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Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald Trump, and the Corruption of Justice
From the New York Times’s Business Investigations Editor and #1 bestselling author of Dark Towers comes a long-overdue exposé of the astonishing yet shadowy power wielded by the world’s largest law firms, following the narrative arc of Jones Day, the firm that represented the Trump campaign and much of the Fortune 500, as a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
In his acclaimed #1 bestseller Dark Towers, David Enrich presented the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality. Now Enrich turns his eye towards the world of “Big Law” and the nearly unchecked influence these firms wield to shield the wealthy and powerful—and bury their secrets. To tell this story, Enrich focuses on Jones Day, one of the world’s largest law firms. Jones Day’s narrative arc—founded in Cleveland in 1893, it became the first law firm to expand nationally and is now a global juggernaut with deep ties to corporate interests and conservative politics—is a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
Since 2016, Jones Day has been in the spotlight for representing Donald Trump and his campaigns (and now his PACs)—and for the fleet of Jones Day attorneys who joined his administration, including White House Counsel Don McGahn. Jones Day helped Trump fend off the Mueller investigation; challenged Obamacare; defended Trump’s Muslim ban and border policies; and handled Trump’s judicial nominations. Jones Day even laid some of the legal groundwork for Trump to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election.
But the Trump work is but one chapter in the firm’s checkered history. Jones Day, like many of its peers, have become highly effective enablers of the business world’s worst misbehavior. The firm has for decades represented Big Tobacco in its fight to avoid liability for its products. Jones Day worked tirelessly for the Catholic Church as it tried to minimize its sexual-abuse scandals. And for Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, as it sought to protect its right to make and market its dangerously addictive drug. And for Fox News as it waged war against employees who were the victims of sexual harassment and retaliation. And for Russian oligarchs as their companies sought to expand internationally.
In this gripping and revealing new work of narrative nonfiction, Enrich makes the compelling central argument that law firms like Jones Day play a crucial yet largely hidden role in enabling and protecting powerful bad actors in our society, housing their darkest secrets, and earning billions in revenue for themselves.
In his acclaimed #1 bestseller Dark Towers, David Enrich presented the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality. Now Enrich turns his eye towards the world of “Big Law” and the nearly unchecked influence these firms wield to shield the wealthy and powerful—and bury their secrets. To tell this story, Enrich focuses on Jones Day, one of the world’s largest law firms. Jones Day’s narrative arc—founded in Cleveland in 1893, it became the first law firm to expand nationally and is now a global juggernaut with deep ties to corporate interests and conservative politics—is a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
Since 2016, Jones Day has been in the spotlight for representing Donald Trump and his campaigns (and now his PACs)—and for the fleet of Jones Day attorneys who joined his administration, including White House Counsel Don McGahn. Jones Day helped Trump fend off the Mueller investigation; challenged Obamacare; defended Trump’s Muslim ban and border policies; and handled Trump’s judicial nominations. Jones Day even laid some of the legal groundwork for Trump to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election.
But the Trump work is but one chapter in the firm’s checkered history. Jones Day, like many of its peers, have become highly effective enablers of the business world’s worst misbehavior. The firm has for decades represented Big Tobacco in its fight to avoid liability for its products. Jones Day worked tirelessly for the Catholic Church as it tried to minimize its sexual-abuse scandals. And for Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, as it sought to protect its right to make and market its dangerously addictive drug. And for Fox News as it waged war against employees who were the victims of sexual harassment and retaliation. And for Russian oligarchs as their companies sought to expand internationally.
In this gripping and revealing new work of narrative nonfiction, Enrich makes the compelling central argument that law firms like Jones Day play a crucial yet largely hidden role in enabling and protecting powerful bad actors in our society, housing their darkest secrets, and earning billions in revenue for themselves.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published September 13, 2022
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November 27, 2022
‘Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald Trump, and the Corruption of Justice’ by David Enrich is a great expose of the American history and internal workings of one particular law firm, Jones Day. The title of the book is hyperbolic, but the research for the book is spot on. Every fact is backed up by interviews, newspaper, TV and magazine articles, and fact-finding reports issued by several government agencies and committees, as well as internal documents from Jones Day.
The history of how the system of corporate legal firms developed in America is also briefly outlined. Laws passed by Congress changed not only how law firms functioned, they enabled sole-proprietorship law firms to change from morally responsible advisors into immoral, vastly wealthy partnerships of ambulance chasers and politically-biased evaders of the law.
I have copied the book blurb because it is accurate:
”From the New York Times’s Business Investigations Editor and #1 bestselling author of Dark Towers comes a long-overdue exposé of the astonishing yet shadowy power wielded by the world’s largest law firms, following the narrative arc of Jones Day, the firm that represented the Trump campaign and much of the Fortune 500, as a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
In his acclaimed #1 bestseller Dark Towers, David Enrich presented the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality. Now Enrich turns his eye towards the world of “Big Law” and the nearly unchecked influence these firms wield to shield the wealthy and powerful—and bury their secrets. To tell this story, Enrich focuses on Jones Day, one of the world’s largest law firms. Jones Day’s narrative arc—founded in Cleveland in 1893, it became the first law firm to expand nationally and is now a global juggernaut with deep ties to corporate interests and conservative politics—is a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
Since 2016, Jones Day has been in the spotlight for representing Donald Trump and his campaigns (and now his PACs)—and for the fleet of Jones Day attorneys who joined his administration, including White House Counsel Don McGahn. Jones Day helped Trump fend off the Mueller investigation; challenged Obamacare; defended Trump’s Muslim ban and border policies; and handled Trump’s judicial nominations. Jones Day even laid some of the legal groundwork for Trump to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election.
But the Trump work is but one chapter in the firm’s checkered history. Jones Day, like many of its peers, have become highly effective enablers of the business world’s worst misbehavior. The firm has for decades represented Big Tobacco in its fight to avoid liability for its products. Jones Day worked tirelessly for the Catholic Church as it tried to minimize its sexual-abuse scandals. And for Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, as it sought to protect its right to make and market its dangerously addictive drug. And for Fox News as it waged war against employees who were the victims of sexual harassment and retaliation. And for Russian oligarchs as their companies sought to expand internationally.
In this gripping and revealing new work of narrative nonfiction, Enrich makes the compelling central argument that law firms like Jones Day play a crucial yet largely hidden role in enabling and protecting powerful bad actors in our society, housing their darkest secrets, and earning billions in revenue for themselves.”
There was a lot of things in the book I didn’t know before. The lawyers and their firms who advise and support clients who have hired them are not often much focused on in news stories. The role of legal firms in enabling politicians, and others, to push out into the various news media their edited spin on unsavory activities, or the advice and financial support lawyers give on how to tell and conceal lies and hide financial wrongdoing is eye-opening. Even worse, is how legal firms are orchestrating the funneling of money to politicians, including coercing their own, normally impartial, employees to give money to people the controlling partners of a law firm openly and proudly support. The days of corporate law firms, at least some of the larger ones, being impartial stewards of the law is gone. Some corporate law firms proudly align themselves only with clients who are members of only one political party.
