Raising the bar: lawyers and leadership.

AuthorHart, Sophie J.
PositionFOREWORD

The legal profession provides a disproportionate number of leaders in American society, everywhere from law firms and law schools to government, the private sector, and the nonprofit realm. The 2017 Stanford Law Review Symposium, "Raising the Bar: Lawyers and Leadership," explores the role lawyers play as leaders in our society, why so many lawyers fill leadership positions, and how the profession can better prepare its members to lead.

The pieces presented in this Issue assess the present gaps in leadership training for lawyers, (1) propose a new model for modern legal education, (2) and address the history of corporate lawyers acting as leaders in the organizations they represent. (3) Recognizing that the best lessons of leadership often come by way of example, this Issue also includes a tribute to the late Justice Antonin Scalia, written by Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton, (4) and a series of personal reflections authored by the lawyers who participated in the Symposium. (5)

The live event was held at Stanford Law School on February 10-11, 2017 and was sponsored by the Stanford Center on the Legal Profession. The event brought together the authors published in this Issue, as well as leading practitioners from government, the private sector, the nonprofit realm, and legal education. Robert W. Gordon, Pamela S. Karlan, Donald J. Polden, Deborah L. Rhode, and David B. Wilkins moderated the discussions, focusing on diversity in leadership, pathways to leadership, and leadership training in legal education. The event culminated in a discussion with the Honorable Tani G. Cantil-Sakauye, Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court, and a keynote address delivered by Eric H. Holder Jr., former Attorney General of the United States.

The Symposium's success would not have been possible without the invaluable participation and support of our fantastic speakers. They included Jeff Adachi, Elected Public Defender of San Francisco; Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law; Lieutenant General Dana K. Chipman, former Judge Advocate General of the United States Army; the Honorable Mariano-Florentino Cuellar, Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court; Gregory G. Garre, former Solicitor General of the United States; Mareia Greenberger of the National Women's Law Center; Kirtee Kapoor of Davis Polk & Wardwell; Dean M. Elizabeth Magill of Stanford Law School; Michele Coleman Mayes of the New York Public Library; Janet...

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