Former City Bar Executive Committee Member
Former Secretary of Homeland Security
Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, LLP
To this day, visiting 42 West 44th Street is an inspirational experience for me; I recognized it immediately as the setting for Tom Hanks’ and Alan Alda’s law office in the movie “Bridge of Spies.”
I have been a loyal and active member of the New York City Bar Association since I became a lawyer in 1983. Over the years I served on the Ethics, Judiciary, and Executive Committees of the Association.
Without a doubt my favorite and most meaningful service to the City Bar was as chair of the Judiciary Committee in 2001-2004. The Judiciary Committee evaluates and approves every candidate or nominee for a judgeship in this City – federal, state and local. It is by far the City Bar’s busiest committee. In three years as chair, I probably interviewed more than 500 actual or potential judges. Much to my trepidation, sitting judges still tell me they recall their interview with me 16 years ago.
To be a member of the Judiciary Committee is also to experience the multiple legal communities throughout this big and diverse city, as we held many of our meetings in the courthouses and bar associations across the city. Through service on the committee, one quickly discovers that the courthouse communities in Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island are all different and distinct; each has its own circle of colorful personalities, reputations, dialogues, and gossip. Though the hours were long and the work grueling, service on the Judiciary Committee was a borough-by-borough Bonfire of the Vanities experience.
The Judiciary Committee also rates (or at least it used to) candidates or nominees for District Attorney and U.S. Attorney in this city. One such candidate while I was chair was Robert M. Morgenthau, for re-election to the office of District Attorney for New York County in 2001. I will never forget my interview of “Mr. Morgenthau” before the full Committee: he brought a writing sample, and carefully and succinctly answered every question I put to him. I asked Mr. Morgenthau what he was doing to campaign for re-election, and he answered, “Appearing for an interview before the City Bar Association, what else …?” When I gently asked Mr. Morgenthau, then 82, the question that was on the mind of every committee member: “Mr, Morgenthau, suppose for some reason you do not finish out your four-year term – say, for example, you seek higher office – do you have any thoughts about a succession plan?” His answer, limited to just two words, was “I do.” Mr. Morgenthau was approved by the committee, re-elected in 2001, served the full four-year term, and another four years after that.
I congratulate the New York City Bar Association on its 150 years of existence. I have been a member for 37 of those 150 years. Looking back on the experience, I now know that through the City Bar’s programs and committees, I made friendships that will last a lifetime, and learned a set of values and a code of professional behavior that has guided me through my life as both private practitioner and public official.