?? Yearender Special: Law firms split and merged, free speech in law schools, the state of abortion rights and big IP cases in SCOTUS next year ??
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?? Greetings from The Legal File! Welcome to our last newsletter for 2022. Dive in for a round-up of the year's highlights and the outlook for 2023. We'll be back in your inboxes on Jan. 3. Thanks for sticking around!
The law firm landscape looked a little bit different by the end of 2022 than it did when the year began. Some of the most notable firms merged, split up and made their debut this year.
U.S. firms Arent Fox and Schiff Hardin combined to create ArentFox Schiff , in one of the largest mergers between two law firms completed this year. Prominent litigators Paul Clement and Erin Murphy left Chicago-founded mega-firm Kirkland & Ellis to start their own law firm in June.
Durie Tangri will combine with Morrison & Foerster effective Jan. 1, 2023. In another combination, litigation firm Robbins, Russell, Englert, Orseck & Untereiner shut its doors in April, as 24 of its lawyers joined Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel. Four partners left Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP in November to launch a new firm , named Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone LLP , in New York and Washington focused on patent litigation work.
Across the pond, the former deputy chair and co-managing partner at Boies Schiller Flexner LLP , Natasha Harrison , founded Pallas Partners LLP with nearly all Boies Schiller’s London office. Mark Lanier , a U.S. trial lawyer known for winning multibillion-dollar verdicts, opened a new Manchester-based law firm focused on group litigation.
The national debate over "cancel culture" and the limits of free speech arrived in full force on U.S. law school campuses in 2022.
Conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito called the state of law school free speech "abysmal" during a speech in October, about a month after two judges, James Ho of the 5th Circuit and Elizabeth Branch of the 11th Circuit, pledged not to hire clerks from Yale Law School because of student protests against conservative speakers there.
The clashes over speech unfolded throughout the year and at law campuses across the country, including the University of California, Berkeley - School of Law ; the University of Kansas School of Law ; and American University Washington College of Law . The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School initiated efforts to sanction a professor over comments deemed as racist by many students and a new hire at Georgetown University Law Center caused an uproar when he tweeted that President Joe Biden’s pledge to select a Black woman for the Supreme Court would result in a “lesser” nominee than his preferred candidate.
Some legal academics, however, argue that critics are overstating the problem and that law schools have always been places where viewpoints collide and tensions are worked out.
Six months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, the state of abortion rights around the country remains unsettled, thanks to a patchwork of lawsuits in state courts and emergency court orders.
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Experts predict that the uncertainty will continue in the coming year, as cases wend their way through courts, and state legislatures consider new restrictions, potentially drawing new battle lines in the fight over abortion rights.
About half of all states are ultimately expected to adopt new abortion restrictions in the wake of the Supreme Court's June ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health.
After a relatively quiet year for intellectual property cases at the U.S. Supreme Court, the justices are set to consider several important issues in copyright, patent and trademark law in 2023.
The copyright world is eagerly awaiting the high court's ruling in a dispute between Andy Warhol's estate and celebrity photographer Lynn Goldsmith over their depictions of the rock star Prince.
Drug makers are closely watching a case involving Amgen, Sanofi and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals that could affect the cutting-edge field of biologic drugs.
The justices have also agreed to consider two cases that could reshape trademark law. Liquor maker Jack Daniel's challenged the legality of a dog toy called "Bad Spaniels" that copied its famous whiskey-bottle design. The Supreme Court will also consider the international reach of U.S. trademark law in a case involving remote-control maker Hetronic International, which is trying to defend a $114 million U.S. court win against its former European distributor for selling devices in Europe with unauthorized parts.
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?? That's a wrap for 2022! Thank you for reading?The Legal File and happy holidays! ??
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Monitoring And Evaluation Specialist at Shiraz University of Medical Sciences
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