May 2024

Dear Fellows:

It is the time of year when the Polls have been released by the National Office. These Polls identify new candidates for Fellowship that have been submitted for approval by your State and Province Committees. I just completed my responses to the Poll for potential new Fellows from Maryland. It took only a few minutes and was easy to accomplish by opening the ACTL Website, logging in with my email address and password, and then clicking on the link for the Poll (which appears on the page once you have logged in). If no candidates have been submitted during this cycle from your State or Province, you will be so informed. If there are candidates from your State or Province, you will be directed to click the circles for your view of the candidate – Very Favorable or Favorable, Very Favorable or Favorable by Reputation, Unfavorable or Unfavorable by Reputation, Insufficient Knowledge, or Do Not Know the Candidate. And for those candidates you know, you will also be asked if you have worked with the candidate in the past, or tried cases in which the candidate was also involved. Finally, you can submit a more substantive response to the candidate’s nomination in your own words. I can tell you that as a former Regent, these Poll results from the local Fellows who know the candidates best were among the most important aspects of my recommendations for Fellowship.

We remind you that the results of these Polls are confidential, and only the Regent from your State or Province will know your identity and how you graded the candidates. The Regent will not share your identity with the full Board of Regents or anyone else. This promise of confidentiality is important to our process, and the Regents take it seriously. Please take the time to complete the Poll; it is an important step in our vetting process to ensure that the College is “opening its portals” only to the very best trial lawyers in your State or Province, who have met our criteria of being outstanding trial advocates and exhibited the highest professional standards for ethical conduct and collegiality.

Until two years ago, each State and Province Committee was given a deadline for submitting candidates either by March 15 or September 15. We have changed that practice and the State and Province Committees are now urged to submit candidates on both those dates. As a result, you may be asked to complete the Polls twice a year if your Committee has submitted one or more candidates by each of the two deadlines. The candidates that are being polled this spring will be submitted to your Regent when the Polls have closed, and they will be vetted again by the Regents before they are presented for approval to the full Board, assembled with our Past Presidents, just prior to our upcoming Annual Meeting in Nashville. 



Please complete the Poll found on your log in page of the ACTL website. If you have any difficulty in completing the process, someone on our National Office Staff can assist you. Best wishes to all for a beautiful spring and the resumption of Major League Baseball.  

Best regards,

William J. Murphy

ACTL President

The College’s fifth Diversity Trial Advocacy Program will take place in Chicago, Illinois on August 23-25, 2024, hosted by the offices of Kirkland & Ellis. Nominations of diverse lawyers who would benefit from the opportunity and the experience are welcome. The program is on a first-come basis and is capped at 50 participating lawyers. Volunteer faculty Fellows are also needed for this important and enjoyable program. To register a diverse litigator or to volunteer as faculty, contact Teaching Committee Chair Tom Heiden (thomas.heiden@retiredpartner.lw.com) or Jagoda Rachwal (jagoda.rachwal@kirkland.com).

If you have already taken the eBulletin survey, thank you! If you haven’t yet taken the survey, click on the link below before the survey closes tomorrow (Thursday May 2) at 3pm PT.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ACTLeBulletin



We appreciate your feedback!

Terri Mascherin, General Committee Chair and a host of the College Podcast, Trial Tested, will be awarded the Founder’s Award from The Chicago Bar Association’s Alliance for Women. The CBA’s Alliance for Women’s annual awards recognize outstanding women lawyers who have significantly contributed to the advancement of women in the legal profession or other areas, and whose careers exemplify the highest level of professional achievement, ethics, and excellence. 

General Committees

Boot Camp Trial Training Programs: The committee presented its full program to the lawyers of the Maryland Legal Aid Bureau in March. The program was presented in the ceremonial courtroom of the United States District Court for Maryland, in Baltimore. Approximately seventy-five young lawyers attended. On April 19, the Committee presented its program with The Advocates’ Society in Toronto. Next will be Greenville, South Carolina on May 17, followed by Miami on May 29.

Judicial Independence: The Committee recently issued two public statements in support of the judiciary. The first, Supporting Fair and Impartial Confirmation Hearings, was issued on March 29 to express our concern about the Senate’s hearings and deliberations regarding the nomination of Adeel Mangi to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. The second, Condemning Former President Trump’s Personal Attacks on Judges, was issued on April 2. Several judges have reached out to thank the College for supporting the judiciary.

National Trial Competition: The Committee recently convened in Houston, Texas for the final rounds of the National Trial Competition. Thirty of the best law school mock trial teams in the United States – each of which had prevailed in earlier regional rounds – squared off. After four days of intense competition, and for the fourth year in a row, a team from UCLA Law School captured the title. President Murphy and his wife Pat were honored guests, with President Murphy presiding over the final trial. The Committee is very much looking forward to celebrating the 50^th anniversary of the NTC in 2025.

State and Province Committees

Michigan: The Fellows will be hosting a Spring Casual Get Together on Thursday, May 9 at the Meadow Brook Hall in Rochester, Michigan. Additionally, the Michigan Fellows will be hosting the Region 9 Summer Meeting (Fellows from Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee) on June 21-23 at the Grand Traverse Resort in Traverse City, Michigan.