Impartiality and independence was the original moral stance of legal firms and individual practicing lawyers. They felt they had a duty to serve their communities - ALL of the people in their city or town. Many early lawyers were imbued with a feeling of having a religious calling.
Part I in the book details the history of how some individual lawyers who decided to work together around 1900 began the law firm of Jones Day. Jones Day originally was Jones, Day, Cockley & Reavis. In its beginnings, Jones Day consisted of lawyers who felt they had a duty to the law, and to help people who hired them by providing them with wise advisors. The author describes a few cases the firm handled which gave the company much respect, particularly how they helped one of their clients, East Ohio Gas in 1944, after a massive explosion. One hundred and thirty people were killed and 225 were hospitalized.
Part II describes how new partners took Jones Day into new directions in the 1980’s and 1990’s - a biased politically conservative one. For instance, helping a tobacco company cover up the studies showing smoking caused cancer. And helping Charles Keating, a politically connected businessman, ‘correct’ his accounting to cover up his illegalities in handling the Lincoln savings-and-loans bank. They helped the Catholic Church cover up rapes. They helped Big Pharma cover up its pharmaceuticals which harmed people.
In part III, the author describes how Jones Day created political action committees during the late 20th century, giving money to conservative politicians. They opened an office in Washington, D.C., and started lobbying. They began hiring federal ex-regulators, ex-judges, and ex-Supreme Court clerks, rewarding them with a job and a high salary at Jones Day for helping to decide cases favorably towards clients of Jones Day in their previous government jobs. And they decided to become Donald Trump’s lawyers, becoming one of the major players in getting him elected and fighting off everyone who has tried to point out all of the ways Trump has and is breaking the law.
This is not a book describing how corporate law is upholding or defending democracy. This is a book describing an intentional destruction of constitutional democracy crafted by some of the smartest, most educated men (they are mostly men). These are lawyers dedicated to obscuring and hiding legal immorality and in breaking, not just bending, the law.
The following are my opinions, not in the book.
Along the way to making themselves each billionaires or as close to being a billionaire as they can, many corporate law firms are quietly f**king all American citizens behind falsified screens of legal justice without most of us even knowing what is happening. Corporate law firms helped cause the deaths of, maybe, your father or mother, by assisting in hiding the proved fact FOR DECADES that smoking causes cancer. Is your brother or dad addicted to opiates or dead from an overdose? Jones Day helped to make pharmaceutical opioids continuously available to your family members, without much of any oversight, long after the fact that some of these opioids were known to become easily addicted to by unknowing people.
Jones Day became a very wealthy firm from defending or helping Trump in his many many many many lawsuits and court cases, although some judges are tossing them out of court or demanding Trump admit to being wrong. Many court employees have been caught either on video or on recordings expressing, with a lot of eye-rolling, disbelief at Jones Day conduct and their ‘supportive' arguments of Trump’s cases. Corporate legal firms are not supporting Trump by using the law, they are supporting Trump with often ridiculous and frivolous arguments that play well to his conservative, less legally-educated, base. Of course, they hope they win, and sometimes they do, to their utter surprise in many cases, attested to by off-the-record remarks. It helps that these giant corporate legal firms have been able to convince politicians to hire the legal firms’ ex-employees into positions of power in government oversight agencies, who rule in favor of their ex-legal firm employers. Who also give them their old jobs in the firm back when they leave their government jobs.
If you have a strong stomach, this is a very revealing book about the intertwining corruptions in the connections between politicians, businesses and corporate lawyers. Through describing the history of one corporate legal firm, a lot of how business and politicians conspire to screw American citizens over, and out of hard-earned financial and physical well-being, and shoveling taxpayer and client money into their own personal bank accounts without most of us being aware of how we are being harmed, is demonstrated.
I am incredibly disgusted and dismayed. Although bits and pieces are often published by the media here and there over decades of corporate and political wrongdoing, having some of it all pulled together in a book brings a lot of enlightenment about the ongoing downgrading of American democracy.
This book has extensive Notes and Index sections.
The history of how the system of corporate legal firms developed in America is also briefly outlined. Laws passed by Congress changed not only how law firms functioned, they enabled sole-proprietorship law firms to change from morally responsible advisors into immoral, vastly wealthy partnerships of ambulance chasers and politically-biased evaders of the law.
I have copied the book blurb because it is accurate:
”From the New York Times’s Business Investigations Editor and #1 bestselling author of Dark Towers comes a long-overdue exposé of the astonishing yet shadowy power wielded by the world’s largest law firms, following the narrative arc of Jones Day, the firm that represented the Trump campaign and much of the Fortune 500, as a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
In his acclaimed #1 bestseller Dark Towers, David Enrich presented the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality. Now Enrich turns his eye towards the world of “Big Law” and the nearly unchecked influence these firms wield to shield the wealthy and powerful—and bury their secrets. To tell this story, Enrich focuses on Jones Day, one of the world’s largest law firms. Jones Day’s narrative arc—founded in Cleveland in 1893, it became the first law firm to expand nationally and is now a global juggernaut with deep ties to corporate interests and conservative politics—is a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal industry in recent decades.
Since 2016, Jones Day has been in the spotlight for representing Donald Trump and his campaigns (and now his PACs)—and for the fleet of Jones Day attorneys who joined his administration, including White House Counsel Don McGahn. Jones Day helped Trump fend off the Mueller investigation; challenged Obamacare; defended Trump’s Muslim ban and border policies; and handled Trump’s judicial nominations. Jones Day even laid some of the legal groundwork for Trump to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election.
But the Trump work is but one chapter in the firm’s checkered history. Jones Day, like many of its peers, have become highly effective enablers of the business world’s worst misbehavior. The firm has for decades represented Big Tobacco in its fight to avoid liability for its products. Jones Day worked tirelessly for the Catholic Church as it tried to minimize its sexual-abuse scandals. And for Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, as it sought to protect its right to make and market its dangerously addictive drug. And for Fox News as it waged war against employees who were the victims of sexual harassment and retaliation. And for Russian oligarchs as their companies sought to expand internationally.
In this gripping and revealing new work of narrative nonfiction, Enrich makes the compelling central argument that law firms like Jones Day play a crucial yet largely hidden role in enabling and protecting powerful bad actors in our society, housing their darkest secrets, and earning billions in revenue for themselves.”
There was a lot of things in the book I didn’t know before. The lawyers and their firms who advise and support clients who have hired them are not often much focused on in news stories. The role of legal firms in enabling politicians, and others, to push out into the various news media their edited spin on unsavory activities, or the advice and financial support lawyers give on how to tell and conceal lies and hide financial wrongdoing is eye-opening. Even worse, is how legal firms are orchestrating the funneling of money to politicians, including coercing their own, normally impartial, employees to give money to people the controlling partners of a law firm openly and proudly support. The days of corporate law firms, at least some of the larger ones, being impartial stewards of the law is gone. Some corporate law firms proudly align themselves only with clients who are members of only one political party.
