1)      Sharpen your presentation skills. Secular and Jewish lawyers alike know that presentation skills are a must if you want to be a success in the legal field. But what sets apart the good lawyers from the great lawyers, is an air tight presentation. Keeping a your presentation clear, concise, easy to understand, and of course, logical is key.

2)      Develop your own style. Clarence Darrow once said “Unless a speaker can interest his audience at once, his effort will quickly be a failure”. Keep that in mind when presenting your case. IT should feel natural to you, not robotic.

3)      Take CLE classes. CLE classes keep you relevant and up-to-date with current changes in the law and society. If you’re looking for CLE classes for credit fulfillment, or simply want to take them for the stimulating discussions with other professionals, really take advantage of these courses and all that they offer.

Remember that IAT Law has a wide variety of CLE course offerings in addition to an audio library where you can listen in on great topics at your own convenience!

These are see-saw days for one of the most important Jewish lawyers in the United States, Elena Kagan.

Senators from all over the country are weighing in on one side or the other. “I support her!” “I oppose her!” “I’m deeply troubled!” “Jewish lawyers aren’t real Americans!” (Well, no one said that last one. But you get the idea.)

It’s no big surprise where the senators are falling, if you’re at all familiar with party lines. Or should I say “all too familiar” with party lines. Or maybe “really tired of the lack of nuance and absence of even trying to understand, connect, relate or work together.” (I know, you can’t dance to it, but don’t you feel it, too?)

There doesn’t seem to be much real listening going on in most Republican’s ears when it comes to Kagan. You can almost picture them closing their eyes and singing Na na na na na, you’re one of those Jewish lawyers AND a Democrat AND Obama chose you, so I’m not listening! But just when you’ve given up, Richard Lugar (R – Ind) comes along. And then Susan Collins, weighing in from Maine…

There are 3 GOP senators in support of Kagan at this point. It’s not a lot of representation from the party, but it will be enough to land her the seat, and gives us a little hope that communications are still possible, even across party lines.

The Audio CLE Library (located HERE) offers lectures that can provide credits to scholars of the law studying in California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, New York, and Pennsylvania.

Here’s a look at just a handful of the many Jewish law scholars whose lectures are available through The Institute of American & Talmudic Law:

Yisroel Schulman, Esq.

The President of the New York Legal Assistance Group, Schulman is the Honorary President and Co-founder of The Institute of American and Talmudic Law. He has been the lead counsel for over a dozen federal and state court class actions. He has taught second and third year law students, and currently serves as the Supervising Attorney for Cadozo Bet Tzedek Legal Services.

Nathan Lewin, Esq.

For over 40 years, Lewin has been engaged in trial and appellate litigation on both the state and federal level. Previously an Assistant to the Solicitor General in the Department of Justice under Archibald Cox and Thurgood Marshall, he argued exactly a dozen cases in front of the United States Supreme Court. Some of his former individual clients includes Attorney General Edwin Meese III, actress Jodie Foster, former Beatle John Lennon and former President of the United States Richard Milhouse Nixon.

Joel Cohen, Esq.

An experienced white-collar criminal lawyer, Cohen spent a decade as a prosecutor for the New York State Special Prosecutor’s Office and as an Assistant Attorney-in-Charge with the United States Justice Department’s Organized Crime & Racketeering Section.

Kagan’s resume is filled with aspects of continued law education. She was a law clerk for Judge Abner Mikva, as well as for Justice Thurgood Marshall (who apparently nicknamed her ‘Shorty’). She was the 45^th Solicitor General of the United States, and the 11^th Dean of the Harvard Law School.

It was on May 9^th, 2010 that President Barack Obama announced he would nominate Kagan to replace Justice John Paul Stevens. If she receives Senate confirmation, she will be the fourth female member in Supreme Court history, as well as the eighth Jewish justice ever. The Highest Court in the Land currently has two Jewish lawyers on it.

However, she would be the first Supreme Court justice to hold the position without any previous experience as a judge since 1972. (The last Supreme Court judge without judging experience was the late William Rehnquist, who was also the Chief Justice of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2005)

Her Jewish heritage made its way into a highly-publicized exchange during her nomination hearing with ignorant South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. During a response about the “Christmas Day Bomber,” Kagan was interrupted by Graham who said “Nah, I just asked where you were at on Christmas.”

Kagan paused only for a brief second, seemingly taken aback by the utterly irrelevant question, and then deadpanned “Y’know, like all Jews, I was probably at a Chinese restaurant.”

Two years later, results have been varied. Agriprocessors has been bought by SHF Industries, and has continued meat production, both kosher and non-kosher, under the new name AgriStar. The city of Postville has survived, and has once again begun to grow. However, only forty-one of the nearly 400 illegal immigrants detained in the raid were allowed to stay in the United States. And the head of Agriprocessors, Sholom Rubashkin, was recently sentenced to twenty-seven years in prison.

However, debate over the facts surrounding the Agriprocessors raid has continued in the Jewish community. The main fact in question is, none of the crimes that the plant committed broke any Jewish law. Illegal immigration and underage workers are not mentioned in the Talmud. And nothing done at the plant would have made any of the meat non-kosher. So in the world of Jewish law, Agriprocessors had committed no sin.

