specificity, so you need to ace their exams, write papers that make genuinely novel contributions to the field, or produce RA work that can be directly imported into their latest book or article because it's that good. I have read a number of recommendation letters from most of the aforementioned professors, and almost all of those letters also speak heavily to an applicant's social and collegial qualities as well, so it's not just about being a law robot, but being a likeable, personable law robot. Probably the best (and yet totally unhelpful) advice is that of a well known philosopher when asked how to achieve success in their field: "be brilliant."

One additional but important thing to remember: these professors are, first and foremost, humans. What I mean by that is that they have their own personality quirks, particular proclivities, and obscure passions. You may not hit it off with a particular professor that your classmate does, and vice versa -- and that's ok! No one is entitled to a mentor relationship, and trying to force a square peg in a round hole is uncomfortable for both the peg and the hole. But also remember that while almost every applicant needs at least one well connected recommender to get their application noticed for any given opportunity, some of the most zealous recommenders and thoughtful mentors in 127 Wall St. are not the fanciest names. More than anything, I would encourage OP (and other readers) to avail themselves of as many opportunities to get to know as many faculty as possible, not simply because faculty X will give them the best chance at credential Y, but because the knowledge, experience, and passion in that building is so vast, one would be well advised to soak up as much of it as possible in the three years you're there. If you do that, a possible SCOTUS clerkship will be icing on what is already a very outstanding cake.

I am happy to take further questions, but as I said at the outset, I am not going to say anything that would tend to identify myself, and beyond the level of details provided in this post, I will not go into detail about how one might try to work with any given professor. (Among other things, to paraphrase Kant, people should be treated not as means to an end but as ends in themselves.) And I should also warn that I may be slow to respond. Thanks!

As another YLS grad, this is a lovely sentiment but also total bullshit. "Vicious meritocrats"? YLS SCOTUS clerks are "extremely good at burnishing your reputation among your peers"? "We love reading case law (and legal scholarship), debating open-ended legal issues, and developing novel arguments about important legal questions of first impression?" Come on.

There are many kind, smart YLS students who clerk on SCOTUS, but many (arguably most) are complete assholes who strive for the gold star. While some are brilliant, most just know how to play the game. As for likeability, some of the least liked students among their peers were the first to get those clerkships by sucking up to the aforementioned professors or being a speechwriter for Dean Post. The amount of ass-kissing bordered on comical. And it was surely a meritocratic coincidence that those were overwhelmingly white men.

I'm sure it was also a coincidence that many of those who had "great mentoring relationships" with those profs were already well-connected before they set foot at YLS, from being politically connected or even the child of a faculty member (how meritocratic can you get?). I can't even count the number of times I heard professors and (often wealthy) students bond over the dinners they had at "Hillary's house" or the like.

And let's be real, unless you're sucking up to Amar, no one wants to watch him masturbate over...I mean, lecture on...his pet theories in the dining hall. Eskridge's anecdotes can be amusing, but he is also a pompous jerk who plays favorites from the word "go." Greenhouse and Resnik are great (unless you're RA'ing for the latter).

I'm glad this poster made it to where he/she wants to be, but let's cut the bullshit that most YLS SCOTUS clerks got there by "being brilliant" at anything but exploiting their privilege and networking.

[Anonymous User]

As another YLS grad, this is a lovely sentiment but also total bullshit. "Vicious meritocrats"? YLS SCOTUS clerks are "extremely good at burnishing your reputation among your peers"? "We love reading case law (and legal scholarship), debating open-ended legal issues, and developing novel arguments about important legal questions of first impression?" Come on. . . .

As another former YLS/SCOTUS clerk lurking around here, I actually could not agree more w/ the sentiment expressed by the first clerk. I think there's very little to add to their spot-on take about how to approach the three years there or any other law school.

I will say to the person above that it's pretty easy to feel jaded about the entire experience and think that the way people get to this is by "exploiting their privilege and networking." There's certainly an aspect of that--sometime explicit (say a parent is fancy lawyer/judge/prof) and sometimes just general compounding structural privilege--but there are also checks. Having gone through both sides of the hiring process for a SCOTUS clerkship and feeder clerkships, there is a ton of reaching out to not just non-recommender professors but also peers (it gets to quickly be a small world when you think of all the people you cross paths with in law school, college, internships, conferences, etc.). You pretty quickly get a sense of who is a jerk and gunner and who genuinely is excited about this stuff. It's hard to overstate how many of the former get weeded out personality alone. That isn't to a say some jerks don't get through but usually it's because--despite being a jerk--their own classmates are left to begrudgingly admit that they are just THAT good. Of course, if I totally had my way, we'd always ding those people but it really is a surprisingly small group of people who get through this way.