Impartiality and independence was the original moral stance of legal firms and individual practicing lawyers. They felt they had a duty to serve their communities - ALL of the people in their city or town. Many early lawyers were imbued with a feeling of having a religious calling.
Part I in the book details the history of how some individual lawyers who decided to work together around 1900 began the law firm of Jones Day. Jones Day originally was Jones, Day, Cockley & Reavis. In its beginnings, Jones Day consisted of lawyers who felt they had a duty to the law, and to help people who hired them by providing them with wise advisors. The author describes a few cases the firm handled which gave the company much respect, particularly how they helped one of their clients, East Ohio Gas in 1944, after a massive explosion. One hundred and thirty people were killed and 225 were hospitalized.
Part II describes how new partners took Jones Day into new directions in the 1980’s and 1990’s - a biased politically conservative one. For instance, helping a tobacco company cover up the studies showing smoking caused cancer. And helping Charles Keating, a politically connected businessman, ‘correct’ his accounting to cover up his illegalities in handling the Lincoln savings-and-loans bank. They helped the Catholic Church cover up rapes. They helped Big Pharma cover up its pharmaceuticals which harmed people.
In part III, the author describes how Jones Day created political action committees during the late 20th century, giving money to conservative politicians. They opened an office in Washington, D.C., and started lobbying. They began hiring federal ex-regulators, ex-judges, and ex-Supreme Court clerks, rewarding them with a job and a high salary at Jones Day for helping to decide cases favorably towards clients of Jones Day in their previous government jobs. And they decided to become Donald Trump’s lawyers, becoming one of the major players in getting him elected and fighting off everyone who has tried to point out all of the ways Trump has and is breaking the law.
This is not a book describing how corporate law is upholding or defending democracy. This is a book describing an intentional destruction of constitutional democracy crafted by some of the smartest, most educated men (they are mostly men). These are lawyers dedicated to obscuring and hiding legal immorality and in breaking, not just bending, the law.
The following are my opinions, not in the book.
Along the way to making themselves each billionaires or as close to being a billionaire as they can, many corporate law firms are quietly f**king all American citizens behind falsified screens of legal justice without most of us even knowing what is happening. Corporate law firms helped cause the deaths of, maybe, your father or mother, by assisting in hiding the proved fact FOR DECADES that smoking causes cancer. Is your brother or dad addicted to opiates or dead from an overdose? Jones Day helped to make pharmaceutical opioids continuously available to your family members, without much of any oversight, long after the fact that some of these opioids were known to become easily addicted to by unknowing people.
Jones Day became a very wealthy firm from defending or helping Trump in his many many many many lawsuits and court cases, although some judges are tossing them out of court or demanding Trump admit to being wrong. Many court employees have been caught either on video or on recordings expressing, with a lot of eye-rolling, disbelief at Jones Day conduct and their ‘supportive' arguments of Trump’s cases. Corporate legal firms are not supporting Trump by using the law, they are supporting Trump with often ridiculous and frivolous arguments that play well to his conservative, less legally-educated, base. Of course, they hope they win, and sometimes they do, to their utter surprise in many cases, attested to by off-the-record remarks. It helps that these giant corporate legal firms have been able to convince politicians to hire the legal firms’ ex-employees into positions of power in government oversight agencies, who rule in favor of their ex-legal firm employers. Who also give them their old jobs in the firm back when they leave their government jobs.
If you have a strong stomach, this is a very revealing book about the intertwining corruptions in the connections between politicians, businesses and corporate lawyers. Through describing the history of one corporate legal firm, a lot of how business and politicians conspire to screw American citizens over, and out of hard-earned financial and physical well-being, and shoveling taxpayer and client money into their own personal bank accounts without most of us being aware of how we are being harmed, is demonstrated.
I am incredibly disgusted and dismayed. Although bits and pieces are often published by the media here and there over decades of corporate and political wrongdoing, having some of it all pulled together in a book brings a lot of enlightenment about the ongoing downgrading of American democracy.
This book has extensive Notes and Index sections.
October 7, 2022
This shares a lot of DNA with When McKinsey Comes to Town: The Hidden Influence of the World's Most Powerful Consulting Firm. In some ways, it's the book I was hoping to read when I picked that one up. It is great, but has a flaw similar to the McKinsey book, in that the author gets in his own way.
It's split into three parts, each of which could be a standalone 400 page book worth reading. The first documents the rise of the corporate law firm - Better Call Saul type hustlers on a mission to turn the practice of law from a zillion sole proprietorships into the monster faceless firms we have today. It's full of great stories, interesting people and fun twists.
The second section documents Jones Day's descent from large, principle-driven firm to profit-focused, win-at-all-costs corporate avenger. This is very much like the McKinsey book, but even more damning and eye-opening. Killer, well-documented and enraging stuff that, standing alone, would do serious damage to the firm.
The third section of the book is about how senior figures at Jones Day took roles in the Trump administration and did bad things. It's well-reported and obviously a case of crony-capitalism at its' worst. But there's a lot of dotted lines, involving people that weren't working at Jones Day at the time, or were affiliated with Jones Day, but not acting on behalf of the firm.
This would be a good book on its' own! But it feels kind of vindictive or editorialized in a way the first two sections don't. There's a lot of allusions to corruption that aren't nearly as concrete as the preceding stuff. This section is the weakest by a mile. It felt a bit contrived, especially the long Wal-Mart pharmacy story that involves people that weren't employees of the firm at the time. And while I know having the words "Trump" and "corruption" on the cover is going to move some units (and the Kirkus review puts an exclamation mark on that point), it invites the kind of (dishonest) blanket dismissal that was published in WSJ by Kevyn Orr (who figures prominently in the third section of the book).
Absolutely recommend, flaws and all.
It's split into three parts, each of which could be a standalone 400 page book worth reading. The first documents the rise of the corporate law firm - Better Call Saul type hustlers on a mission to turn the practice of law from a zillion sole proprietorships into the monster faceless firms we have today. It's full of great stories, interesting people and fun twists.
The second section documents Jones Day's descent from large, principle-driven firm to profit-focused, win-at-all-costs corporate avenger. This is very much like the McKinsey book, but even more damning and eye-opening. Killer, well-documented and enraging stuff that, standing alone, would do serious damage to the firm.
The third section of the book is about how senior figures at Jones Day took roles in the Trump administration and did bad things. It's well-reported and obviously a case of crony-capitalism at its' worst. But there's a lot of dotted lines, involving people that weren't working at Jones Day at the time, or were affiliated with Jones Day, but not acting on behalf of the firm.
This would be a good book on its' own! But it feels kind of vindictive or editorialized in a way the first two sections don't. There's a lot of allusions to corruption that aren't nearly as concrete as the preceding stuff. This section is the weakest by a mile. It felt a bit contrived, especially the long Wal-Mart pharmacy story that involves people that weren't employees of the firm at the time. And while I know having the words "Trump" and "corruption" on the cover is going to move some units (and the Kirkus review puts an exclamation mark on that point), it invites the kind of (dishonest) blanket dismissal that was published in WSJ by Kevyn Orr (who figures prominently in the third section of the book).
