Opportunities to argue before the United States Supreme Court are scarce, with a single digit percent of filed petitions ever getting heard. Consequently, those that do find their way in front of the Supreme Court are frequently helmed by the same pool of attorneys. This limited set of advocates was the subject of a recent analysis by Adam Feldman, who identified key commonalities among these top lawyers.
Notably, Feldman observed a pronounced homogeneity among the identified group of 55 attorneys who have argued the most before the Supreme Court between October 2016 and December 2023. The archetypal profile includes a male lawyer, often a graduate of Harvard, Yale or Stanford, supplemented by experience clerking at a federal appeals court and the Supreme Court.
The gender disparity is noticeable, though largely confined to private practice. Women lawyers representing the Office of the Solicitor General, with its mandate to advocate for the federal government, are more equitably represented, with nine female attorneys among the noted cohort compared to only three in private practice.
The pronounced correlation between legal education and appearances before the Supreme Court is clear. The figures show that over 50% of the advocates studied, graduated from either Harvard, Yale or Stanford. A notable academic bottleneck given the relative ranking of these law schools.
Following a similar vein, the data shows that all 55 advocates secured clerkships at the federal appeals court level, an experience which appears to be near-essential. The Supreme Court clerkships are rarer, but still held by close to two thirds of the top attorneys, highlighting the preeminent role these coveted appointments play in an attorney’s career.
Considering these repeated patterns across the professional biographies of these recurring Supreme Court advocates, one cannot escape Feldman’s contention that there may well be many a worthy but overlooked advocate out there. Perhaps in recognizing these somewhat rigid career paths, governments and law firms will be inspired to look beyond the usual pool to identify advocates with more diverse career trajectories.