If all that can be converted into any practical advice, it's just to echo the point made by the prior clerk that they way to get ahead at a place like YLS is by really trying to pursue your genuine interests, work hard, and be decent to the people around you. It may sound like naive advice but it really is the secret sauce for most people.

[Anonymous User]

I'm neither YLS nor a SCOTUS feeder clerk, but worked at an "elite" (W&C/Susman/WLRK/MTO) firm which had a decent number of SCOTUS clerks and also many more YLS grads. (This is an aside- designed to establish the basis for knowledge, not to talk about any firm's merits in particular)

The point is:

I can't speak to anything other than that I had friends/colleagues who were YLS alumni who had current clerks reach out to see if the applicant under consideration was a nice person. Don't know which justices or which applicants, or how seriously it was taken - but even three years out - it can still matter (apparently).

[Anonymous User]

Since we're on a similar subject, what is the value of YLJ, both instrumentally (below the level of EIC) and as a way to spend one's time at YLS?

[Anonymous User]

Question for former SCOTUS clerk (and others who can weigh in): I am now 2 years out of YLS/HLS. I've clerked for 2 semi-feeders (both feed occasionally, but not at Garland level) and I have pending apps at the Court. Both my judges wrote LORs for me and are making calls. My "well-connected" profs will also make calls. I am starting at a firm soon, and the firm has a number of former SCOTUS clerks.

Is there anything I can do over the next months/years to improve my chances? Like publishing a law review article? Conversely, is there anything that would hurt my chances? Would public commentary about legal issues (including current/future SCOTUS cases) hurt?

[mjb447]

SCOTUS clerk, thank you for posting that - it was really great (and fascinating even for someone like myself, who's never going to clerk for SCOTUS).

+1.

[Anonymous User]

Since we're on a similar subject, what is the value of YLJ, both instrumentally (below the level of EIC) and as a way to spend one's time at YLS?

Original YLS/SCOTUS poster here. In law school I was in the camp of people who thought the prestige value of YLJ was a bit overrated and was a touch scornful of those who sought it out just to burnish their CV. You probably know the arguments for and against joining for that reason, so I will just touch on the more substantive reasons. In retrospect, I think there are several benefits I did not fully appreciate at the time, most of which, to a greater or lesser degree, one can also obtain from serving in a board position on a specialized journal:

1. Deeply internalize bluebook rules and learn how to be a nit-picky proofreader. This is a supremely useful skill as both a practitioner in drafting or litigation work and as a law clerk at all levels in the federal judiciary. One does not have to serve on a law journal to learn the bluebook well or enhance their capacity to proofread closely and carefully, but let's just say one gets a lot of practice doing it when they're spending hours and hours per week in a carrel on L3 checking and rechecking 40 footnotes and accompanying text. Ceteris paribus, I have found that lawyers who have served on law journals are more reliable bluebookers and proofreaders/editors than are those who have not, though self-selection might be doing much of the work. Nevertheless, I know that I personally internalized the rules much more closely as a result of my time spent on a journal, and it's a CV mark that I have found relatively reliably signals someone who will make the effort to get the tiniest details right. At a place like YLS where big abstract (somewhat imprecise) ideas often overshadow the picayune details of legal craftsmanship, it's perhaps salutary that one of the most "prestigious" activities rewards pedantic perfection.

2. Understand how to develop and communicate original and novel long-form legal arguments. If you serve in a substantive senior role on either YLJ or a specialized journal (i.e., Articles or Notes editor, lead submissions editors, etc.), you read a lot of legal scholarship and understand how to communicate a new and important legal idea relatively succinctly (in the abstract and introduction), as well as how to develop that idea deeply in 50-90 pages, anticipating counterarguments and extrapolating how that idea could be applied to future cases/issues. If you're a leader editor, you get to work with the authors directly, and many authors are eager for LEs to make surprisingly substantive suggestions that may involve reframing or expanding an entire section of a piece. I wrote a note/comment in law school and I am almost as proud of an article I LE'd on the journal I was on as I am of my own note/comment, because the author was amenable to, and incorporated, so many of my ideas. They have since become something of a minor mentor to me, as I have gone on to do work in the author's main scholarly field. And of course, if one is interested in academia down the road, there is probably no better extra-curricular at YLS than serving as an EIC, EE, or Articles Editor. Again, the same opportunities avail on specialized journals, with the caveat that the quality of the source material you work with will generally not be quite as high as on YLJ.

