A partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Jenner & Block, Smith is one of the country’s leading lawyers in the areas of First Amendment litigation and appellate advocacy.  He has presented oral argument in more than a dozen Supreme Court cases, including his groundbreaking advocacy in Lawrence v. Texas, the landmark gay rights case that is often compared in significance to the Brown v. Board of Education case, which was argued and won by Thurgood Marshall. 

Smith has not only led the way in advancing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender civil rights, but has also been a leading advocate in addressing voting rights issues, including arguing three times before the U.S. Supreme Court in voting rights matters since 2004. His most recent argument was in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, a 2008 case challenging an Indiana voter ID law.  The case has been called the most significant election law case to reach the court since Bush v. Gore in 2000. Smith has also been a leader in advancing freedom of speech issues, especially with regard to the application of the First Amendment to the Internet and video games. 

The Thurgood Marshall Award recognizes substantial, long-term contributions to the advancement of civil rights, civil liberties and human rights in the United States.  The section established the award in 1992, conferring the inaugural award upon U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.  Since that time, recipients have included:

1993     Judge Frank M. Johnson                                    1994     Oliver W. Hill

1995     Ralph S. Abascal                                              1996     Jack Greenberg

1997     Judge Damon J. Keith                                        1998     Stephen B. Bright

1999     Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg                2000     Judge Revius Q. Ortique, Jr.

2001     Judge William Wayne Justice                            2002     Judge Don Edwards

2003     Dale Minami                                                    2004     Fred D. Gray

2005     Judge Abner J. Mikva                                        2006     Julius Chambers

2007     Judge Matthew J. Perry, Jr.                                2008     Judge Nancy Gertner

2009     Former Attorney General Janet Reno

The keynote speaker for this year’s event will be Pamela S. Karlan, the Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law at Stanford Law School, and the founding director of the school’s Supreme Court Litigation Clinic.  One of the nation’s leading experts on voting and the political process, Karlan has served as a commissioner on the California Fair Political Practices Commission and an assistant counsel and cooperating attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.  She is a former law clerk of Justice Harry A. Blackmun of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Abraham D. Sofaer of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

With nearly 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is the largest voluntary professional membership organization in the world.  As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.

Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP is pleased to announce that the firm's chairman of the executive committee, Guy N. Halgren, has been re-elected to a fourth consecutive, three-year term leading the firm.  Halgren was first elected to this management role in 2001.  Halgren is the first Sheppard Mullin chairman to hold this position for four terms.  

"Our partnership is very fortunate to have Guy at the helm for another term.  He's smart, fair and forward-thinking," said Benjamin R. Mulcahy, New York-based partner and member of the executive committee.  "Guy has been instrumental in growing the firm in terms of size, locations, and practice areas, while preserving Sheppard Mullin's tradition of collegiality and entrepreneurship."  

Sheppard Mullin has experienced significant growth in the past nine years.  The number of attorneys is now more than 500, which is more than 70% greater than the firm's attorney headcount in 2001.  During the same time period, the firm has geographically grown from a California firm, to a national firm with locations in New York and Washington, D.C., to an international firm with an office in Shanghai.  The firm currently has a total of eleven offices, having significantly expanded from four locations in 2001.

Comparing 2001 to 2009, gross revenue has climbed from $149 million to $361 million.  Practice area growth has occurred in a number of ways, including the establishment of an institutional entertainment and media practice in 2003, the significant growth of the firm's Intellectual Property practice group in recent years, and the strengthening of signature practices: Antitrust, Corporate, Finance & Bankruptcy, Government Contracts, Labor & Employment, Litigation, Real Estate/Land Use and Tax.  

Additionally, Sheppard Mullin's Business Trial practice group co-chair, Robert S. Beall, has been re-elected as the firm's managing partner for another three-year term.  He has held this firm management position since 2005.  Beall, based in the firm's Orange County office, has also been re-elected to the firm's executive committee for another three-year term. 

"I'm very pleased that Robert has agreed to serve as the firm's managing partner for another term.  Our talents complement each other.  The firm could not have made the tremendous progress it has without Robert's contributions,"  Halgren commented.

Partner Judy V. Davidoff has been elected to the executive committee for a three-year term.  Davidoff, based in the San Francisco office, has served as Real Estate/Land Use practice group co-chair and also as one of the firm's alternative fee czars.

About Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP

Sheppard Mullin is a full service AmLaw 100 firm with 550 attorneys in 11 offices located in the United States and Asia.  Since 1927, companies have turned to Sheppard Mullin to handle corporate and technology matters, high stakes litigation and complex financial transactions.  In the U.S., the firm's clients include more than half of the Fortune 100.  For more information, please visit www.sheppardmullin.com. 

The Washington law firm Arent Fox said Monday that it has named longtime partner Mark M. Katz as its new chairman, a leadership change that comes as the legal sector copes with an economic downturn that has curtailed business and prompted layoffs.

Katz, 52, succeeds Marc L. Fleischaker, who served as chairman of the firm's executive committee for 14 years. Fleischaker will remain at the firm, concentrating on antitrust and civil rights cases.

Like many of its counterparts, Arent Fox has faced declining revenue as corporate clients cut back on legal work, particularly in commercial real estate and finance, Katz said Monday in an interview. Although the firm cut 13 associates and 15 staff members and is in the early stages of restructuring how it bills clients, Katz said Arent Fox wasn't hurt as deeply by the recession because it decided to grow more cautiously during the boom.

"Some of the firms that grew very rapidly and worked on a mega-international platform seem to be running into difficulties," he said. "We've grown on a patient pace, and that's helped us."

As of 2008, the latest year for which statistics from the economic development group Greater Washington Initiative are available, more than 40,000 lawyers worked in the Washington region, second only to the New York area. Nearly 64,000 people work in the legal profession in the Washington region, which employs more people in that sector on a per-capita basis than any U.S. metropolitan area.

Keith Halleland, one of the founders of Halleland Lewis Nilan & Johnson, is leaving to start a new law firm — and taking his name with him.

Halleland’s new firm will focus on business law and consulting when it launches this spring, according to a news release issued Thursday by the 50-attorney, Minneapolis firm now known as Nilan Johnson Lewis.

“I am proud of what we have achieved together over the years,” Halleland said in the release. “I am very excited about building something new, and I look forward to establishing a firm where my focus will be on the work I really love – business law and consulting.”

Nilan Johnson Lewis President Matthew Damon called Halleland “a big part of our growth and success over the 13 years we have been in business,” and said he expects the two firms to work together.