Burning the Candle at Both Ends

• Author: Scott F. Partridge
• Position: Scott F. Partridge is chair of the ABA Section of Intellectual Property Law. He is a partner at Baker Botts LLP in Houston, Texas. He can be reached at scott.partridge@bakerbotts.com.
• Pages: 3-3

Published in Landslide® magazine, Volume 10, Number 5, a publication of the ABA Section of Intellectual Property Law (ABA-IPL), ©2018 by the American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved.

This information or any portion thereof may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association.

Perspective

My candle burns at both ends; it will

not last the night; but ah, my foes, and

oh, my friends—it gives a lovely light!

—Edna St. Vincent Millay

My family lived in the northern

Appalachian hills of Pennsylvania,

which were once the lands of the

mighty Iroquois nation. As a teen I would

often go to a red brick, two-story library

in my small hometown to read famous

poets and do my best at writing a few

lines of my own (14-line sonnets being

my self-observed forte). I was inspired

by the poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, who

wrote “Renascence” in her late teens

and received a Pulitzer Prize for poetry

shortly after turning 30 years old. I’m still

intrigued by this poem and often recom-

mend it to others for the deep meaning and

rhythm it offers. In those days, though, I

thought that a point of signicance beyond

the words of the poem was how much one

could accomplish within a short period in

one’s life. It was only later that I discov-

ered that Millay had also written about

burning candles at both ends, which led me

to search all the library shelves for every

single book of her poetry and a few others

of that era. What has stuck with me to this

day is the consistency between the words

themselves and what Millay accomplished

in a few short years even as a teenager.

I think that good lawyering comes

from living life in the way Millay

speaks about her burning candle and

the resulting light emitted by doing so.

We lawyers learn to accomplish much

in a short period of time because much

is usually expected of us. This is espe-

cially true practicing law in the culture

created by today’s technology. As dif-

ferent as carbon paper and the telex

machine would have been in the 1970s

from riding the circuit at the time of

Lincoln, today’s practitioners face

equally compelling but continually new

challenges in serving their clients—

all while maintaining a family life and

contributing a fair portion of their tal-

ents to outside activities. Fortunately

for the eld of intellectual property (IP)

law, our colleagues’ choice of activities

is often to become involved in bar asso-

ciations. Like our own Section of which

I am most proud, these associations

enable the profession not just to endure

but to advance the IP system we so

much care about in ways that ultimately

serve our society and way of life.

I encourage you to check out some of

the recent work that the ABA-IPL Section

has done to advance the IP system as a

critically important incentive to economic

success. One example is the letter we sent

to the United States Trade Representa-

tive (USTR) regarding renegotiation of

the NAFTA IP provisions. Another is our

amicus brief in the NantKwest case where

we argue that access to justice is deni-

grated by forcing litigants to pay the U.S.

Patent and Trademark Ofce (USPTO)

its attorney fees even when those liti-

gants prevail. Our letter to the USTR on

its 301 investigation of alleged IP abuses

in China addressed a critical matter for IP

and the world. All of this exemplary work

and much more was accomplished by the

handiwork of the volunteers in this Sec-

tion, and that work was reemphasized by

testimony before the USTR, and meetings

with the Director of the USPTO, high of-

cials at the Copyright Ofce, members of

Congress, PTAB judges, and others who

play key roles in advancing IP law.

Of course, I highly recommend par-

ticipating in our work and burning your

own candles at both ends to the extent

your health, well-being, and personal and

professional commitments permit. I can

promise that doing so provides a very

special “lovely light” of accomplishment.

Hercle qui tu recte dicis! n

Scott F. Partridge is chair of the ABA Section of Intellectual Property Law. He is a partner at Baker Botts LLP in Houston, Texas. He can

be reached at scott.partridge@bakerbotts.com.

By ScottF. Partridge

Burning the Candle at Both Ends

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