How a Law Firm Decided to Fold Instead of Fight

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Today’s lead story is about how Brad S. Karp, the chairman of law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, walked into the Oval Office last Wednesday and “cut a deal” with President Donald Trump to do $40 million of pro bono work for the administration.

The TL;DR version of this story is that Brad S. Karp turns out to be a coward. Sorry, Brad S. Karp! Love from, Matt C. Davis.

Lawyers, eh? What’s with the pomposity over their middle initials?

Before we continue, let’s just pause a minute to acknowledge that along with Columbia University folding to pressure on Friday, this is a spectacular capitulation and one that, altogether, did not need to be made. If there’s a spectrum of options from “capitulation” to “fighting to the death,” then Paul, Weiss could easily have gone midway along the line to say, a five-out-of-ten and just “put up a bit of modest resistance.”

But that is not what has happened. Instead they have gone straight for zero.

I used to run communications for a nonprofit in New York that worked with major law firms, including Paul, Weiss, on a pro bono basis, and they would cut us a check for about $25,000 a year, if memory serves, or about a 1,600th of what they’ve just agreed to turn over to Trump.

We ran a charity golf tournament. You get the idea.

Doing some more math: Profits per equity partner at the firm are $7.51 million each and so they’re really sacrificing the profits of fewer than six partners to protect the profits of the other 194. That’ll buy a lot of trophy kitchens in Connecticut, or, conversely, perhaps pay for a lot of illicit liaisons and the other various bills required to keep everyone “functioning” over the next few years.

It’s clear that Mr. Karp spoke with his colleagues and that privately, they advised him to follow a course that would serve their financial interests:

Of course, being a lawyer should not only be about making $7.51 million in profits each year. Those of us who “follow my work” know that “Michael Clayton” is my favorite movie in the world apart, of course, from the Pierce Brosnan version of “The Thomas Crown Affair” co-starring Rene Russo. Both movies are set in Manhattan, and both feature flesh-eating lawyers. But the reason they’re both so good is that they make the point that money isn’t everything. In other words? Don’t be a lawyer if you’re going to later become a fascist. #Judging

Here’s Michael Clayton negotiating with Tilda Swinton to sell out his murdered colleague for $10 million at Kenner, Bach and Ledeen. It turns out, he’d rather walk away from the profession than do so, of course. But this is a work of fiction.

If you didn’t read yesterday’s scathing opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times by the dean of UC Berkeley’s Law School, I’d recommend it, too, for showing why Paul, Weiss would have had an excellent case to fight Trump’s actions against it in court. If they could only find a collective backbone.

Mr. Karp, the law firm’s chairman, has a long history of fund-raising for Democrats and sought to unite major law firms in a “call to arms” against Mr. Trump’s administration on policies like its policy of separating migrant children from their parents. “He publicly said lawyers were obligated to defend the rule of law,” the reporters write.

You can see where this is going. It’s always the outspoken ones.

Mr. Trump targeted Paul, Weiss with an executive order this month, “although the order was legally dubious and undercut fundamental principles in the justice system,” the story goes. Mr. Karp even “began discussions with another big firm about presenting a unified and bipartisan front and challenging the order in court.”

Yes, this is where this is going:

Details, details. In deciding to bend to Mr. Trump, the story says, the firm likely saved itself “from hemorrhaging clients and lawyers.”

But there’s a catch. He’s also sold out the whole legal profession.

It’s like the strongest guy in the playground capitulating to the bully on day one, so that you don’t have to. The problem is, that means you’re not actually the strongest guy in the playground, after all. These roles come with responsibilities. Ask any dominant male in a pride of lions and you’ll hear that the position is earned from fighting the battles that matter.

On Friday, Mr. Trump promised to go after other law firms, especially those linked to any efforts to investigate him or hold him legally accountable. You might want to read that sentence again just in case you’re feeling good about America this morning.

As an aside you might also want to look into the history of the term “white shoe law firm,” which essentially meant an old firm that excluded Jewish and Catholic lawyers. Paul, Weiss is a “modern” law firm, by contrast. And yes, there are comprehensive lists. The term comes from white buckskin derby shoes (bucks), once the style among the men of the upper class:

Again here’s a reminder of why Mr. Trump issued his illegal order against Paul, Weiss, from the L.A. Times editorial. It seems to have gotten lost in the Times’ reporting:

Again: Trump wanted to ruin Paul Weiss financially by cutting all its government contracts and security clearances in a move likely to spook Paul Weiss’s corporate clients like Exxon. He decided, basically, to hit the company in its pocketbook, and to do so because one of its former lawyers convicted the president on business fraud charges. The firm also attempted to hold Trump accountable for January 6.

Trump calculated rightly that for all its outspokenness about principle, ultimately the law firm values its annual profits more highly. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Virtually the entire legal profession was horrified by the move.

Here’s a separate story in the Times rounding up shock and disappoinment by lawyers. The quotes are 🔥.

The subtext here is that if you work at Paul, Weiss you should be quitting your job today. I wonder now many of the 200 partners will do so. What do you think?

I’m guessing zero.

Some lawyers are quitting like-minded big law firms publicly, though:

A major test, now, is whether “working at Paul, Weiss” will become a thing that people in New York can get cancelled for. Because if it is, then that could mean Mr. Karp miscalculated. Although cancellation is very 2021, isn’t it? Again, the firm has trumpeted its moral credentials repeatedly:

No white shoes, here!

The rest of the story goes into detail about how the firm had been lining up to sue Mr. Trump until Mr. Karp capitulated. And it gives a rather sad possible reason, without going into more details.

Not for the faint of heart, that email. Or for those who are recovering from heart attacks. I’ve got a heart condition. I manage it daily with medication and appropriate amounts of caution, as well as by playing a lot of squash. As in, I often rely on telling my opponents “I have a heart condition” at a crucial point in the match, hoping they might take it easy on me. It works!

But if I were in Mr. Karp’s position I would have stepped back from my job and handed the keys to the firm to somebody who was ready to fight as hard as they needed to, to preserve the firm’s legacy, right now. My sense, now, is that ultimately he will have to leave his position, and that his miscalculation won’t survive long-term scrutiny. If I were his cardiologist I would have advised him after the heart attack that the stress associated with his position was most likely fatal if he kept it up. What do you think? It sounds to me that we’re talking about a person who is in over his head and not thinking clearly about anything.

You know this is bad because even conservative lawyers are saying that Karp has erred:

If you check out his bio page at the law firm, Brad has been praised by everybody.

Although I wonder what they’ll all start saying about him, now?

The reported story in the Times this morning is the work of seven people, all of whom are probably earning less than $150k a year and many substantially less than that. Let’s give them a round of applause 👏🏻, shall we?

Thanks for letting me read the newspaper so that you don’t have to. And quit your stressful job, already. It’s not worth it. Unless you look like this:

Matt Davis lives in Manhattan with his wife and kid.