15 August 2004

Is it too late?

Is it too late for me to become a Supreme Court clerk?

I could go back and retake the LSAT and ignore the Princeton Review's advice so that I get a higher score.1 I could put some actual effort into applying to the Ivy league.2 I could live the One L experience of scheming, hiding books, and freaking out when exams came. I could actually participate in the write on for law review3 and spend the next two years telling law professors that they can't use the word "since" in thier articles because it has a duel, ambiguous meaning. Then I could send out a couple hundred resumes to "feeder" judges, with a cover letter explaining how I came to walk on water at a very early age, that I'm now looking for the more serious challenge of checking to make sure that the 20 string cites in a brief, averaging 15 cites apiece, are all on point, and that I think this will allow me to die a happy and fulfilled man. When I complete that clerkship I can send my resume off to each of the 9, with a cover letter explaining how much I enjoyed being an appellate clerk (especially that 30 page memo I had to research and write on the effect of Utah's Dog Liability statute on a herd of beef owned by an Alabama company which were run off a cliff by a Utah family's dog while vacationing in New York4) and that I think being a Supreme Court clerk would not only allow me to die a happy and fulfilled man, it would also guarantee me a place in the firmament. Then, after a year or two more I could go off and get a $150,000 bonus from BigLaw just for walking in the door.

On second thought, I'll just stay where I am.


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1 The Princeton Review suggested that if unable to complete a section you look up, figure out which letter had been used the least, and fill in the rest of the section with that letter. While doing the thrice-damned logic puzzles I screwed one up and had to redo it. I didn't have enough time to do the last question. Foregoing the age old wisdom of "When in doubt, Charlie out," which I think I had used since kidergarten, I took the Review's advice. I looked up and saw that "D" was the least used and filled all the rest with "D". Not a single one of the answers were "D"; three of the answers were "C". I would have scored in the 170's.

2 Yes, I did apply to Harvard but it was half-hearted. One of my fraternity brothers was absolutely beside himself because I hadn't applied to any Ivy League schools. One night, in the middle of a party, he and a couple other Brothers cornered me and made me promise to apply to an Ivy League school if they paid the application fee. So, I filled out the application and one of them ponied up the check. It was way too late to apply so I basically forgot about it after I sent it in and made plans to attend W&L. On the day I graduated from Centre I cleaned out my room and was getting ready to leave when I decided to make one last run by the campus post office. The only piece of mail in the box was the rejection letter from Harvard - the only school which rejected me.
:-(

3 Yep, I chose not to try to write on to law review. I regret not this decision. I had a lot more fun doing moot court and being on the moot court board (we got to travel around the country to competitions). And I didn't have to give up all my weekends sitting in the library checking obscure 17th century legal references.

4 Thereby making me the world's foremost expert on a subject which shall never again come before a court anywhere at any time.

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