<p>so ive just started considering becoming a lawyer and i understand that a law degree can bring many different types of opportunities ur way</p>
<p>what exactly are the diff types of law out there (please define them) and what types of careers could i possibly end up with? </p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>Corporate Law, Environmental Law (IMO probably the most fun/worthwhile) Criminal Law (not sure it pays well) Real Estate Law (VERY competitive) Contract Law (Boring)
anyone else with a couple others?</p>
<p>Immigration - the practice consists mostly of filing petitions and attending hearings at the INS. Family law - the practice consists mostly of fighting over who gets what at the end of a marriage (and sometimes who gets custody of the kids). Personal injury - the practice consists of collecting medical bills and reports, writing demand letters, negotiating settlements, filing form complaints,engaging in discovery (i.e. answering written questions, producing copies of documents, asking detailed questions of a person who is under oath (or sitting there while someone questions your client), occasionally going to court for law and motion matters, and more rarely, for trial. Workers comp (people who specialize in this usually handle a high volume of cases; WC attorneys file applications, collect documents, and attend a lot of hearings before administrative law judges). Collections. Intellectual property: prosecuting patents (i.e. filing patent applications), applications for trademarks or copyrights; negotiating the terms and conditions of license agreements. Tax - advising people how to structure deals to minimize taxation. Landlord-tenant: this usually means evicting people who can't pay their rent; many big cities have a few attorneys who specialize in defending against eviction, or suing landlords for wrongful eviction. Landlord-tenant attorneys often spend a lot of time in court. Bankruptcy (often fairly hearing-ntensive). Securities. Mergers and acquisitions. Labor/employment law. Land use. Estate planning (drafting wills and setting up trusts). Entertainment law (negotiating and drafting contracts with a lot of IP considerations). Complex litigation (class action cases; plaintiffs' class-action attorneys are often looked upon by other attorneys the way the general public looks at all lawyers). </p>
<p>And I wouldn't call contract law boring. It's as creative as any other area of law.</p>
<p>And don't forget appellate law -- we clean up the mess all the other lawyers and judges made in the court below!!!</p>
<p>What about International Law? How does one go about getting into this sort of law?</p>
<p>Tlaktan,</p>
<p>I'm going to start with a couple of observations, and then state an assumption, before answering your question.</p>
<p>Observations:
1. Law practices often can't be neatly boxed into the categories we've been naming. I work in-house for an American corporation that publishes software; most of my time is taken up with reviewing, drafting and negotiating intellectual property license agreements with companies located predominantly in Asia. Does that make me a corporate attorney, an intellectual property attorney, a licensing attorney, a contract attorney, or an international attorney? Probably some mixture of the above.</p>
<ol>
<li> A lot of interesting work gets done in the intersections between bodies of knowledge. Knowing a fair amount about both gene splicing and patent law, for example, can put you in rare company professionally.</li>
</ol>
<p>Assumption: I'm guessing that by international law you mean a job something like mine, or with a law firm that advises on international business transactions. (There are a few specialists out there in international treaties, practicing in the U.N., or in The Hague, or Geneva, or a handful of other places. I can't tell you much about how to get those jobs.)</p>
<p>On to the advice (wrapped in one more observation): most people will tell you that their route to their job was circuitous, and marked with serendipity. Mine certainly was. My path involved some fairly serious foreign language study coupled with study of Asian history, followed by a year living in Asia before starting law school.</p>
<p>I also work in house as General Counsel for a corporation. We refer to ourselves as the "country doctors" of the legal profession. We have to know a little bit about everything so that we know enough to call in the specialists when we need to. I have always worked in house- when I got out of law school back in the middle ages, this was not as common as it is now. I had an undergraduate business degree and really wanted to be a contributor to an ongoing business and feel like a part of management. This can occur as a private lawyer at a firm, but I wanted to be a company-person. Generally, the pay isn't as good but the hours aren't quite as long as the partner-track. It is not a piece of cake, however. With corporate greed what it has become, a General Counsel's job can be pretty stressful.<br>
What I like is the variety of issues I handle every single day. I never know what is going to come up from one day to the next. I might have an employee with porn on his computer, a customer complaint, a class action lawsuit filed against us, a lease to review, etc. What I DON'T like is the way some companies view their legal departments. Sometimes the lawyers are well-respected and considered an integral part of any decision. At other companies the legal department is viewed as a pain in the a-- and an obstacle to getting business done.<br>
My advice to someone coming out of law school now would be to spend at least a few years at a good firm, even if you want to go in house later on. I often wish I had some law firm experience. I just didn't want to do it!
Karen</p>
<p>Then there are some delightfully arcane specialties such as art law, which is an umbrella term for everything from representing individual artists in contract, copyright, and many other types of issues, to representing museums, etc. It's the one I wish I had pursued, but is a very small niche. one of my "mom" (mother of daughter's friend) friends is general counsel at a major university, which as you can imagine touches on a million different types of law. Also, the type of clients you have can REALLY affect how boring or exciting your practice is. I worked for a summer in Santa Fe and Albuquerque, New Mexico, for a firm which represented a number of Native American tribes in the region. Although the issues were sometimes generic, such as contracts, government regulations, etc.--the opportunity to become part of a very rich culture through work with the tribal leaders was incredibly interesting. During summer festivals at the reservations, we were invited into homes and made to feel part of the family because of the relationships we had formed. </p>
<p>oh and Greybeard--it is just so great when another lawyer demeans your own specialty without knowing anything about it or the varieties of practice within it, as you did.</p>
<p>whats general counsel?</p>
<p>Patient,</p>
<p>I'm guessing that your complaint ("oh and Greybeard--it is just so great when another lawyer demeans your own specialty without knowing anything about it or the varieties of practice within it, as you did") relates to the following statement of mine:</p>
<p>"Complex litigation (class action cases; plaintiffs' class-action attorneys are often looked upon by other attorneys the way the general public looks at all lawyers)."</p>
<p>You shouldn't assume that I know "nothing about your own specialty or the varieties of practice within it." I don't claim to be an expert on class action litigation, but I do have an informed acquaintance with it from managing litigation in-house. </p>
<p>Second, why assume that my statement was demeaning? Do I demean the legal profession by recognizing the unfortunate fact that the general public holds it in lower regard than I do? </p>
<p>Your classification of my remark as "demeaning" tacitly acknowledges that you're aware of the general public's view of lawyers. Are you unaware that other lawyers are "often" (my word) similarly prejudiced against plaintiffs' class-action attorneys?</p>
<p>Let me give you a couple of anecdotes that illustrate the prejudice:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I heard an in-house attorney say recently that if me met a man at a ****tail party who told him he was a plaintiff-side class-action attorney, he would refuse to shake his hand. </p></li>
<li><p>I once heard several hundred in-house attorneys burst into enthusiastic applause over the news that Milberg Weiss paid $50 million to settle an abuse of process suit.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>By the way - I didn't join in the applause. </p>
<p>Regards,</p>
<p>Greybeard</p>
<p>Can I confess to being amused by the software's insertion of four asterisks in place of the first syllable of the word for the sort of party where mixed drinks are served?</p>
<p>Jeparlefrancais,</p>
<p>A General Counsel is the head lawyer for a corporation or other entity.</p>
<p>----BACK to what the other guy said about types of law...</p>
<p>I want to choose between Corporate, Environmental and International law [if i wanna go to law school that is...]</p>
<p>now can Anyone <em>briefly</em> summarize each branch for me? [like what does it involve in...]</p>
<p>and in your opinion, rank each branch of law from the most FUN and EXCITING to the most BORING and TEDIOUS</p>
<p>THANK YOU !</p>