New Jersey: The Committee announced that the 2024 recipient of the Frank Dee Award will be Fellow Joe Hayden. The award will be presented at the summer gala on June 20.

Downstate New York: On March 26, the Fellows held a trial training program, in partnership with the Federal Bar Council, for lawyers interested in handling pro bono cases for the EDNY and SDNY. Opening and closing statements were covered. Participating Fellows included: Former Regent Larry Krantz, State Chair Mark Cohen, Judicial Independence Committee Chair Matt Fishbein, Moe Fodeman, Robert Jossen, Susan Kellman and Sandy Litvack. Another program will be held in June; those interested in participating as faculty can contact Larry Krantz at lkrantz@krantzberman.com. Additionally, on April 24, the Downstate NY Fellows issued a  Statement Regarding Governor Kathy Hochul’s Proposed Attempt to Divert $55 Million from the IOLA Fund of New York State.

Texas: The State Committee unanimously agreed to issue the following public statement on March 13: The Texas State Committee of the American College of Trial Lawyers Responds to the Texas Attorney General’s Personal Attacks on Travis County District Judge. 

We hope you are enjoying Did You Know, the new eBulletin feature brought to you by the Heritage Committee. This month’s entry celebrates the month of May being Asian American Heritage Month. 

DID YOU KNOW that the first recorded Asian American Fellow was Raymond W.J. Tam, who was inducted in 1980? Tam, from Hawaii, is a decorated trial lawyer and a trailblazer in U.S.-China relations. He is known for being a humanitarian and community leader as documented in a book about his life, A Saint Louis Man, The Story of Hawaii's Ray Tam. There is no official recognition of the first Asian American Fellow because the College did not collect race/ethnicity data until the early 2000s. Today, Fellows who identify as Asian make up less than 1% of the College.

Utah Fellows Dinner, Salt Lake City, Utah: March 20, 2024



President Murphy attended the Utah Fellows dinner on March 20 at Caffé Molise in Salt Lake City. State Chair Shawn McGarry served as emcee, with State Committee Vice Chair Juli Blanch organizing the dinner. There were around thirty Fellows and spouses/guests in attendance, including Regent Dan Folluo. President Murphy emphasized the need for younger, more diverse Fellows to be added to the ranks. The Judicial Independence program became a focus of discussion, including the need to be alert to unfair personal attacks on judges by politicians and others. The dinner's highlight was the introduction of former State Chair Andrew Morse (current Chair of the College's Jury Committee) for special recognition. 

North Carolina Fellows Meeting, Asheville, North Carolina: April 4-7, 2024



President-Elect Rick Deane travelled to the Tar Heel State for a meeting of the North Carolina Fellows at the historic Grove Park Inn in Asheville. State Chair James Wyatt, his wife Edna, and thirty-five Fellows and their spouses and guests were in attendance. At the reception on Thursday evening, President-Elect Deane, with an assist from Buddy Wester, Immediate Past Chair of the Judicial Independence Committee, addressed the process the College undertakes in issuing public statements such as the recent statement condemning threats against judicial officers. This was followed by a request for support for the College’s Diversity Trial Advocacy Program to be held in both Chicago and Toronto this year, and for next year’s Boot Camp program. The next day included an interesting program on the implications of AI and a fascinating presentation by Fellow Tim Barber who summited Mt. Kilimanjaro. The final day included remarks from the Honorable Allison Rushing, Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, who at her confirmation was the youngest federal judge in the nation, and a thought-provoking presentation about how reformation of our criminal justice system aligned with tenets of the world’s religions, including compassion and the search for truth.

Ohio Fellows Dinner, Columbus, Ohio: April 13, 2024



President Murphy and his wife Pat attended the Ohio Fellows Dinner, held at the Columbus Club. State Chair John McCaffrey presided over the short program and President Murphy provided remarks, mentioning the ongoing Strategic Planning and the recently completed National Trial Competition, in which Ohio Fellow Jim Curphey had participated as a Committee member. Former Regent and Foundation Secretary Kathleen Trafford was in attendance, along with husband and Fellow Buzz Trafford, who serves as Vice Chair of the Legal Ethics and Professionalism Committee. Outreach Committee Chair and State Committee Vice Chair Kim Herlihy was also present, whom President Murphy recognized as being a needed force of harmony during the national meeting sing-a-longs. 

The College has been notified of the passing of the Fellows listed below. The date after each name notes the year of induction into the College, and the date following the city is the date of his or her passing. A tribute to each will appear in the In Memoriam section of a subsequent issue of the Journal.

California

J. Michael Hennigan, ’08, Pasadena, April 6, 2024

Connecticut

Thomas W. Boyce, Jr., '93, Waterford, April 13, 3024

Illinois

Richard Phelan, ’82, Lake Forest, March 27, 2024

Iowa

Thomas D. Hanson, ’99, Des Moines, April 3, 2024

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