ABA Journal: Asked and Answered

After 13 years and 170 episodes, Asked and Answered host Stephanie Francis Ward is hanging up her headphones and switching off her mic. Asked and Answered, the ABA Journal's first and longest-running podcast, is ending its run—at least for now. In this final episode, Ward discusses her podcast tenure with the Journal's Lee Rawles. Ward recently accepted a new position within the ABA Journal as an assistant managing editor after a long reporting career covering legal education and general legal affairs. They chat about the podcast's humble beginnings with an episode about alternative billing released on April 5, 2010, and the changes Ward has observed in the legal community over that time period. A major shift Ward identifies is an increasing willingness to talk about mental health struggles and work-life balance. There has also been a sea change in attitudes towards remote work, accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Ward and Rawles—host of the Modern Law Library, another Journal podcast—discuss the rapid pivot they had to make when the pandemic shut down the ABA offices and podcasts had to be recorded at their homes instead of a media room. They discuss some of their favorite episodes from the past 13 years, and which topics feel dated—like “How Can Attorneys Use Google+ to Generate Business“—versus more timeless issues lawyers face. One evergreen Asked and Answered topic Ward returned to in several episodes was helping lawyers navigate social anxiety in business and rainmaking situations, and Ward shares some of her favorite tips she's gleaned from guests. Finally, Ward thanks the listeners who've accompanied her on this journey and urges them to stay in touch with legal tips and pitches. The Journal's other two podcasts, the Legal Rebels Podcast and the Modern Law Library, will continue to be released on their normal schedules.  

When lawyers hear the term "LLM," their first thought may go to a master of law degree that a person earns after law school. However, the acronym also stands for “large language model,” which is technology that generates and creates writing for offerings that include ChatGPT and Google Bard. The technology doesn't know what is accurate—that's where lawyers come in—but the writing is impressive, it could make legal writing better and you could even use it as a writing coach, says Greg Sarab, a technologist and a lawyer.

After almost 40 years on the bench, Judge Pauline Newman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has sued her chief, two judge colleagues and the Federal Circuit Judicial Council, following a court committee interview and a medical records request, which she denied, and a suggestion that she should be suspended from work for one year.

As stories of some CEOs' outrageous behaviors continue, the amount of activist shareholder activities keeps growing, say Kenneth Mantel and Megan Reda, partners at Olshan Frome Wolosky in New York. They represent investment funds, family offices and people trying to bring change at public companies—and maybe get a seat on the board.

Winning a 2003 landmark U.S. Supreme Court case expanded a gay lawyer's Supreme Court practice, he says, and looking back, it's his favorite case. Because Paul M. Smith was the editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal, clerked for then-U.S. Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr. and handled various Supreme Court cases—including for paying clients—many thought that it made sense for the Washington, D.C., lawyer to argue Lawrence v. Texas, which led to a 2003 landmark opinion that struck down state laws criminalizing sexual conduct between consenting adults of the same gender.

With the current exam, candidates have a 90% chance of passing, if they follow the advice of their law schools' academic support staff. When the National Conference of Bar Examiners launches a revamped version of the bar exam in 2026, called the NextGen bar exam, it is expected that there will be new assessments on skills including legal research, investigation and client counseling. And that could mean less focus on memorization for candidates. Or not, says Mike Sims, president of the test prep group BARBRI.

In the criminal justice world, pig butchering refers to bacon—but not literally. Instead, it's a term used to describe scamming someone online out of all their money through promises of romance and cryptocurrency windfalls, says Erin West, a prosecutor in the Santa Clara County, California, district attorney's office.

As rises in Chicago carjackings continue to increase fear among many residents, Cliff Nellis, an attorney and pastor who founded the Lawndale Christian Legal Center, says his nonprofit group represents a fair amount of young people charged with the crime.

Jessica Bednarz has spent much of her career representing people, researching access-to-justice issues and using that knowledge to try to find better ways to deliver legal services. That includes using what's known as “design thinking” for developing client service programs.

In the 35 years that Jayne Conroy has been a lawyer, she's spent the entire time in private practice doing civil litigation and has tried more than 70 cases. Conroy's work includes leading some of the multidistrict litigation involving opiates with jury trials around the country. Through that, she's seen juries and judges change their minds about addiction and responsibilities. Her next target is social media.

