So here I am, waiting to start at a law firm next week. And now that I'm through with my clerkship, of course, I'll be free to have a blog again. But that's the question . . . .
Blogging takes time. Not necessarily all that much time, depending on the number of posts and the level of research and thoughtfulness that goes into each one. But it still takes time. When I was a judicial clerk (for those few happy weeks when I was allowed to run a blog before someone accused me of being too "partisan"), I had lots of time to run a blog. As long as I did my work (I typically handed in opinion drafts to my judge within 2 or 3 days of oral argument), I was free to use any extra time for my own writings.
At a law firm, however, one is typically expected to bill a certain number of hours. It's not expected that one will finish early on a consistent basis and then spend the rest of the day on other writings. And at home, I have a wife and two small children who expect and deserve my time. So I'm not sure how the whole time issue will work out in the long run. We'll see. . . . But heck, some of the bigtime bloggers take plenty of time off when their schedule demands -- Virginia Postrel is on another hiatus now; the mighty Instapundit is on his second vacation this summer, James Lileks is taking off for a while, etc., etc. I hereby reserve the right to do likewise.
P.S. How can I say that I had so much time as a clerk? Well, the D.C. Circuit hears the fewest cases per judge of any circuit in the country, and despite what some D.C. Cir. clerks might say about how awfully complex all their cases are, I can say from experience (having clerked first in the Sixth Circuit) that the average difficulty in the D.C. Circuit is no higher. As a Sixth Cir. clerk, I had a death penalty case that was more work than any two D.C. Cir. cases I saw put together (although that was in large part because the guy's lawyer threw about 40 issues into a 110 page brief -- and in a death case, everything has to be considered meticulously). Anyway, there was plenty of time.
Blogging takes time. Not necessarily all that much time, depending on the number of posts and the level of research and thoughtfulness that goes into each one. But it still takes time. When I was a judicial clerk (for those few happy weeks when I was allowed to run a blog before someone accused me of being too "partisan"), I had lots of time to run a blog. As long as I did my work (I typically handed in opinion drafts to my judge within 2 or 3 days of oral argument), I was free to use any extra time for my own writings.
At a law firm, however, one is typically expected to bill a certain number of hours. It's not expected that one will finish early on a consistent basis and then spend the rest of the day on other writings. And at home, I have a wife and two small children who expect and deserve my time. So I'm not sure how the whole time issue will work out in the long run. We'll see. . . . But heck, some of the bigtime bloggers take plenty of time off when their schedule demands -- Virginia Postrel is on another hiatus now; the mighty Instapundit is on his second vacation this summer, James Lileks is taking off for a while, etc., etc. I hereby reserve the right to do likewise.
P.S. How can I say that I had so much time as a clerk? Well, the D.C. Circuit hears the fewest cases per judge of any circuit in the country, and despite what some D.C. Cir. clerks might say about how awfully complex all their cases are, I can say from experience (having clerked first in the Sixth Circuit) that the average difficulty in the D.C. Circuit is no higher. As a Sixth Cir. clerk, I had a death penalty case that was more work than any two D.C. Cir. cases I saw put together (although that was in large part because the guy's lawyer threw about 40 issues into a 110 page brief -- and in a death case, everything has to be considered meticulously). Anyway, there was plenty of time.
posted by Stuart Buck at
9:28 AM
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