Illinois Bar Examiners Use Website To Show Their Utter Contempt For Applicants, Former Law School Dean

The Illinois Board of Admissions to the Bar, known affectionately as IBAB, found themselves in a quandary the other day. It appears as though multiple applicants writing in with technical concerns about the upcoming bar exam — a natural consequence of the state supreme court’s quizzically curt decision to block any real stress testing of the system — were informed by IBAB officials that the technical concerns might ultimately force applicants to “wait until February.”

This sparked a lot of understandable consternation among a class of applicants that have been jerked around by this exam for months now, with many depending on earning a license to get to work to support themselves and — more importantly — pay their crushing student debt.

Daniel Rodriguez, former dean of Northwestern Law, used his platform as an eminent figure in the Illinois legal profession to amplify the alarm that individual examinees were raising.

It turns out that the bar exam is not being canceled — yet, anyway — and IBAB wanted to assure everyone that this was a false rumor and that everyone should operate as if the test goes forward on the 5th. That’s the sort of message that could be conveyed by saying something like, “There is a rumor that the test might be canceled and we’re sorry if anything we’ve said contributed to this impression, but we are still going forward on the 5th and 6th and we assure you that we’re on top of any tech concerns you may have (and please let us know if you’re experiencing any issues!).”

Instead, they wrote this:

Let me make this clear. There is a time and a place for online mockery about the legal profession and it’s within the pages of Above the Law. This isn’t hypocrisy on our part — we do what we do because the profession can’t do this to itself and maintain the moral authority it requires to function. When bar examiners start doing it, they disgrace the whole profession.

“Applicants should exercise critical thinking and problem-solving skills”?!?!? I guess this is a fair criticism: applicants should have thought critically and realized they couldn’t trust anything coming from IBAB at face value. Because what’s completely missing from this statement is any sort of APOLOGY for making the statements that got everyone worried in the first place. Remember, the rumor wasn’t that the exam was canceled, it was that IBAB officials were telling applicants that they feared it might be and that applicants might have to consider waiting until February. So IBAB has transmogrified this rumor into something bigger than it was just so they could scoff at anyone who would believe a rumor they’re responsible for. Astounding.

Also, let’s not overlook that their dig at critical thinking and problem-solving skills also applies to the former dean’s comments because he’s entirely covered by this nakedly insulting response. But at least the IBAB folks gave him the dignity of responding directly. As he correctly pointed out in a later tweet, “But, hey, why did this happen just because I weighed in? Are the impacted IL examinees mere chopped liver? Disgraceful way to manage a difficult process.”

If it wasn’t clear from the earlier state supreme court battles over this, the Illinois bar examiners have nothing but contempt for the people they’re charged with testing. They don’t care about the unreasonable delays. They don’t care about the technical problems. And they don’t care about their own confusing information. They “care” to the extent that they have to perfunctorily do their jobs but they don’t worry about how their actions impact the applicants. To their mind, they put out a test and everyone should shut up and feel lucky they got to take it… eventually.

There’s a lot of folksy wisdom that boils down to “it’s not what you say, it’s what you do” and not to besmirch that as a general rule, but sometimes it really is about what you say. Illinois just showed off its true colors: they think that anyone who questions them deserves contempt and mockery. Full stop. And when it comes to “what you do,” the attitude someone takes into it means a lot to the final outcome.

This is a bad statement. They should retract it and profusely apologize.

Earlier: Everyone: Maybe We Should Test This Bar Exam Software; State Supreme Court: LOL, No.


HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

Judge Is Gonna See What Happens Over The Next Three Months And Then Decide If LVMH Has To Buy Tiffany

Magic Circle Firm Enters The Special Bonus Fray

The special fall bonuses are still making their way through Biglaw. It may be taking a little longer than the insta-matches we’ve seen in compensation before, but the COVID-19 appreciation bonuses are still gaining steam. And a Magic Circle firm just joined in.

Yesterday, Freshfields announced that they’d be giving out special appreciation bonuses to associates on October 15th. The firm noted that money will not trade off with year-end bonuses, and they expected to be competitive with the market for those end-of-the-year bonuses. They’re matching the scale set earlier by Davis Polk, meaning associates will see between $7,500 and $40,000, depending on class year, as follows:

Sources at the firm describe the mood as excited, and as one tipster said it demonstrates the firm’s commitment to the U.S. market:

I think the mood is very positive around this, given Freshfields’ continued commitment to the US and recent expansion. People are glad to see the leadership putting their money where their mouths are and being an early-adopter of this trend (especially given the number of recent laterals, from Cleary in particular).

You can read the firm’s full announcement on the next page.

Please help us help you when it comes to bonus news at other firms. As soon as your firm’s bonus memo comes out, please email it to us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Bonus”) or text us (646-820-8477). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.