Attorneys often expect incarcerated clients to lie and vice versa, says Derrick Hamilton, who served more than 20 years of a second-degree murder sentence. Those outlooks don't help build good attorney-client relationships, according to Hamilton, who now works with students at the Yeshiva University Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law's Perlmutter Center for Legal Justice.

While 2022 was a phenomenal year for attorneys and “anyone with a pulse” and a law license could find work, 2023 might “go back to normal,” says Valerie A. Fontaine, a founding director of the legal search company SeltzerFontaine.

As we head into the holiday season, consider what you want your celebrations to look like, rather than meeting everyone else's expectations, says Laurie Besden, a lawyer who has been sober for almost two decades.

The overall employment outcomes for 2007 and 2021 law school graduates were both 91.9%. And while that sounds like a good thing, it could be a warning.

Ellen Freeman immigrated from Odesa, Ukraine, to Pittsburgh almost 30 years ago. And although her family always planned to leave—she grew up learning various languages so that she could communicate wherever they settled—moving to the United States as a young single mother was one of the most difficult things that she has ever done.

Aliza Shatzman didn't realize that federal judicial employees are not protected by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. That is until the judge she worked for in 2020 ended her clerkship early—for reasons that she thinks were due to gender discrimination.

If you are studying for the July bar exam, you're not going to memorize every flashcard for the Multistate Bar Examination, and that's OK. You can still pass.

A good home-school program provided a nurturing environment that was lacking in elementary education, and the experience helped build confidence for law school, says Haley Taylor Schlitz, a 2022 graduate of Southern Methodist University's Dedman School of Law.

A recent order from Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott directing the state to consider medical treatments for transgender youths as child abuse is hurtful to children and their families, as is a new Alabama law that makes providing gender-affirming care to a minor a felony, says lawyer Asaf Orr. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

For young litigators who want to be considered “a lawyer's lawyer,” careers spent mostly working from home may not get you to where you want to be, according to Robert Giuffra and Evan Chesler, two Wall Street partners who have been trying cases for more than 30 years. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Although the Americans with Disabilities Act is decades-old, many businesses, including law firms, continue to treat it as a suggestion, rather than federal law, according to Eve Hill and Jason Turkish, two lawyers who represent plaintiffs in disability cases. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Business hasn't slowed down during the COVID-19 pandemic, which tore many couples apart, according to family law attorneys Stacy D. Phillips, who practices in Los Angeles, and Bonnie E. Rabin, who practices in New York. However, the COVID-19 crisis has made it easier to work together. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Physical aspects aren't the only changes in federal litigation, according to two veteran Chicago litigators. They think jurors, particularly those younger than age 40, are much more forgiving when a witness is caught lying, few care whether a party admits to drug use, and many expect significant documentation from law enforcement trying to defend misconduct charges. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

The heavy, hardback editions of Martindale-Hubbell law directories, which were published annually and had different volumes for each jurisdiction, represented an important tool for executive search consultants back in the 1980s, before internet access was common, and lawyers' backgrounds could only be found through paper or word of mouth. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

In the late 1980s, law school groups for gay and lesbian students met off campus in case members didn't want the school community to know their sexual orientation. And there were so few female faculty at law schools, if two or more were seen together talking, male faculty would ask what they were up to. So if they were actually up to something, such as persuading their dean to adopt a faculty parental leave policy that was longer than a few weeks, they would meet off campus, too. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

A few decades ago, there were no page limits for U.S. Supreme Court briefs, and that brought considerable headaches for the clerks who had to read them. Also, the justices rarely, if ever, asked more than 15 questions total during oral arguments. But that changed in 1986, after Antonin Scalia joined the high court. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Many Harvard Law School students knew of classmate Rehan Staton through a July 2020 video that went viral, which featured him opening a Harvard Law School acceptance email. There's a lot more to him than the video, and Staton wanted to connect with classmates more significantly while they attended remote classes over the past year. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Lawyer Patrick Krill learned to be more flexible during the pandemic, with inspiration from "Be Water," an ESPN documentary about martial artist and actor Bruce Lee. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

As the dean of Pennsylvania State University's law school during the COVID-19 pandemic, and at a time of significant social unrest, Hari Osofsky tried to say yes whenever possible. Leadership involves taking in a variety of viewpoints, she explains, and recognizing what students, professors and administration want is a good way to guarantee people that they are being heard. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