However, that didn’t stop prominent Jewish leaders to speak out against the plant. A great example is Rabbi Arthur Segal, who requested through his blog that “the Jewish community, even those who do not maintain kosher, to demand…. That (a) processing plant goes beyond the letter of kashrut law, and treats its workers and animals ethically.”

The point the Rabbi is making is clear; Kashrut should go beyond kosher and non-kosher. If a food-provider does not run its business ethically, they should not be allowed to deem their products kosher.

In 1999, Brafman rose to fame during his defense of Sean “P. Diddy” Combs. Despite an approximate 100 witnesses, as well as a large number being summoned on behalf of the prosecution proclaiming Combs’ culpability, Brafman got his celebrity client acquitted with a unanimous ‘not guilty’ verdict.

More recently, Brafman was hired as representation for disgraced NFL star Plaxico Burress, who was being held on gun possession charges revealed when he shot himself in the leg at a night club.

His other more famous clients includes James Patino, whom Brafman got cleared on the slaying of Yusuf Hawkins. And Vincent Basciano, one of the ten men who were charged in a 1994 heroin-distribution ring.

Although his list of clients does have quite a few celebrities, the Jewish lawyer is not above fame himself, as he has been featured in both The New York Magazine and The New York Times.

A veteran state prosecutor once said of Brafman, “Jurors wind up saying that the defendant couldn’t be that bad if Ben’s speaking for him.”

Many law schools around the country are raising the GPA’s of their students to stay competitive in a hiring drought. Loyola Law is tacking on .33 to everyone’s GPA later this month, and other competitive schools have recently done the same, forgoing the traditional bell curve standard. Some are awarding more A’s, others have ridden the C, and Harvard and Stanford have done away altogether with grading, offering a modified pass/fail curriculum. Universities have felt the pressure from graduating law students who are often more than $150,000 in debt and can’t get a job.

Unfortunately this could result in all graduating law students looking better on paper as schools try to stay ahead of one another. Large scale firms often detect these shifts in the sea of applications they annually receive. They look at participation in the law journal and honors to separate the wheat from the chaff. But smaller firms may be more lenient in their hiring.  Either way, it still matters where young Jewish lawyers went to school.

Once they graduate they still have to take cle classes. If you want to attend cle classes for Jewish lawyers, visit www.IATLaw.org to see a schedule of when and where the next classes are being held.

Being a lawyer means that inevitably there will be sacrifices. You may have to postpone that dinner date with the girl from the gym if you want to attend the CLE classes you’ve been waiting for. It can be difficult to maintain a position at a high powered firm, raise a family, and stay in shape, which is why expectations have to be set down for many lawyers.

Too often recent law school grads think that their degree means a lot of money, and too often they forget what they may have to sacrifice in order to get the paycheck of their dreams. A balance is crucial to happiness, but for many it may be difficult to attain.

Don’t assume that now that you have your law degree, you will be happy. Try to squeeze in time for yourself even after a long day at the office, and don’t be disappointed if you can’t attend all of the social activities you did while you were in school – no one said that law is for socialites. Reaching a long term goal and making money are just a couple of the things from which happiness comes.

If you want to learn more about CLE classes and continuing legal education seminars, visit www.IATLaw.org.

Immigration in Arizona is being fought with a new law that allows police to stop suspected illegal immigrants and ask for identification. On the other side of the spectrum, in Princeton, New Jersey, illegal immigrants are being given identification cards that will allow them to drive. A Hispanic advocacy group is distributing the I.D.’s with the approval of local police to assist immigrants in driving.

Some say that Arizona is encouraging racial profiling, and that this is a distraction to police officers who could otherwise better serve communities. Others say that in New Jersey,  illegal immigrants are encouraged to stay in our country without providing legal documentation and that sponsoring immigrants undermines the notion of what it is to be American, and provides no incentive to become a citizen.

Immigration reform has been an object of contention for years now, and as the United States continues to welcome immigrants, legally or illegally, it will continue to be so.

If you want to attend CLE classes that deal with this topic more thoroughly, come to one of the continuing legal education seminars being held on July 22nd where immigration law will be the topic of conversation. IAT Law’s CLE classes are designed to facilitate discourse and build a further understanding.

If you’re looking for CLE classes, there’s one this week that relates to a pertinent topic: the fiduciary’s duty to disclose information. This seminar will discuss the need for transparency in a balanced financial market. In too many cases, those with important information keep it until it is too late.

In today’s news, Goldman Sachs recently came under fire when it failed to disclose information to a group of derivative mortgage security buyers. A bearish trader who was shorting that fund had selected the same mortgage properties. Goldman, in order to settle the case, may wind up paying as much as $1 billion to investors and the SEC.
Both common law and federal security obligate a level of openness with regard to these markets so that those in possession of insider knowledge don’t take advantage of other investors who may not be in the loop.
Stanley Grossman will be speaking from 4:00 to 6:30 this Wednesday on this topic. He has long been one of the most prominent securities litigators in New York, settling for hundreds of millions of dollars over his career.

For a tasty dinner and a stimulating lecture, come to Jewish Law continuing legal education seminars. These CLE classes are for credit for NY and PA lawyers.