And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish.


headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

Morning Docket: 09.23.20

* A lawyer has been censured for telling a female judge that after she returned from vacation, “I better be able to see your tan lines.” [CBS News]

* Attorney General Barr has announced around $100 million in Department of Justice grants to combat human trafficking. [Albany Herald]

* An Arizona lawyer, who helped orchestrate the failure of a Toby Keith restaurant chain, has been sentenced to jail. [Arizona Republic]

* HBO has picked up a documentary about a lawyer on the frontlines of the fight for immigrant rights. [Variety]

* A new lawsuit alleges that YouTube did not do enough to protect video moderators from viewing grotesque content. Guess they can’t watch cat videos all day… [CNBC]


Jordan Rothman is a partner of The Rothman Law Firm, a full-service New York and New Jersey law firm. He is also the founder of Student Debt Diaries, a website discussing how he paid off his student loans. You can reach Jordan through email at jordan@rothmanlawyer.com.

Mitt Romney Is Just Making Stuff Up Now

(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Mitt Romney stated he will support reversing the “McConnell Rule,” claiming that the “historical precedent” is that the Senate can confirm a nominee of their OWN party in an election year but not a nominee of the opposing party. This is, as you might imagine, a complete lie. Who was the last Supreme Court justice confirmed by the opposing party during an election year?

Hint: The seat opened up the year before, but there were some hijinks in the process that ended with the nominee being voted on in an election year.

See the answer on the next page.

Simpson Thacher Enters The COVID-19 Biglaw Bonus Wars

You know what’ll put a little pep in an associate’s step when it’s close to 5 p.m.? A special bonus! Hooray!

Elite firms have been falling all over themselves to match the generous Davis Polk scale for COVID appreciation bonuses (a trend that was first started by  Cooley), and one by one, firms like Milbank, Irell, Hueston Hennigan, Sullivan & Cromwell, and Debevoise have opened up their coffers.

Who’s up next to fatten associates’ wallets? Not to be outdone by anyone, the latest firm to show associates the money is Simpson Thacher. We’ve been wondering where you’ve been. Welcome to the party! Simpson will be matching the DPW scale up to the class of 2012, and in a memo (available in full on the next page), the firm praised associates and counsel. “We are immensely grateful for your hard work and perseverance under these trying circumstances,” chairman Bill Dougherty wrote.

Here’s the scale, in case you’ve forgotten:

  • Class of 2019: $7,500
  • Class of 2018: $10,000
  • Class of 2017: $20,000
  • Class of 2016: $27,500
  • Class of 2015: $32,500
  • Class of 2014: $37,000
  • Class of 2013: $40,000
  • Class of 2012: $40,000

Simpson associates in good standing across the world will receive these special bonuses on October 15. Not to worry, because it’s unlikely the special bonuses will have an impact on year-end bonuses at the firm. (Specifically, Dougherty wrote, “We do not anticipate this special bonus will impact year-end bonus levels, which we expect to be at least consistent with last year’s amounts.”)

Congratulations to everyone at the firm.

P.S. In case you’re wondering where Cravath’s special bonus money is… so are we. Is the prestigious firm planning to come over the top or pull a Kirkland? We suppose we’ll have to wait and see.

Please help us help you when it comes to bonus news at other firms. As soon as your firm’s bonus memo comes out, please email it to us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Bonus”) or text us (646-820-8477). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.

And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish.


Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

Governor Ron DeSantis Announces Plan To Allow Floridians To Stand Their Ground Against Protestors … By Running Them Over With Their Cars.

(Image via Getty)

Oh, Florida.

Governor Ron DeSantis convened a press conference yesterday to announce that his state was “not going to go down the road that other places have gone.”

What road would that be? Apparently the road to the First Amendment’s right to assemble and engage in constitutionally protected free speech. Speaking at the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, DeSantis announced his intent to pass the “Combating Violence, Disorder and Looting and Law Enforcement Protection Act.”

What does Governor DeSantis have in mind for his constituents?

There’s collective punishment, if “7 or more people are involved in an assembly and cause damage to property or injury to other persons.” Will all seven protesters be liable if only two smash a window? Unclear!

He’d like to immunize drivers who run over protesters “if fleeing for safety from a mob.” Dozens of people have been rammed by cars driven by opponents of racial justice protesters, but now they’ll be able to assert the defense that they were fleeing.

Shouting at people in restaurants? A felony.

Throwing a water bottle at a cop during a protest? Mandatory six month sentence in jail with enhancements for being “an individual from another state.”

And no bail either for anyone charged with participating in a “violent or disorderly assembly.”

DeSantis wants to terminate “state benefits” for anyone “convicted of participating in a violent or disorderly assembly.”

He wants to waive sovereign immunity, but only as to jurisdictions “where the local government is grossly negligent in protecting persons or property.” (Really? Might want to think that one through a little more.)

He’s threatening to withhold “state grants or aid” — i.e. funding for everything from public schools to Medicaid — to municipalities which fail to maintain level funding for their police departments when COVID has decimated county budgets.

And, in the coup de grace, he wants to charge “anyone who organizes or funds a violent or disorderly assembly” with THE RICO. So everyone from a local college student organizing a Black Lives Matter rally to George Soros, whom DeSantis is convinced funds protests, despite exactly zero evidence, is involved in a criminal enterprise to … exercise their first Amendment right of assembly. It just makes too much sense!