In May 2020, lawyer and author David Lat was starting his recovery from a life-threatening bout with COVID-19. A little over a year later, Lat, founder of Above the Law, decided to leave his job as a legal recruiter, go back to writing full time, and leave New York City for the New Jersey suburbs with his husband and their 3-year-old son. The COVID-19 pandemic influenced those changes. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Emily D. Baker wanted a diversion from 2020, so she started doing her own legal commentary about pop culture, with topics including a pair of "Satan Shoes" associated with rapper Lil Nas X and the conservatorship of Britney Spears. Today, Baker is considered to be an influencer. According to her, she earns more than she did as a Los Angeles County deputy district attorney. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has caused there to be fewer court filings in some jurisdictions, Howard Bashman’s blog, How Appealing, continues to share multiple posts on a daily basis about appellate law and legal news. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

When she’s posting online, Beth Bourdon is not like most other lawyers, and she says that’s probably why she has more than 50,000 Twitter followers. She is a Florida public defender who represents people charged with homicide. She also helps journalists with Freedom of Information Act requests in her spare time—and that includes a Patreon account, a membership platform that provides funds for the work. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Rather than focus on the restrictions of teaching via Zoom, Peter H. Huang zeroed in on how he could use the platform in innovative ways. This summer, the University of Colorado Law School professor enjoyed the creativity involved with thinking about different ways to conduct class, and he got pleasure from brainstorming with colleagues on efficient ways to navigate change. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Jeffrey L. Fisher has argued more than 40 U.S. Supreme Court cases, and he relies heavily on the justices’ body language during arguments. But that wasn’t possible for his last three, which were conducted by phone because of the COVID-19 pandemic. He recently shared his experiences with ABA Journal Senior Writer Stephanie Francis Ward. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

April Dawson, an associate dean and professor at the North Carolina Central University School of Law, misses seeing her constitutional law students in person. But the constitutional law and voting rights scholar has been finding creative ways to use technology in the classroom, even before the pandemic, and she says the experience helped her connect with students and foster meaningful discussions, even when classes can’t meet in person.

Plenty of lawyers in private practice worry about business development during the COVID-19 pandemic, but there may be more opportunities to discover new clients than they realize. And that is thanks to an increase in online events, says Karen Kaplowitz, a lawyer and business development coach. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

Legal news about President Donald Trump often outrages people, but it shouldn’t. And at the same time, his administration makes outrageous legal statements that many accept as normal, says Kenneth White, a former assistant U.S. attorney known as "Popehat" on Twitter. Now a partner at Brown, White & Osborn in its Los Angeles office, White recently spoke with ABA Journal Senior Writer Stephanie Francis Ward. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

While Veena Dubal has adopted to working at home with three young children during the COVID-19 pandemic, the “reply guys” came after the California law professor on Twitter for her support of a 2020 state law that extends employee classification status to gig workers. Dubal tells ABA Journal Senior Writer Stephanie Francis Ward that she thinks that people’s anxieties are running high amid the pandemic, and some public relations groups harness that energy to support client platforms, particularly on social media. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

This past spring, when few people realized that most July bar exams would ultimately be canceled, Molly Coleman decided to forgo the test, for the time being, despite her lawyer father’s objections. Coleman chats with ABA Journal Senior Writer Stephanie Francis Ward about moving back to St. Paul, Minnesota—her hometown—less than a week before the area erupted in protests following the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd in late May. She was joined by her fiance—a University of Michigan Law School student—and the couple postponed their September wedding to 2021, given health concerns with large gatherings. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.

When COVID-19 closed ABA offices in March, staff sprang into work figuring out how the association could convert its meetings and events to virtual environments. In this bonus episode of Asked and Answered, we're giving you a sneak peek at how the 2020 ABA Annual Meeting came together, some of the exciting guests and speakers who have been lined up, and what exactly it will be like to attend an all-virtual meeting. ABA President Judy Perry Martinez and Marty Balogh of the Meetings and Travel Group spoke with the ABA Journal's Lee Rawles to share behind-the-scenes information about the annual meeting, which is free to all ABA members. Register before July 27, then attend sessions and events at your leisure from July 29-Aug. 4.

Lawyer and author Brian Cuban chats with ABA Journal Senior Writer Stephanie Francis Ward about how he’s been focusing on what he can control during the COVID-19 pandemic, rather than what he can’t, and what he misses the most. For Cuban, that includes hugs from family and friends, and he’s not sure that they’ll ever be given as freely as they once were. Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.