Absolutely recommend, flaws and all.
February 29, 2024
Damning. Thoroughly researched. Good weaving in of the backgrounds of the law firms at issue (particularly Jones Day). As a former “BigLaw” attorney, I found myself having some empathy with the Jones Day attorneys up to a point - anyone who’s practiced at a BigLaw firm knows that you have to accept that clients aren’t going to be pure as the driven snow - but once the book got to the post-2015 “all in for Trump” era of the firm, it became harder and harder to have any sympathy for those attorneys who held their noses and went along to get along.
A very sobering read.
A very sobering read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 15, 2022
I’ve been pretty put off by big name lawyers in America in the first time I read She Said and Catch and Kill and saw how Harvey Weinstein was able to intimidate and threaten his victims, any witnesses and the journalists wanting to uncover his crimes - by employing high powered lawyers and using their full legal apparatus against those who possibly couldn’t afford costly legal challenges.
And this book only increases my ire and makes me more pessimistic because nothing is going to change. Big law and politics and multibillion dollar corporations are all deeply intertwined and nothing’s gonna separate them. Corporations will continue to spend significant amounts of money on their lawyers so that they can do whatever they want with impunity and as less government oversight as possible; the big law firms will throw all their power at the government lawyers who probably will never have enough budgets to confront big corporations; and lawyers and high level government officials will just keep changing their jobs from law firm to government to lobbying to law firm … till it’s just a vicious circle, where all these people with money and power get what they want, and the public is left with nothing.
Jones Day is just one part of this big corrupt enterprise, which the author goes deep into explaining the origins of and how as the firm grew, it changed from a principled midwestern law firm to a right wing legal organization where power is prime and there is no ethical boundary while serving a client. I don’t know why I keep reading these books which just make me despair more, but I guess atleast knowing a bit about the reality of our world is much better than being totally ignorant.
And this book only increases my ire and makes me more pessimistic because nothing is going to change. Big law and politics and multibillion dollar corporations are all deeply intertwined and nothing’s gonna separate them. Corporations will continue to spend significant amounts of money on their lawyers so that they can do whatever they want with impunity and as less government oversight as possible; the big law firms will throw all their power at the government lawyers who probably will never have enough budgets to confront big corporations; and lawyers and high level government officials will just keep changing their jobs from law firm to government to lobbying to law firm … till it’s just a vicious circle, where all these people with money and power get what they want, and the public is left with nothing.
Jones Day is just one part of this big corrupt enterprise, which the author goes deep into explaining the origins of and how as the firm grew, it changed from a principled midwestern law firm to a right wing legal organization where power is prime and there is no ethical boundary while serving a client. I don’t know why I keep reading these books which just make me despair more, but I guess atleast knowing a bit about the reality of our world is much better than being totally ignorant.
September 2, 2023
This book should be required reading for lawyers and law students. Don't sell your soul to the devil, and remember your ethical obligations!
October 19, 2022
8/10
Representing clients is one thing, getting in bed with them is another. This is the story of a law firm that has gotten so far into bed with its clients that the analogy breaks down for fear of becoming overly graphic.
Enrich shows the rise of this intrepid and upstart, yet principled, firm into a financial and political powerhouse over the course of several decades. In doing so, he outlines the changes to the legal profession, which has gone from an advisory role to a subservient one. Law firms have largely done this to themselves, as they seek profits, and can most easily get this by doing whatever the company they represent asks, no matter how duplicitous. I don't see an easy, or even a difficult way to decouple the incentive structure, aside from bringing in outside auditors, but shockingly, auditors have the exact same issue of bias and have arguably sold their collective souls to a greater degree than their bloodsucking cousins. The legal profession is largely a joke, still holding up the veneer of servants of truth and justice that they could at least partially claim 75 years ago. There is left that's worth admiring. They are now, like so many others, servants of corporate greed with less than one backbone in one thousand. If you think I'm being harsh, you should the read book, Enrich goes harder than I do. He essentially starts the book by asking what Tobacco companies, the catholic abuse scandal, Trump and nearly every other unsavory company have in common? They are all represented by Jones Day, of course. Their motto appears to be "aid and abet, but get compensated for it." This book was well written, and made me angry.
Johnson and Johnson was sued and chose to transfer the offending department into a separate company in Texas, and saddle it with debt and the lawsuit in what is now called The Texas Two Step. This would be hilarious if it wasn't somehow legal.
Representing clients is one thing, getting in bed with them is another. This is the story of a law firm that has gotten so far into bed with its clients that the analogy breaks down for fear of becoming overly graphic.
Enrich shows the rise of this intrepid and upstart, yet principled, firm into a financial and political powerhouse over the course of several decades. In doing so, he outlines the changes to the legal profession, which has gone from an advisory role to a subservient one. Law firms have largely done this to themselves, as they seek profits, and can most easily get this by doing whatever the company they represent asks, no matter how duplicitous. I don't see an easy, or even a difficult way to decouple the incentive structure, aside from bringing in outside auditors, but shockingly, auditors have the exact same issue of bias and have arguably sold their collective souls to a greater degree than their bloodsucking cousins. The legal profession is largely a joke, still holding up the veneer of servants of truth and justice that they could at least partially claim 75 years ago. There is left that's worth admiring. They are now, like so many others, servants of corporate greed with less than one backbone in one thousand. If you think I'm being harsh, you should the read book, Enrich goes harder than I do. He essentially starts the book by asking what Tobacco companies, the catholic abuse scandal, Trump and nearly every other unsavory company have in common? They are all represented by Jones Day, of course. Their motto appears to be "aid and abet, but get compensated for it." This book was well written, and made me angry.
Johnson and Johnson was sued and chose to transfer the offending department into a separate company in Texas, and saddle it with debt and the lawsuit in what is now called The Texas Two Step. This would be hilarious if it wasn't somehow legal.
August 30, 2025
A strongly researched work, Servants of the Damned, is an unsparing commentary on everything that is wrong with Big Law, with Jones Day as the object of inspection. I found the writing quite riveting, with Enrich's NYT storytelling skills apparent.
Enrich, possibly having met many victims of Jones Day's work and shaken by the extent of human misery the firm has enabled, pulls no punches. His thesis is that Big Law, particularly the likes of Jones Day, have mutated from being groups of officers of the justice system to entities enabling transfers of wealth to the powerful, irrespective of the means of that wealth. Big tobacco, opioid pushers, environmental polluters, Trump and his group; everyone who is damn powerful, or powerfully damned, has a friend in Jones Day.
The book, given Enrich's day job as an NYT reporter, is backed by strong research and extensive interviews with people who have seen the insides of Jones Day. Enrich managed to trace everyone from the granddaughter of Tom Jones (after whom the firm's named) to countless former employees who left on ethical grounds, or due to the firm's toxic culture. These human stories add significant depth to the critique.