Although DeSantis’s surprise announcement seems to have left some of his own party non-plussed.

“I can’t see someone who throws a brick at law enforcement not getting six months without a mandatory minimum,” Sen. Jeff Brandes (R-St. Petersburg) told the Miami Herald. “While I agree we have to support law enforcement 100%, we also have to recognize the right afforded to citizens to peacefully protest.”

But DeSantis was having none of that namby-pamby Constitution stuff.

“If you do it, and you know that a ton of bricks will rain down on you, then I think people will think twice about engaging in this type of conduct,” DeSantis said yesterday.

Harvard Law, Class of 2005, FTW.

DeSantis proposes crackdown on protesters, penalties to cities that ‘defund’ police [Miami Herald]
DeSantis calls for ‘ton of bricks’ penalties on protesters who commit illegal acts [Politico]


Elizabeth Dye lives in Baltimore where she writes about law and politics.

Trump Suggests Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Dying Wish Came From Liberal Operatives

(Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images)

I don’t know that she said that, or was that written out by Adam Schiff, Schumer, and Pelosi? I would be more inclined to the second. That came out of the wind, it sounds so beautiful … but that sounds like a Schumer deal or maybe Pelosi or shifty Schiff … maybe she did and maybe she didn’t.

— President Donald Trump, casting doubt upon Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dying wish that she “not be replaced until a new president is installed,” during an interview on “Fox & Friends.” Clara Spera, Ginsburg’s granddaughter, confirmed that her grandmother made the remark shortly before her death Friday evening, as did Ginsburg’s doctor.


Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

No, Seriously, Amy Coney Barrett Would Be A Dumpster Fire Of A Supreme Court Justice

Amy Coney Barret. Photo via Wikimedia Commons

Ah, the rehabilitation of Supreme Court front runner Amy Coney Barrett has begun! Even in Above the Law’s own digital pages, there’s a piece written by David Lat that breathlessly touts Coney Barrett’s (and other SCOTUS contenders’) elite pedigree and sparkling personality.

In the subtweet of the blogging world — an uncredited link — Lat references the issues that myself and others have with a potential Justice Coney Barrett:

She’s very conservative and very Catholic, and so liberals and progressives are freaking out over how she might rule as a justice, especially on such precedents as Roe v. Wade (which she is bound to follow as a lower-court judge, but able to revisit as a Supreme Court justice).

But here’s the thing, as I said in my initial article, I don’t care that Coney Barrett is “very Catholic” — that isn’t the problem, it’s her jurisprudence. Not that FedSoc talking points actually pay attention to nuance. Certainly not when crying “religious freedom” can “galvaniz[e] evangelicals and Catholics in midwestern battleground states.”

But if you want more proof her religion isn’t the problem: I don’t even mention the (utterly batshit) point about her membership in the religious group that ACTUALLY inspired The Handmaid’s Tale. Our country is basically on the Gilead Express and it doesn’t get a mention. Also, of note, my very favorite Supreme Court justice is Catholic — Sonia Sotomayor. (And no, it’s not an insult to RBG’s memory, she was great, but progressives don’t have to be a monolith.)

And we should realize in the fawning profile of Coney Barrett zero words are written about the kind of Justice she’d be (but progressives are the ones that are reacting without analysis, ummm, okay). Not about the deeply troubling “life begins at conception” comment or her disregard for precedent or that she doesn’t seem to believe in Miranda rights. But her penchant for winning people over? Yup, that makes the cut.

Nobody cares if your nominee is nice. We care about what her tenure on the Court will look like. At least Lat makes some sort of tacit acknowledgment in the piece that Coney Barrett is being set up to be the Justice that overturns a woman’s right to choose, not that it changes his opinion of Coney Barrett as someone whose “advantages are manifest and manifold.” Because what’s such a minor quibble as a woman’s right to choose in the face of someone so charming!?!?!

Here’s the thing — this is a really, really big deal. It’s not just because as someone with a uterus, it is impossible for me not to oppose the approaching erosion of reproductive freedom. But this is only the tip of the iceberg — one the right has been priming the public for since Coney Barrett was one year old. There will surely be other marginalized groups that see their hard won rights take a hit as a very particular sort of conservative philosophy keeps tightening its grip on American jurisprudence. You shouldn’t need your own rights on the chopping block to see the problem with empowering this jurisprudence.

And it’s not just progressives that see a dangerous trend. Eric Posner and Lee Epstein recently made this argument in the New York Times:

The religious right has made no secret of its expectation that President Trump will choose a socially conservative successor to the seat held by Ruth Bader Ginsburg. And the president will likely deliver, further confirming the power of the religious right.

The conservative legal movement, which at one time was libertarian in spirit, has been hijacked by the religious right. This religious version has left a deep mark on the Supreme Court under the leadership of Chief Justice John Roberts.

A potential Justice Coney Barrett — and the 40+ years she could sit on the Court — is so much more than the final nail in the coffin of women’s reproductive freedom.


headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).