3. Perks. This may seem silly, but it can matter, especially given the dearth of fun around the law school in the cold winter months. YLJ had a lot of money when I was there, which meant the journal had fancy launch parties with free cocktails and appetizers at a high-end bar; two terrific banquets per year; the flag football games vs. HLR during The Game weekend at the annual Bluebook invitational; and regular weekly lower-key breakfasts and happy hours with free food and drinks. But once again, being on YLJ is not the only way to achieve this: lots of non-YLJ members are invited to partake in the launch parties and banquets, and YLJ is hardly the only journal with terrific socializing opportunities (i.e., the JREGGER Keggers).

4. The Alumni Network. YLJ hosts annual happy hours in major cities like NYC and DC, where they welcome newly admitted 2Ls and 3L senior editors to meet with alumni former members. This might seem like a minor footnote, but it can be a surprisingly lovely way to catch up with friends and meet alums from other generations of YLS in a low-key setting. Many alums are generally busy people with limited time to socialized outside of work, and so the YLJ alumni events can serve as a gathering opportunity. It is also not super uncommon for a connection between a recent and older alum at the alumni happy hour to result in a subsequent coffee or lunch where there is a mutual overlap in work/interest/etc. As anyone who goes to or went to YLS knows, a lot of us are pretty dang awkward human beings, so some free food, alcohol, and a nominal rationale for getting together can grease the wheels of casual conversation and mutual exchange. Of course, YLS hosts similar events in most major U.S. cities, so once again, YLJ is not the exclusive avenue here either.

---

My over-under is that there is immense value in doing at least one clinic and at least one journal, and that it may be difficult to fully invest in both the most time-consuming clinics (like WIRAC) and the most time-consuming journals (like YLJ), especially if you want to lead an affinity group or serve as a Coker. So, one way to approach this decision calculus could be to identify which kinds of opportunities are most important to you, and then prioritize accordingly. I personally found it a bit off-putting that YLJ was held in such high esteem compared to most of the clinic opportunities, even though the latter almost always better prepare students to become top-notch lawyers. But I also found the YLJ vs. LSO culture war dichotomy to be a bit silly and overplayed, since there was absolutely no reason why these had to be mutually exclusive opportunities. My advice is dive into some version of both journals and clinics!

All of that said, regardless of whether you have a deep desire to serve on YLJ, and assuming the write-on process still begins with a timed "spot the errors" bluebook exam, I would recommend every student take the exam. (Provided, of course, that they have any interest in working as a lawyer after law school -- an important caveat at someplace like YLS!) There is no better opportunity to be motivated to learn the bluebook and to have so many 2Ls and 3Ls willingly take their time to guide you through it. If not now, when will you ever learn it?

[Anonymous User]

Question for former SCOTUS clerk (and others who can weigh in): I am now 2 years out of YLS/HLS. I've clerked for 2 semi-feeders (both feed occasionally, but not at Garland level) and I have pending apps at the Court. Both my judges wrote LORs for me and are making calls. My "well-connected" profs will also make calls. I am starting at a firm soon, and the firm has a number of former SCOTUS clerks.

Is there anything I can do over the next months/years to improve my chances? Like publishing a law review article? Conversely, is there anything that would hurt my chances? Would public commentary about legal issues (including current/future SCOTUS cases) hurt?

Original former YLS/SCOTUS here. First of all, congratulations! You are an in an enviable position and are lucky to have so many well-positioned mentors eager to support your application. There is probably a limited amount you will want to divulge anonymously in this forum, and I know there is a limited amount I want to share about the specifics of any given Justice's hiring process! (I am not revealing super secret information in noting that the Justices' hiring processes can be very different.) Needless to say, the best advice you can get will be tailored to your specific circumstances, for which this public forum is not the place.

Broadly speaking, however, if you have not already been advised to do this, you may want to discuss with your mentors (and, eventually, the former SCOTUS clerks at your new firm) to which of the Justices you and your recommenders' efforts should be prioritized. My understanding was that when SOC was an active justice on the Court she implemented a rule that she would not hire a clerk who did not apply to all Nine; as the then-swing Justice who regularly hired clerks of all ideological stripes, this was both to her benefit and the Court's. I gather that when this rule was in full force, it was more common for applicants to put their efforts into most or all chambers relatively equally. These days, the Court is more divided and the hiring process is more fragmented. Many have succeeded in the post-SOC process by identifying which Justice or handful of Justices are most likely to take an interest in their application and try to ascertain when that Justice is beginning to do hiring, when calls will be most useful, etc. If I remember correctly, in the original SCOTUS clerk thread the "OG" SCOTUS clerk talked about this quite a bit, so I recommend rereading that thread start to finish, as it was very on point.

