Lawdragon Presents the 2020 Inductees to the 500 Hall of Fame
By Katrina Dewey | March 11, 2020 | Guides, News & Features
Photo of Anita Hill by Ken Richardson.
The 2020 inductions to the Lawdragon 500 Hall of Fame reflect the amazing breadth of legal talent we have recognized since founding Lawdragon fifteen years ago. This year, we add 41 lawyers to the permanent Hall of Fame, which we first assembled in 2015.
As in past years, the 2020 Hall of Fame class includes some of the nation’s most famous lawyers, including the likes of David Boies, Ted Wells and Ty Cobb. In addition to the most accomplished lawyers from the plaintiff and corporate ranks, we include public interest titans like Connie Rice, David Lash and Patti Goldman – and the incomparable leader from academia, Erwin Chemerinsky.
Given the increasing proportion of women on the Lawdragon 500 over the past several years – topping 40 percent this year – it is fitting that this year’s Hall of Fame class contains so many women who have possessed the strength, determination and power required to change the profession for better. Elizabeth Warren, a professor at Harvard Law School when she graced our 2005 Lawdragon 500, has waged this fight from the classroom to Congress to the political battlefield. And who better to represent this group than Anita Hill, the essence of strength and brilliance. Both lawyers show how far the profession has come since we started in 2005, and how much work remains.
| Name | Firm | Category |
|---|---|---|
| Rosemary Alito | K&L Gates | Litigators |
| Clifford Aronson | Skadden | Dealmakers |
| Max Berger | Bernstein Litowitz | Litigators |
| Alexander ‘Zander’ Blewett | Hoyt & Blewett | Litigators |
| David Boies | Boies Schiller | Power Brokers |
| Paulette Brown | Locke Lord | Leadership |
| Erwin Chemerinsky | University of California, Berkeley, School of Law | Leadership |
| Ty Cobb | Law Offices of Ty Cobb | Power Brokers |
| Patrick Coughlin | Robbins Geller | Litigators |
| Kathleen Fisher | Calvo Fisher | Litigators |
| Thomas Fitzgerald | Winston & Strawn | Leadership |
| Donald Godwin | Godwin Bowman | Litigators |
| Patti Goldman | Earthjustice | Compassion |
| Nina Gussack | Pepper Hamilton | Litigators |
| James Harrington | Harrington & Mahoney | Litigators |
| Richard Heimann | Lieff Cabraser | Litigators |
| Lynne Hermle | Orrick | Litigators |
| Anita Hill | Cohen Milstein | Leadership |
| Cassandra Holleman | Harris County Judge | Remembered |
| Jeffrey Kessler | Winston & Strawn | Power Brokers |
| David Lash | O’Melveny | Compassion |
| Jane Michaels | Holland & Hart | Litigators |
| Wayne Outten | Outten & Golden | Leadership |
| Lee Phillips | Manatt | Dealmakers |
| Stacy Phillips | Blank Rome | Litigators |
| John Quinn | Quinn Emanuel | Innovators |
| Connie Rice | Advancement Project | Leadership |
| Jonathan Schiller | Boies Schiller | Litigators |
| Roman Silberfeld | Robins Kaplan | Litigators |
| Lawrence Sucharow | Labaton Sucharow | Litigators |
| William Urquhart | Quinn Emanuel | Remembered |
| Christine Varney | Cravath | Leadership |
| Leigh Walton | Bass Berry | Dealmakers |
| Elizabeth Warren | U.S. Senate | Leadership |
| Howard Weitzman | Kinsella Weitzman | Innovators |
| Theodore Wells | Paul Weiss | Litigators |
| William Whelan | Cravath | Dealmakers |
| Steven Yerrid | The Yerrid Firm | Litigators |
| Lawrence Zweifach | Gibson Dunn | Litigators |
| Margaret Zwisler | Latham | Litigators |
About the author: Katrina Dewey (katrina@lawdragon.com) is the founder and CEO of Lawdragon, which she and her partners created as the new media company for the world’s lawyers. She has written about lawyers and legal affairs for 30 years, and is a noted legal editor, creator of numerous lawyer recognition guides and expert on lawyer branding. She is based in Venice, Calif., and New York. She is also the founder of Lawdragon Campus, which covers law students and law schools. View our staff page.
