By Tanya Metaksa
Special to TGM
Paul Clement, the esteemed attorney who got the win in NYSRPA v. Bruen on June 24, 2022, found himself kicked out of his law firm on that very same day.
What? You say. Most lawyers who win a case before the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) usually get accolades, possibly more remuneration and large page on the firm’s website.
Not Clement. His former law firm, Kirkland & Ellis, erased his page on their website, and sent out a press release announcing the firm will “no longer represent clients with respect to matters involving the interpretation of the Second Amendment.” Mr. Clement and his colleague, Erin Murphy, who also left Kirkland & Ellis, are starting their own firm Clement & Murphy in order to keep serving their clients.
So who is Paul Clement? First of all, he is an honorable person. He believes that “lawyers owe a duty of loyalty to their clients.” In a Wall Street Journal opinion piece published the day after the Bruen decision was announced, entitled “The Law Firm That Got Tired of Winning,” he and Erin Murphy wrote, “This time around, we received a very different message from our law firm. Having just secured a landmark decision vindicating our clients’ constitutional Second Amendment rights in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, we were presented with a stark choice—withdraw from representing them or withdraw from the firm. There was only one choice: We couldn’t abandon our clients simply because their positions are unpopular in some circles.”
The lawyers continue that Kirkland and Ellis “approved our representation of these clients years ago, and dropping them would cost the clients years of institutional memory. More remarkable still, in one of the cases we were asked to drop, we prevailed in the Supreme Court on Thursday. Those who object to the representation are thus taking issue with the Constitution as interpreted by a majority of the high court.” In conclusion they write, “The problems posed by the spate of recent violent gun crimes are real. But the solution isn’t to fire clients who have just vindicated a fundamental constitutional right. We are sticking with our clients.”
Both Clement and Murphy were partners at Kirkland and Ellis. They had a lot to lose when they left the firm in order to defend the Second Amendment as an individual right. Yet, they upheld the principles that controversial clients deserve representation and upholding the constitution requires a successful advocate.
Paul Clement attended Harvard Law School and graduated in 1992. After law school he was a law clerk to judge Laurence Silberman and Justice Antonin Scalia at the U.S. Supreme Court from 1993-1994. He then worked at Kirkland & Ellis before becoming the Chief Counsel to the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism and Property Rights of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
In 2001 he joined the US Department of Justice (DOJ) serving as Deputy Solicitor General before becoming Solicitor General in 2004. The Solicitor General is the chief appellate lawyer for the U.S. government. All litigation before SCOTUS is managed by that office. He left the federal government in 2008 and joined Georgetown University Law Center. A Wall Street Journal in late 2008 called Clement “The LeBron James of Law Firm Recruiting.” Before the end of the year he joined King & Spalding.
While he was at King & Spalding he argued successfully before SCOTUS in McDonald v. Chicago (2010). In April 2011 he was hired by the U.S. House of Representatives as outside counsel to defend the Defense of Marriage Act after the Obama DOJ stopped defending that law. Later that month King & Spaulding withdrew from that case and Paul Clement resigned from the firm in order to continue representing his client. In a letter to Robert D. Hays, Chairman King & Spalding, he wrote, “I resign out of the firmly-held belief that a representation should not be abandoned because the client’s legal position is extremely unpopular in certain quarters.” He joined Bancroft PLLC.
Five years later Kirkland & Ellis announced, “Kirkland & Ellis LLP is pleased to announce that Paul D. Clement, former U.S. Solicitor General and top U.S. Supreme Court and appellate lawyer, will join the Firm as a partner in the Washington, D.C., office. Mr. Clement is currently a partner of Bancroft PLLC, a top appellate litigation boutique in Washington, D.C., founded by Viet D. Dinh, former U.S. Assistant Attorney General for Legal Policy. Mr. Dinh and all of Bancroft’s 15 other attorneys, including Chris Bartolomucci, Erin Murphy, George Hicks and Jeff Harris, will also join Kirkland with Mr. Clement by Oct. 1, in time for the new Supreme Court Term. The press release also included the fact that Mr. Clement “has argued more Supreme Court cases since 2000 than any lawyer in or out of government.”
Since 2016 Paul Clement has argued two more Second Amendment cases before SCOTUS —NYSR&PA v. City of New York in 2019 and in this court term the successful NYSR&PA v. New York. He and Erin Murphy are also advocates for gun owners in California and New Jersey that are seeking certiorari before SCOTUS. These are cases challenging magazine capacity restrictions.
Jonathan Turley, another lawyer who supports constitutional rights, tweeted, “Can you imagine a firm taking this position with regard to any other constitutional right? At one time, firms were afraid to fight for abortion or civil rights due to the backlash. Now, lawyers are proudly fighting to prevent colleagues from defending the Second Amendment.” All law-abiding gun owners should quietly offer a ’Thank you” to Paul Clement for his steadfast belief in our legal system, his adherence to the Constitution and his faithfulness in supporting his clients.
Thank you, Paul.