In terms of what else to do, first and foremost, I would say enjoy your life and appreciate the fruits of your multi-year labors! You worked for what I will assume are two great bosses and now-lifelong mentors, and you're joining a firm where you will be making beaucoups bucks working with folks who at the top of their legal games. Regardless of what happens with your application to the Court, you will likely be doing work that is not a step function different from the work one would be doing returning to the same firm coming off a SCOTUS clerkship. And you'll be doing it against the backdrop of 35+ million Americans who have suddenly found themselves unemployed, including, unfortunately, an increasing number of lawyers, to say nothing of the horrific effects of the pandemic itself. So if you win the SCOTUS lottery, it is even more icing on your cake. If you do not, your cake is already as sweet as most Americans' icing, moreso now than ever. Try to remember that, and enjoy it! (Needless to say, this advice applies not just to SCOTUS applicants but to many of us lawyers who can ably work from home while collecting six-figure paychecks.)

I raise this platitude not to scold or sound high-minded, but because waiting and hoping for a phone call inviting you for an interview can easily take over your mental space if you let it. Many clerks did not succeed on their first or second applications to the Court, and some clerks interviewed with more than one Justice before they were lucky to secure a position. Prepare for the possibility that this could be a multi-year, multi-application process, and adjust your expectations and psyche accordingly. In my opinion, it should not be how you organize your daily or weekly activities, and it should not be something you give much energy to apart from the windows in the year where you think there is a decent probability your target Justice(s) may be hiring. But this is much easier said than done. I did not go to law school dreaming of SCOTUS, nor did I have serious expectations that it would work out when I applied. Despite this, I was surprised to find that the application process took over my mental space in a quasi-detrimental way for a decent stretch of time. That was (almost) entirely in my control, and in retrospect, I could have managed it better. One straightforward way to do that is to zoom out and remember that you're a credible applicant precisely because you have already achieved so much and have a lot to be proud of and grateful for, regardless of what happens.

Along similar lines, if you have a spouse/partner/kids/other family members whose lives will be significantly upturned if your application is successful, and if you have not already done so, I would recommend raising this with them now, and also acknowledging and voicing appreciation for what they are agreeing to sign up for if your application is successful. Particularly if you do not already live in D.C., winning the SCOTUS lottery ticket will entail 2-3 years of significant life disruption, since these days many clerks are hired 1-2 years out. Although SCOTUS spouses get to run in rarified air the year their partner is clerking at the Court, I think most SCOTUS spouses deserve even more recognition than they get, because many have had to put up with multiple job relocations, thin paycheck years, and absentee-spouses for many nights and weekends -- both during the clerkship year and before it. Particularly for the non-lawyer spouses, this can be a meaningful sacrifice that deserves recognition and acknowledgement, because not all professions kneel in genuflection at the prestigious feet of a (relatively) low-paid term clerk! (And at least the spouses of ER doctors can say their sacrifices are literally in the furtherance of saving lives!) The clerks are also necessarily pretty dull and uninteresting partners during their year at the Court, because most interesting work that they do at the Court is confidential, and the hours in most chambers are long. Not only did I not not fully internalize the significance of all this when I applied, but I also did not appreciate that there can be a fleetingly short window of time between when an applicant gets an interview call and when they interview and (if they are lucky) get offered the job, so laying the groundwork for the possibility of a relatively abrupt change of life plans now may be prudent, at the time you get an interview invitation if not before.

Finally, to end on a more prosaic note, if you think you have a novel intervention into an ongoing legal issue/area of doctrine, write scholarship. If you think you have something to add to our (increasingly degraded) public forum, write an op-ed. For either, proofread it as if you are reading it out loud to whichever Justices you hope to work for. If that notion does not make you at all uncomfortable, you'll be smooth sailing with whatever you write. But given your other already sterling credentials and eager recommenders, even a well received piece will probably only move the needle marginally at best, so I would only apply my energy in that way if I had an independent desire to do so. Good luck!