That said, Enrich's strong views do at times appear a bit influenced by his political-liberal worldview, and his experience talking to the wide spectrum of Jones Day's victims. For example, he criticises almost all big law firms by calling out their problematic acts. Sometimes this doesn't land; for instance, criticism of Paul Weiss’s use of strongly worded letters to keep client info out of the press.
Nonetheless, the book is an insightful, pacy read, and must be picked up if you are interested in finding how big law firms may have become net negatives for the society at large. Particularly, if you are a lawyer (especially at big law), it is great to know of the harms you would eventually enable (at times). Even if one cannot avoid those harms, given the pressures of the profession, cognizance is important to neutralize those harms.
Enrich, possibly having met many victims of Jones Day's work and shaken by the extent of human misery the firm has enabled, pulls no punches. His thesis is that Big Law, particularly the likes of Jones Day, have mutated from being groups of officers of the justice system to entities enabling transfers of wealth to the powerful, irrespective of the means of that wealth. Big tobacco, opioid pushers, environmental polluters, Trump and his group; everyone who is damn powerful, or powerfully damned, has a friend in Jones Day.
The book, given Enrich's day job as an NYT reporter, is backed by strong research and extensive interviews with people who have seen the insides of Jones Day. Enrich managed to trace everyone from the granddaughter of Tom Jones (after whom the firm's named) to countless former employees who left on ethical grounds, or due to the firm's toxic culture. These human stories add significant depth to the critique.
That said, Enrich's strong views do at times appear a bit influenced by his political-liberal worldview, and his experience talking to the wide spectrum of Jones Day's victims. For example, he criticises almost all big law firms by calling out their problematic acts. Sometimes this doesn't land; for instance, criticism of Paul Weiss’s use of strongly worded letters to keep client info out of the press.
Nonetheless, the book is an insightful, pacy read, and must be picked up if you are interested in finding how big law firms may have become net negatives for the society at large. Particularly, if you are a lawyer (especially at big law), it is great to know of the harms you would eventually enable (at times). Even if one cannot avoid those harms, given the pressures of the profession, cognizance is important to neutralize those harms.
October 29, 2025
I am a Servant of the Damned. Some of my friends would say that this admission tells them nothing they did not already know. But others will wonder what I did to earn this colorful sobriquet. It was because of my partnership in the multi-national law firm, Jones Day, and more particularly because of my representation of a tobacco company as a litigation partner. And why was the firm – well respected internationally and a pillar of the Cleveland community – deemed so wicked? To get the full explanation, you need to read New York Times journalist David Enrich’s “Servants of the Damned: The Dark Side of American Law.”
While the devil is in the details (pun intended), Enrich’s reasons for writing an entire book to denounce a single law firm can be distilled into five main arguments. First, the firm leans conservative (although many of its lawyers actively support liberal causes) and, even worse, represented Donald Trump in connection with his 2016 Presidential campaign (although not in connection with later attempts to invalidate the election). Much of what Enrich found appalling about Jones Day is indistinguishable from what other large law firms are doing. But to a Times reporter, the firm’s embrace of conservative causes and its association with Trump made it an irresistible target.
Second, Jones Day is one of the biggest law firms in the world – with over 2,500 lawyers in 40 offices worldwide. There was a time when big was good – or, at least, not necessarily bad. Growth was perceived as a marker of success. If your business is attracting more clients or customers, you must be doing something right –or so the thinking went. But that’s now changed. Big is now synonymous with bad. If you want to condemn a company or an industry or a profession, you add the word “big” to your description. Thus, we have Big Tobacco, Big Pharma, Big Tech, Big Oil, and now Big Law. The operating assumption – which permeates Enrich’s book – is that the only way to become big is by engaging in predatory practices.
Third, Jones Day has represented clients that Enrich finds morally repugnant – a tobacco company, gun manufacturers, the now defunct Lincoln Savings Bank, Citizens United, pharmaceutical companies, and the team owner who moved the Browns out of Cleveland (although now, ironically, the firm is representing the city in its efforts to prevent the owner of the new Browns from leaving town). While never clearly articulated in the book, Enrich appears to argue that law firms should represent only morally worthy clients. But who gets to make those determinations? Enrich doesn’t say – although I suspect that he would readily volunteer to become America’s moral compass. Interestingly, Enrich concedes that murderers, rapists, arsonists, child molesters, and terrorists are entitled to representation. But he would deny counsel to large corporations. There’s a difference, he maintains, because of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel in criminal cases. But if the issue is – as he suggests – morality and not Constitutional imperatives, it is difficult to understand why it makes any difference whether a firm is representing a bad actor in a civil or a criminal proceeding.
Fourth, Enrich castigates the firm for representing its clients aggressively – by interviewing witnesses, taking depositions, preparing its clients to testify, seeking and demanding all relevant documents, and otherwise leaving no stone unturned in an effort to achieve the best possible result. But what exactly does Enrich propose to remedy that problem? That firms like Jones Day exert no more effort to win cases than the other side? That it permit its opponents to determine how much is appropriate to spend on litigation? Taken to its logical conclusion, Enrich’s reasoning would require the Yankees to field only its bench players when paired against the Guardians because big market teams have vastly more resources than small market teams. Moreover, Enrich conveniently ignores that Jones Day is primarily a defense firm. It does not typically initiate litigation against other parties but, rather, defends clients who have been sued. If you start a fight, you cannot dictate how your opponent responds – a harsh lesson that Hamas recently learned in Gaza.
In any event, the lawyers’ Code of Professional Responsibility not only allows, but actually requires lawyers to represent their clients zealously within the bounds of the law. On multiple occasions in the book, Enrich castigates the firm for preparing its witnesses to testify and for objecting to improper questioning. He suggests that there is something sinister about those practices. But every practicing litigator knows that it would be malpractice not to prepare witnesses to testify or to object to inappropriate questions.
In arguing that the firm institutionally exceeded ethical bounds, the best Enrich can do is point to a few cases – out of the thousands the firm has managed over the years – in which plaintiff-leaning judges have been critical of a handful of Jones Day lawyers. As I read that argument, I could not help wondering if Enrich would be just as unforgiving of the Times’ reporting missteps. In any event, Enrich grudgingly admits that other firms employ the same tactics (although he devotes only a few pages to their alleged misdeeds).
Enrich also ignores the legions of cases in which well-heeled plaintiffs’ lawyers are allowed by elected judges they financially support -- in jurisdictions deemed “judicial hellholes” by outside observers -- to request megabytes of information from corporate defendants; those requests are frequently tangentially relevant to the case(if at all), require thousands of hours to identify and produce, and yield documents that counsel never even bother to review. In Enrich’s world, there appears to be a different standard of conduct for litigants on what he considers the right side of an issue.
