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Interested in transactional work but not completely sure - Been thinking about this for a while and would really appreciate any advice/anything anyone has heard about these firms in terms of culture, hours, stereotypes, anything would be helpful. Thank you in advance!

Gibson litigated and won Citizens United and seems to genuinely enjoy helping clients destroy the environment (see their Chevron cases and the way they present their "Environmental Law" practice on their website). Overall, I'd pick Latham because of these factors. I know BigLaw is BigLaw, and lots of firms (likely including Latham) do ethically questionable work, but Gibson is on another level. If I were in your shoes, Citizens United alone would preclude Gibson for me. But then again, I know most law students don't care about this type of thing, and you said you want to go into corporate, so if you choose Gibson I'd forgive you because at least you wouldn't be aiding their disturbing litigation haha

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 22, 2021 9:38 pm

Gibson litigated and won Citizens United and seems to genuinely enjoy helping clients destroy the environment (see their Chevron cases and the way they present their "Environmental Law" practice on their website). Overall, I'd pick Latham because of these factors. I know BigLaw is BigLaw, and lots of firms (likely including Latham) do ethically questionable work, but Gibson is on another level. If I were in your shoes, Citizens United alone would preclude Gibson for me. But then again, I know most law students don't care about this type of thing, and you said you want to go into corporate, so if you choose Gibson I'd forgive you because at least you wouldn't be aiding their disturbing litigation haha

This gets at the right answer but for the wrong reasons. For litigation, I think Gibson is the move here. But since you’re leaning transactional, Latham probably takes the edge. This assessment has nothing to do with past representations. Frankly, all biglaw firms have represented some ugly clients and causes, and that is rarely a justification alone for dismissing an entire firm.

jbagelboy wrote: ↑

Fri Sep 03, 2021 1:46 am

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 22, 2021 9:38 pm

Gibson litigated and won Citizens United and seems to genuinely enjoy helping clients destroy the environment (see their Chevron cases and the way they present their "Environmental Law" practice on their website). Overall, I'd pick Latham because of these factors. I know BigLaw is BigLaw, and lots of firms (likely including Latham) do ethically questionable work, but Gibson is on another level. If I were in your shoes, Citizens United alone would preclude Gibson for me. But then again, I know most law students don't care about this type of thing, and you said you want to go into corporate, so if you choose Gibson I'd forgive you because at least you wouldn't be aiding their disturbing litigation haha

This gets at the right answer but for the wrong reasons. For litigation, I think Gibson is the move here. But since you’re leaning transactional, Latham probably takes the edge. This assessment has nothing to do with past representations. Frankly, all biglaw firms have represented some ugly clients and causes, and that is rarely a justification alone for dismissing an entire firm.

I recognize most firms have had problematic clients, and I agree that representing ugly clients alone is rarely a good reason to dismiss a firm. I argue Gibson is significantly more problematic than many other top firms (for reasons described above), to the extent that its representations should reasonably deter many people from working there. The fact that all firms take some questionable clients shouldn't mean that people don't weigh firms against one another to see whose clients are the most questionable. Choosing BigLaw shouldn't mean you throw your most fundamental political ideals out the window. (And I, of course, don't assume OP shares my political beliefs--but OP is asking for the opinions of random strangers, so I am sharing mine.)