[Anonymous User]

Question for former SCOTUS clerk (and others who can weigh in): I am now 2 years out of YLS/HLS. I've clerked for 2 semi-feeders (both feed occasionally, but not at Garland level) and I have pending apps at the Court. Both my judges wrote LORs for me and are making calls. My "well-connected" profs will also make calls. I am starting at a firm soon, and the firm has a number of former SCOTUS clerks.

Is there anything I can do over the next months/years to improve my chances? Like publishing a law review article? Conversely, is there anything that would hurt my chances? Would public commentary about legal issues (including current/future SCOTUS cases) hurt?

Original former YLS/SCOTUS here. First of all, congratulations! You are an in an enviable position and are lucky to have so many well-positioned mentors eager to support your application. There is probably a limited amount you will want to divulge anonymously in this forum, and I know there is a limited amount I want to share about the specifics of any given Justice's hiring process! (I am not revealing super secret information in noting that the Justices' hiring processes can be very different.) Needless to say, the best advice you can get will be tailored to your specific circumstances, for which this public forum is not the place.

Broadly speaking, however, if you have not already been advised to do this, you may want to discuss with your mentors (and, eventually, the former SCOTUS clerks at your new firm) to which of the Justices you and your recommenders' efforts should be prioritized. My understanding was that when SOC was an active justice on the Court she implemented a rule that she would not hire a clerk who did not apply to all Nine; as the then-swing Justice who regularly hired clerks of all ideological stripes, this was both to her benefit and the Court's. I gather that when this rule was in full force, it was more common for applicants to put their efforts into most or all chambers relatively equally. These days, the Court is more divided and the hiring process is more fragmented. Many have succeeded in the post-SOC process by identifying which Justice or handful of Justices are most likely to take an interest in their application and try to ascertain when that Justice is beginning to do hiring, when calls will be most useful, etc. If I remember correctly, in the original SCOTUS clerk thread the "OG" SCOTUS clerk talked about this quite a bit, so I recommend rereading that thread start to finish, as it was very on point.

In terms of what else to do, first and foremost, I would say enjoy your life and appreciate the fruits of your multi-year labors! You worked for what I will assume are two great bosses and now-lifelong mentors, and you're joining a firm where you will be making beaucoups bucks working with folks who at the top of their legal games. Regardless of what happens with your application to the Court, you will likely be doing work that is not a step function different from the work one would be doing returning to the same firm coming off a SCOTUS clerkship. And you'll be doing it against the backdrop of 35+ million Americans who have suddenly found themselves unemployed, including, unfortunately, an increasing number of lawyers, to say nothing of the horrific effects of the pandemic itself. So if you win the SCOTUS lottery, it is even more icing on your cake. If you do not, your cake is already as sweet as most Americans' icing, moreso now than ever. Try to remember that, and enjoy it! (Needless to say, this advice applies not just to SCOTUS applicants but to many of us lawyers who can ably work from home while collecting six-figure paychecks.)

I raise this platitude not to scold or sound high-minded, but because waiting and hoping for a phone call inviting you for an interview can easily take over your mental space if you let it. Many clerks did not succeed on their first or second applications to the Court, and some clerks interviewed with more than one Justice before they were lucky to secure a position. Prepare for the possibility that this could be a multi-year, multi-application process, and adjust your expectations and psyche accordingly. In my opinion, it should not be how you organize your daily or weekly activities, and it should not be something you give much energy to apart from the windows in the year where you think there is a decent probability your target Justice(s) may be hiring. But this is much easier said than done. I did not go to law school dreaming of SCOTUS, nor did I have serious expectations that it would work out when I applied. Despite this, I was surprised to find that the application process took over my mental space in a quasi-detrimental way for a decent stretch of time. That was (almost) entirely in my control, and in retrospect, I could have managed it better. One straightforward way to do that is to zoom out and remember that you're a credible applicant precisely because you have already achieved so much and have a lot to be proud of and grateful for, regardless of what happens.