Reduced to its essentials, Enrich’s argument is that large corporations can afford to be more thorough than individual litigants. The argument proves too much. Even a century ago – in what Enrich seems to think was the golden age of the legal profession -- not every litigant could afford to retain Clarence Darrow. But not everyone can afford the best doctors or the most luxurious vacations or business class travel or the nicest houses either. If the imbalance of resources is a problem, it is an indictment of our justice system, not of the firm. In an effort to balance the scales, Congress and state assemblies have appropriated funds to provide free legal assistance to indigent criminal defendants and various forms of legal aid to impecunious civil litigants. If they haven’t done enough, the solution is to lobby for more aid, not to attack firms that vigorously defend their clients.
Fifth, Enrich complains about the firm assisting clients in areas other than litigation. But litigation always has been just a small part of the services lawyers provide for their clients. Law firms long have been involved in negotiating corporate transactions -- contracts, leases, mergers, etc. – and in tax planning. Enrich is particularly enraged by the firm’s involvement in shaping and in some instances resisting government regulation. But he never explains why it is inappropriate for lawyers to help understand how proposed legislation might affect their clients’ business and to try to effect changes that work for their clients’ benefit. Reduced to its essentials, Enrich’s argument is that the firm has shaped legislation in a way that he deems undesirable.
I readily acknowledge that I have biases that I bring to writing this review. But those biases pale in comparison to the prejudices that permeate Enrich’s book. Not that I am surprised. Enrich distorts the record in ways that you would expect from a New York Times reporter on a mission. All that you need to do is review the chapter headings to realize that Enrich is a man on a mission. Those headings include “Creating a Monster”; “Judas Day”; “Rogue Lawyers”; “Dirty, Dirty, Dirty”; “Trump’s Stallion”; “A Lawless Hobbesian Nightmare”; “Subsidizing Trump”; “Redefining Shamefulness”; and “Fearmongering.” Those headings make it clear that Enrich had no interest in being either fair or balanced.
“Servants of the Damned” is a self-reverential screed masquerading as investigative journalism. Instead of honest reporting, Enrich provides misleading anecdotes and half-truths. For example, he spends an entire chapter excoriating the firm for claims that it discriminated against women in its Irvine, California office. But when you get to the end of the chapter, you learn that the claims were flatly contradicted by the office’s personnel data and that, as a result, the complainants voluntarily dismissed their claims. Similarly, Enrich discusses retreats that R.J. Reynolds hosted for its lawyers as though they were Puff Daddy style freak-offs when – as I can attest -- the lawyers spent most of their time in day-long seminars and the most exotic activity was a round of golf.
Not content to vilify the firm, Enrich attacks several individual lawyers by name. His favorite tactic is to portray the firm’s principals as hypocrites by suggesting that their public positions are inconsistent with remarks they have made privately. But the allegedly contradictory remarks all come from anonymous (and unidentified) sources. To create the appearance of fairness, Enrich reports that he gave the targeted lawyers an opportunity to respond. But their explanations and – in most instances –outright denials are captured only in footnotes published in a typeface so tiny that one needs a microscope to read them.
Another favorite tactic is to distinguish the rank and file from the firm’s leaders. Only the latter, Enrich intimates, are truly evil. He reports that the lawyers in the trenches found their leaders morally reprehensible and were anxious to leave the firm. Yet, Enrich cites no evidence of a mass exodus from the firm – as you would expect if there was as much discontent as he suggested. Nor does he identify by name even a single lawyer who harbored that view -- not even a lawyer whose outrage at the firm’s moral depravity led him/her to go elsewhere, where he would no longer fear retribution if he spoke honestly.
On one level at least, it is unfortunate that the book devolved into polemics. The book contains an interesting discussion of the evolution of the legal profession during the second half of the 20th century and the beginning of this century. We learn, for example, that, while law firms were originally collections of solo practitioners, they later became an agglomeration of specialists, with different lawyers providing expertise in different areas of the law – an early form of one-stop shopping. There is a fascinating account of the impact on the legal profession of the Supreme Court’s decision in Bates invalidating restrictions on lawyer advertising and promotion. The book also offers an interesting account of Jones Day’s history – including some information of which I was not previously aware (and which I assume is truthful). In particular, Enrich provides a mostly accurate description of how the firm’s culture changed with each change in its managing partner. Regrettably, those passages represent only a small portion of the book.
Here’s the bottom line. If you self-identify as a victim; if you are a small businessman whose company was destroyed by Amazon; if you believe that the lawyer your spouse retained took you to the cleaners in your divorce proceedings; if you are one of those misguided souls who believes that all Republicans are Nazis and that President Trump is “literally Hitler”; if you delight in seeing the exalted humbled; if you think that Shakespeare got it right when he said “the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers”; or if you had the misfortune to be on the other side of Jones Day in litigation, this book is for you. Indeed, one of my delusional friends who falls into more than one of these categories could hardly wait to tell me about the book once he discovered it. But if you are looking for fair and balanced, you need to look elsewhere. Enrich brings all the objectivity to the book that you would expect from a Palestinian writing about Gaza. If I had written a comparable book about the predations of the sanctimonious New York Times and the rest of “Big Media,” I would be seeing an avalanche of editorials denouncing my conclusions as “hate speech.” But that’s essentially what “Servants of the Damned” is. Enrich is so blinded by his hatred of President Trump and Jones Day’s decision to represent him that he cannot see how biased he is. Instead, he filters this proud firm’s history of vigorously representing its clients and its sterling record of pro bono service through the prism of his hatred to produce a distorted and wildly inaccurate reflection of all that it has accomplished.
December 22, 2022
The 'big lie' in attorney-land is, "oh every person deserves zealous advocacy in the legal system, so if you criticize me for representing X you actually just don't believe in due process."
This is really only true for public defenders. Everyone else CHOOSES to represent their clients- for money or ideology. Usually money.
This isn't just a conservative lawyer issue. Neal Katyal, former US Solicitor General under Obama, chose to represent Nestle against (true) claims that they aided and abetted child slavery in west Africa.
And so what did we learn? The rich stay rich. Helping the rich pays very well. Justice is not served. The world turns.
This is really only true for public defenders. Everyone else CHOOSES to represent their clients- for money or ideology. Usually money.
This isn't just a conservative lawyer issue. Neal Katyal, former US Solicitor General under Obama, chose to represent Nestle against (true) claims that they aided and abetted child slavery in west Africa.
And so what did we learn? The rich stay rich. Helping the rich pays very well. Justice is not served. The world turns.
August 5, 2023
What started as a small law firm in Cleveland, Ohio over 100 years ago is now a behemoth with Jekyll/Hyde tendencies. In the 1930s, Jones Day advised one of its clients to do the right thing after an explosion that killed dozens and destroyed many properties. Today, the same firm battles for its customer no matter what many of us (AND some of the firm's lawyers) would consider ethical.
More than that, a plethora of its associates have shuttled between influential government positions and the firm such as fighting for 45's misguided beliefs of inappropriate voting and a stolen election.
Guaranteed to make you blood boil.
More than that, a plethora of its associates have shuttled between influential government positions and the firm such as fighting for 45's misguided beliefs of inappropriate voting and a stolen election.
Guaranteed to make you blood boil.
