Meet the Chancery Bar

The Court of Chancery may set the rules for corporate America, but the lawyers who argue before it belong to a strikingly small club. The Delaware corporate bar is a tight community of specialists who know the judges, the precedents, and one another intimately, and who handle a caseload wildly out of proportion to their numbers.

Membership is not easily won. Delaware requires lawyers to be admitted to its own bar, and out-of-state firms bringing a major dispute almost always partner with Delaware counsel who can navigate local practice. That arrangement keeps a steady stream of the country's biggest corporate fights flowing through a few Wilmington firms.

The work rewards a particular temperament. Chancery litigation moves fast, turns on dense questions of fiduciary duty, and is decided by judges who have seen every argument before. Flashy courtroom theatrics count for little; precise written advocacy counts for almost everything.

For young lawyers, a clerkship with a vice chancellor is among the most coveted credentials in corporate law — a front-row seat to the reasoning that the rest of the country will later be required to follow.