Connecticut Employment Lawyer & Attorney : Daniel Schwartz : Stamford, Hartford New Haven, CT

In representing clients, I have, on occasion, had a client make a honest inquiry about the federal laws regarding age discrimination. Their question is something along the lines of: If discriminating against age is against the law, why can law firms insist on mandatory retirement policies?

The simple response is that partners at law firms have, historically, been viewed as owners/employers, rather than employees. But that view has been challenged in recent years by the EEOC's lawsuit against Sidley Austin LLP -- a case that settled in October 2007 for $27.5 million.  But it's always struck me how this rule is perceived as creating two different sets of rules -- one for lawyers and one for everyone else.

Business New Haven, a niche business publication in Connecticut (which is republished on Conntact.com), has an article in this week's issue about this very topic and how law firms in Connecticut are addressing this situation:

Connecticut law firms are practicing what the American Bar Association (ABA) has been preaching since last summer about retirement rules for partners.

And many have been doing it far longer than that, according to area attorneys.

In August 2007, the ABA's House of Delegates, its policy-making body, approved a resolution encouraging law firms to jettison mandatory age-based retirement policies for partners and "instead evaluate senior partners individually in accordance with their attributes and interests and the firm's generally accepted performance criteria."

The resolution deemed mandatory retirement policies "inconsistent with accepted employment practices, against public policy and not in the best interest of either law firms or their clients.

I spoke to the reporter in the case as part of her research into the subject a few weeks ago.  In the article, I discuss the effect that the ABA policy will have on mandatory retirement practices in general.

As I said there, I don't expect the ABA resolution to have any dramatic impact on law firms immediately. But the trend over the years has been to discourage such policies and focus instead on performance.  As society's concept of what is "old" continues to change, so too do law firm's concepts of what they need to do for succession planning and overall performance. 

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If your labor & employment attorney isn't returning phone calls over the next few days, odds are he or she is at the first annual ABA Labor  & Employment conference in Philadelphia.  I arrived this afternoon and discovered that over 1250 of my closest colleagues are here as well.

I had the opportunity to chat at the welcome reception tonight with NLRB Board Member Peter Schaumber.  Knowing him only by Board decisions, I found him a pleasure to talk with.  Regardless of political affiliation, you have to appreciate that he's charming, affable and has a breadth of knowledge on a variety of subjects. Too often, lawyers tend to depersonalize judges -- forgetting that behind each decision is a real person making difficult decisions. 

One item he mentioned was that the NLRB was actually holding a rare oral argument on one of its cases on Friday in Philadelphia. He was looking forward to it.  Thus, if you're at the conference, or in Philadelphia, it's worth a visit. The WorkPlace Prof prepared a thumbnail sketch of the case a short time ago. 
 
For practitioners and those interested in the subject, the conference has posted their program materials -- free of charge -- on the ABA website.  It's easily over 1000 pages worth of materials.  It's a treasure trove of information about cases, strategy, law and the like.  It's helpful not only to employer and employee lawyers, but to in-house counsel as well.

If you're at the conference, drop me an e-mail at daschwartz@ebglaw.com and perhaps we'll have an opportunity to meet in person. 

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