March 21, 2023
I have never been so unsurprised by anything in my entire life.
August 7, 2023
No comment other than a must read if you work in this world..
November 29, 2022
The central question addressed by this very readable book is the tension between law firms' claims that it is ethical to represent (and stand by) clients regardless of their perceived morality - the so-called "next cab off the rank" principle - and the reality that providers of advisory services have a huge amount of discretion both in whom they select and continue to represent as customers, and how exactly they choose to behave in the course of that relationship.
Jones Day is the perfect selection for exposing this dilemma - its roster including gun manufacturers, opiates peddlars, major polluters, a tobacco giant, purveyors of harmful healthcare products and of course, most recently and most notoriously, Donald J. Trump. Enrich traces the history and "stop whining" culture of the firm from its Cleveland roots where its foundational myths around ethical representation first developed through its rapid and rapacious growth in both footprint and service offering, and in so doing charts the wider evolution of legal services from its gentlemen's club origins and early squeamishness about advertising and competitive remuneration through to the relentless, billion-dollar global behemoths we recognise today, charting every moral and procedural barrier that was trampled in that journey - such as lobbying, signing bonuses, the aggressive dismantling of consumer class actions, and the highly problematic 'revolving doors' shuttling attorneys between the judiciary and regulatory agencies and the (presumably much more comfortable) offices in the upper levels of the white shoe titans' glitzy skyscrapers.
One could presumably find nasties among most large advisory providers' rolodexes - an account of McKinsey's last decade, for example, is surely in the works. There has also apparently (inevitably) been some pushback from Jones Day about the accuracy of the author's claims of how things played out in private within its lushly carpeted corridors, in particular about how partisan and right-wing its leadership truly is (and in his defence, he does cover its pro-bono work, some of which as he notes seems to directly contradict its more notorious fee-earning work). Although the narrative about this rightward tilt and how it made some of the firm's employees (and clients) feel is part of the story, in a way it is a distraction. Whom this outfit chose to work and what it chose to do for them is the starkest part of the account; here the facts speak for themselves: it is on these that most readers will make up their minds, and they are what troubles the mind most upon concluding its pages, especially in terms of how far and for how long their shadow will fall over American democracy for years to come.
After reading some recent books by journalists that have felt cobbled together and in need of a good edit, I also wanted to compliment this one for feeling cohesive, well-structured, persuasively written and with an excellent narrative flow.
Jones Day is the perfect selection for exposing this dilemma - its roster including gun manufacturers, opiates peddlars, major polluters, a tobacco giant, purveyors of harmful healthcare products and of course, most recently and most notoriously, Donald J. Trump. Enrich traces the history and "stop whining" culture of the firm from its Cleveland roots where its foundational myths around ethical representation first developed through its rapid and rapacious growth in both footprint and service offering, and in so doing charts the wider evolution of legal services from its gentlemen's club origins and early squeamishness about advertising and competitive remuneration through to the relentless, billion-dollar global behemoths we recognise today, charting every moral and procedural barrier that was trampled in that journey - such as lobbying, signing bonuses, the aggressive dismantling of consumer class actions, and the highly problematic 'revolving doors' shuttling attorneys between the judiciary and regulatory agencies and the (presumably much more comfortable) offices in the upper levels of the white shoe titans' glitzy skyscrapers.
One could presumably find nasties among most large advisory providers' rolodexes - an account of McKinsey's last decade, for example, is surely in the works. There has also apparently (inevitably) been some pushback from Jones Day about the accuracy of the author's claims of how things played out in private within its lushly carpeted corridors, in particular about how partisan and right-wing its leadership truly is (and in his defence, he does cover its pro-bono work, some of which as he notes seems to directly contradict its more notorious fee-earning work). Although the narrative about this rightward tilt and how it made some of the firm's employees (and clients) feel is part of the story, in a way it is a distraction. Whom this outfit chose to work and what it chose to do for them is the starkest part of the account; here the facts speak for themselves: it is on these that most readers will make up their minds, and they are what troubles the mind most upon concluding its pages, especially in terms of how far and for how long their shadow will fall over American democracy for years to come.
After reading some recent books by journalists that have felt cobbled together and in need of a good edit, I also wanted to compliment this one for feeling cohesive, well-structured, persuasively written and with an excellent narrative flow.
July 23, 2023
This excellent study of the evolution of the legal profession from one based on services to individual clients based on personal relationships and professionalism to giant law firms working on behalf of huge corporations to advance interests contrary to individual rights and government regulations is an excellent study that uses global super firm Jones Day as an example of this evolution. And it is an extreme example- a Cleveland firm dedicated to Cleveland clients that has become a global Goliath representing tobacco companies, big pharma, and the Trump administration. Gone is collegiality and a work life balance for junior attorneys in favor of huge salaries and billable hours driving 7 day work weeks. And gone is a sense of doing right for the world and the profession in favor of pushing the limits to gain advantage for wealthy clients. Well researched and comprehensive- an excellent read, especially if you have ever worked in a big law firm.
July 12, 2023
Extremely informative and quite depressing account of a firm I spent the first few years of my legal career at. Unfortunately nothing very surprising. Should be required law school reading. I would highly recommend, especially to my lawyer friends.
July 21, 2023
The book is quite obviously a negatively skewed portrait. The title itself “servants of the Damned“ doesn’t leave a lot of room for interpretation on what this book is going to be about. But it is condemning.
Overall well researched and the type of journalism you would expect from an NYT associated editor for better and for worse. It’s got a slant and perspective, but I trust the fact checking to be accurate.
I think aspirationally, this is a very interesting portrait of how the larger, multinational law firms have lost their way. It did not have to be primarily focused on Jones Day and the intro sets it up where it could be about Skadden or any one of the top BigLaw firms. And the author alludes to that. However, he makes the choice to focuses on Jones Day itself instead of the other big law firms that snort up top law school graduates like a frat boy consuming nose nachos on spring break. And I think the book is persuasively worse for it, if slightly more entertaining as a result.
What results is a specific look at Jones Day and their defense of high profile “bad actors“ of the corporate and political world. From Donald Trump and his ilk trying to overthrow the 2020 election. To the proactive protection of RJR Nabisco and Perdue Pharma. David paints a picture of a “have gun, will travel“ law firm that’s really only focused about meeting its bottom line.
But that’s also where this book felt like it lost its way. It’s too specific onto one firm for me to really buy into the whole industry claim. There’s the wrong combination of sort of a hand wavy Federalist Society Boogeymen, and a sort of inclusive hand gesture at all of the big law firms. Not that I don’t think other firms are engaging in similar behavior, but other firms aren’t representing Purdue Pharma, or trying to structurally lay claims to overthrow elections. And to make that claim as a sweeping generalization seems to require more evidence in this book put forth.