Along similar lines, if you have a spouse/partner/kids/other family members whose lives will be significantly upturned if your application is successful, and if you have not already done so, I would recommend raising this with them now, and also acknowledging and voicing appreciation for what they are agreeing to sign up for if your application is successful. Particularly if you do not already live in D.C., winning the SCOTUS lottery ticket will entail 2-3 years of significant life disruption, since these days many clerks are hired 1-2 years out. Although SCOTUS spouses get to run in rarified air the year their partner is clerking at the Court, I think most SCOTUS spouses deserve even more recognition than they get, because many have had to put up with multiple job relocations, thin paycheck years, and absentee-spouses for many nights and weekends -- both during the clerkship year and before it. Particularly for the non-lawyer spouses, this can be a meaningful sacrifice that deserves recognition and acknowledgement, because not all professions kneel in genuflection at the prestigious feet of a (relatively) low-paid term clerk! (And at least the spouses of ER doctors can say their sacrifices are literally in the furtherance of saving lives!) The clerks are also necessarily pretty dull and uninteresting partners during their year at the Court, because most interesting work that they do at the Court is confidential, and the hours in most chambers are long. Not only did I not not fully internalize the significance of all this when I applied, but I also did not appreciate that there can be a fleetingly short window of time between when an applicant gets an interview call and when they interview and (if they are lucky) get offered the job, so laying the groundwork for the possibility of a relatively abrupt change of life plans now may be prudent, at the time you get an interview invitation if not before.

Finally, to end on a more prosaic note, if you think you have a novel intervention into an ongoing legal issue/area of doctrine, write scholarship. If you think you have something to add to our (increasingly degraded) public forum, write an op-ed. For either, proofread it as if you are reading it out loud to whichever Justices you hope to work for. If that notion does not make you at all uncomfortable, you'll be smooth sailing with whatever you write. But given your other already sterling credentials and eager recommenders, even a well received piece will probably only move the needle marginally at best, so I would only apply my energy in that way if I had an independent desire to do so. Good luck!

Thank you so much for this thoughtful and insightful post (as well as your detailed and comprehensive answers to others on this thread). There are so few people in this (exceedingly privileged) position, so it is so helpful to hear from someone who has been through the process. I have felt I really had no one to talk to about all this. And your advice about significant others in particularly well-taken, and something that I will keep in mind going forward. Thanks again for your help.

[Anonymous User]

To the former SCOTUS clerk: Thank you for all your insight, in this thread and several others. It is invaluable.

When do justices typically interview? For example, is hiring currently happening for OT 2021, or has it been wrapped up? I've been told that a lot of hiring happens in June/July, but is that not the busiest time at the Court? And if you have any conjecture about how COVID will change hiring, I would love to hear it.

[Anonymous User]

To the former SCOTUS clerk: Thank you for all your insight, in this thread and several others. It is invaluable.

When do justices typically interview? For example, is hiring currently happening for OT 2021, or has it been wrapped up? I've been told that a lot of hiring happens in June/July, but is that not the busiest time at the Court? And if you have any conjecture about how COVID will change hiring, I would love to hear it.

Original former YLS/SCOTUS here. Very glad it's helpful, and as someone earlier in this thread said, there's so much cloak and daggers around this that it's often hard to find good information... and speaking of which, how the Justices hire is one of the most cloak and daggers part of it all, because it's so important to a successful application and yet should in theory be the most straightforward part of the process.

In the interests of preserving anonymity, I will be pretty vague and will not say anything about any particular Justice, but their hiring practices vary significantly from Justice to Justice and even year to year. Some Justices generally only like to hire one year out, then suddenly hire two years out. Some Justices typically hire in the spring but then suddenly hire in the fall one year and do that for several years before changing back to the spring. To my knowledge, only a few chambers have a relatively consistent hiring systems that are maintained year to year - one commences in early fall and leads to interviews/offers in the Thanksgiving to Christmas stretch, and another typically commences in the spring and leads to interviews at the end of June. To the degree there is any critical mass of hiring, historically it has very often the case that multiple Justices are doing interviews at the end of June, and in the past that has often been the last week of the term.

To operationalize this for the purposes of an applicant to the Court, this is where feeder judges and other well connected recommenders are so crucial - they will often have inside info on when a particular Justice is getting ready to hire. That's when calls, emails, etc., can be most useful. In some chambers, the clerks are very involved in this process so knowing a current or recent clerk can also be very useful. (As the other YLS/SCOTUS on this thread alluded to, in some chambers the clerks are involved in the "is this person a jerk? screening process.)

I'm afraid there's no insider knowledge I can divulge re: COVID hiring. That said, I know of at least two instances in which prospective clerks were hired by Justices on the basis of non face-to-face interviews, so it was not unprecedented even in pre-COVID times. As with everything about the Nine, I imagine how COVID hiring will work will vary from chambers; I can imagine several Justices who would probably really hope to conduct in-person interviews and wait a while if necessary to be able to do so, while I can also imagine several who would not be fussed at all about hiring over zoom. Once you see how varied the hiring practices are across chambers, you realize it really isn't applying to "the Court" as much as it is to nine very different individuals who all happens to be hiring for the same job position in the same building.

Good luck!