Is this book titillating and interesting, soaked in gossip and speculation about yearly bonuses in the millions, inter firm intrigue, and all sorts of John Grisham ask sensationalism? Yes, totally, and it was awesome for that. Do I think this book amounts to something that will change peoples minds and move the needle on the sorts of things that Jones Day and firms like it are doing? Probably not. If anything they will hang this out as a shingle, “we don’t give a shit, we’re good at law and if you’re paying us enough we will figure out how to defend you”. Wrongfully I think, but it doesn’t really matter. Ultimately, this is just sort of a transient expose. My best guess is that those who care enough to read this will have takeaways resembling a banker watching Wolf of Wall Street, and those who don’t care will never read this book. So I see this going more American psycho (inspiring people in grotesque irony) then Silent Spring to be frank.
Overall well researched and the type of journalism you would expect from an NYT associated editor for better and for worse. It’s got a slant and perspective, but I trust the fact checking to be accurate.
I think aspirationally, this is a very interesting portrait of how the larger, multinational law firms have lost their way. It did not have to be primarily focused on Jones Day and the intro sets it up where it could be about Skadden or any one of the top BigLaw firms. And the author alludes to that. However, he makes the choice to focuses on Jones Day itself instead of the other big law firms that snort up top law school graduates like a frat boy consuming nose nachos on spring break. And I think the book is persuasively worse for it, if slightly more entertaining as a result.
What results is a specific look at Jones Day and their defense of high profile “bad actors“ of the corporate and political world. From Donald Trump and his ilk trying to overthrow the 2020 election. To the proactive protection of RJR Nabisco and Perdue Pharma. David paints a picture of a “have gun, will travel“ law firm that’s really only focused about meeting its bottom line.
But that’s also where this book felt like it lost its way. It’s too specific onto one firm for me to really buy into the whole industry claim. There’s the wrong combination of sort of a hand wavy Federalist Society Boogeymen, and a sort of inclusive hand gesture at all of the big law firms. Not that I don’t think other firms are engaging in similar behavior, but other firms aren’t representing Purdue Pharma, or trying to structurally lay claims to overthrow elections. And to make that claim as a sweeping generalization seems to require more evidence in this book put forth.
Is this book titillating and interesting, soaked in gossip and speculation about yearly bonuses in the millions, inter firm intrigue, and all sorts of John Grisham ask sensationalism? Yes, totally, and it was awesome for that. Do I think this book amounts to something that will change peoples minds and move the needle on the sorts of things that Jones Day and firms like it are doing? Probably not. If anything they will hang this out as a shingle, “we don’t give a shit, we’re good at law and if you’re paying us enough we will figure out how to defend you”. Wrongfully I think, but it doesn’t really matter. Ultimately, this is just sort of a transient expose. My best guess is that those who care enough to read this will have takeaways resembling a banker watching Wolf of Wall Street, and those who don’t care will never read this book. So I see this going more American psycho (inspiring people in grotesque irony) then Silent Spring to be frank.
October 3, 2025
I’m not a traditional non-fiction reader, so my thoughts are purely based on my expectations prior to reading this book.
I was expecting a deep dive into biglaw, corruption, and the Trump administration. This was instead, for the most part, a deep dive into the history of one firm- Jones Day. While well researched and still containing interesting bits about corruption/quid pro quo that runs rampant in the field, it wasn’t what I was here to read. It is almost all through the lens of Jones Day, how various leaders within the firm handled issues/stewardship throughout the years and changing landscape of corporate law.
In short, I was expecting something more broad and specifically tied to Trump. The last section finally gets there, but I wasted 200 pages on biglaw politics at a single firm to get there.
I was expecting a deep dive into biglaw, corruption, and the Trump administration. This was instead, for the most part, a deep dive into the history of one firm- Jones Day. While well researched and still containing interesting bits about corruption/quid pro quo that runs rampant in the field, it wasn’t what I was here to read. It is almost all through the lens of Jones Day, how various leaders within the firm handled issues/stewardship throughout the years and changing landscape of corporate law.
In short, I was expecting something more broad and specifically tied to Trump. The last section finally gets there, but I wasted 200 pages on biglaw politics at a single firm to get there.
January 9, 2023
This is a really interesting book. Enrich outlines the history of the law firm Jones Day, showing how it grew from a small Cleveland operation to a large international organization. Initially lawyers thought it unseemly to solicit clients, but over the course of the 20th century the Supreme Court cleared the way for law firms to advertise, and it was off to the races. In pursuit of billable hours, Jones Day did not have many scruples about who they were willing to represent (RJ Reynolds, for example) or what ruthless tactics they would use to crush consumers who had been harmed by a company's product. Although historically its partners were not overtly political, in the 21st century a number of far right partners saw the opportunity to reshape the judiciary (with the help of the Federalist Society) by getting in bed with Donald Trump. The Trump years found many Jones Day partners in positions at the White House and Justice Department, having been given hefty bonuses on their way out the door, and ushered right back in when Biden won in 2022. I found it frightening how much power a single law firm was able to wield, but I am sure I am just naive.
February 21, 2023
Reads like true crime and I’m more disillusioned than ever at our corrupt capitalistic system can be at times - if you have the right law firm behind you.
Well researched look at how a “broad swath of American public policy has been handed over to non-elected Catholic extremists, who have killed the right to abortion, kneecapped the EPA, eroded the barrier between church and state…”
Equal part fascinating and frustrating. A lot of inside baseball on how law firms operate - especially the uber large firms, those parts can be skimmed if not interested. Glad I read it - opened my eyes wider.
Well researched look at how a “broad swath of American public policy has been handed over to non-elected Catholic extremists, who have killed the right to abortion, kneecapped the EPA, eroded the barrier between church and state…”
Equal part fascinating and frustrating. A lot of inside baseball on how law firms operate - especially the uber large firms, those parts can be skimmed if not interested. Glad I read it - opened my eyes wider.
February 23, 2023
This is right up my alley - dramatic telling of how one of America's premier law firms became the go-to for anti-democratic legal efforts. Good to stay on top of the good, honest work my buddies at Jones Day are doing
December 22, 2022
This should be included in every law school’s required reading.
December 30, 2022
Would have been a good chemo read.
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. - MLK
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. - MLK
February 20, 2024
Fascinating and frustrating at the same time. I've read quite a few legal books because it is my husband's profession and this is one of the best written for a lay audience.
December 31, 2024
If I become a big-law lawyer villain twenty years from now I can no longer say that I didn’t know what I got myself into
February 9, 2025
Pretty compelling read into the rise of huge corporate law firms and the tactics they use to overwhelm everyday people. Worth a read for anyone interested in the current practice of Law in the U.S.
March 30, 2025
The things that Jones Day is able to get away with… unbelievable.
July 10, 2025
really informative book. somewhat about the evolution of legal services into a capitalist cess pit, and somewhat about just how big of an ethical cess pit Jones Day is. don't expect this book to make you feel good.
November 19, 2025
Kind of predictable. But perhaps I take that view on account of the prevalence of BigLaw abdication of morality in 2025
August 17, 2023
This is a doozy of a book. Kudos to the author for lifting the veil on the “bad guys” who are reliably, consistently, creatively the “bad guys (and girls!)”.
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