Sullivan and Cromwell

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AP? 6 26

Trump taps James M. McDonald as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York

Nation Jun 13, 2026

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Saturday that he will appoint one of his personal lawyers to serve as the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, filling a pending vacancy after Trump tapped the man currently in the job to be director of national intelligence.

James M. McDonald, a former federal prosecutor in the office he had been picked to run, served as a financial regulator during Trump's first term and worked in the White House counsel's office in President George W. Bush's administration.

A partner at the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, McDonald is part of the legal team handling Trump's pending appeal of felony convictions in New York related to hush money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential election.

Trump said Saturday he would name McDonald to the role of U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, one of the most influential positions in the Justice Department. He would replace Jay Clayton, whom Trump put forward this week as his pick for the director of national intelligence.

McDonald's perch as U.S. attorney would give him oversight of arguably the most prestigious of the Justice Department's prosecution offices, with a vast portfolio ranging from terrorism and espionage cases to security fraud and public corruption.

McDonald was also part of the legal team that last month secured a favorable outcome for Indian billionaire Gautam Adani when the Trump administration Justice Department dropped a fraud and conspiracy case that had been brought under the Biden administration.

McDonald has also served as director of enforcement at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission during Trump's first term in office and was deputy associate counsel in the White House under Bush.

"I am confident that Jamie will deliver strong results for our Country," Trump posted Saturday about McDonald on the Truth Social platform.

Nicholas Biase, spokesperson for the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan, said it "welcomes the President's choice to lead the SDNY. Mr. McDonald is widely respected."

Trump's announcement on Clayton came as pressure increased from Congress to name a permanent replacement for Tulsi Gabbard, who announced her resignation as national intelligence director last month. Trump faced intense pushback over his decision to name Bill Pulte, head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, as acting director.

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8 22

https://www.cnn.com/**2022/08/**22/politics/dark-money-donation-conservative-group-invs/

cnn

A new group led by a prominent conservative lawyer has received $1.6 billion from one donor -- the largest single contribution to a politically focused nonprofit that's ever been made public, and a fortune that could be used to fuel right-wing interests.

The nonprofit, Marble Freedom Trust, received the contribution in the form of stock and then funneled more than $200 million to other conservative organizations last year, a tax form CNN obtained from the IRS shows.

Marble Freedom is led by Leonard Leo, the co-chairman of the conservative Federalist Society, who advised former President Donald Trump on his Supreme Court picks and runs a sprawling network of other right-wing nonprofits that don't disclose their donors, which are often referred to as dark money groups.

A CNN review of financial documents connected the donation to Barre Seid, a low-profile, 90-year-old Chicago electronics company executive and philanthropist who has previously been tied to smaller anonymous contributions to other right-wing groups. The New York Times, which first reported the contribution on Monday, also identified Seid as the donor.

the massive donation instantly makes the Utah-based group one of the most well-funded organizations bankrolling conservative causes in the US -- a staggering distinction for a group with zero public profile or even a website. In comparison, the single contribution is more than double the total amount raised by Trump's presidential campaign committee during the entire 2020 election cycle.

Robert Maguire, the research director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, called the donation "stupefying," and "by far" the largest known contribution to a dark money political group.

"I've never seen a group of this magnitude before," Maguire said. "This is the kind of money that can help these political operatives and their allies start to move the needle on issues like reshaping the federal judiciary, making it more difficult to vote, a state-by-state campaign to remake election laws and lay the groundwork for undermining future elections."

Leo said in a statement that "it's high time for the conservative movement to be among the ranks of George Soros, Hansjörg Wyss, Arabella Advisors and other left-wing philanthropists, going toe-to-toe in the fight to defend our Constitution and its ideals" -- referring to two liberal-leaning billionaires and a consulting firm that manages several smaller dark money groups on the left.

Seid did not respond to requests for comment left on phone numbers listed for him and his longtime assistant.

Huge anonymous donation has ties to Chicago executive

"Dark money" generally refers to nonprofits that get involved in politics but do not disclose their donors, a practice that significantly ramped up after the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision in 2010. Many dark money groups, like Marble Freedom, are 501(c)4 organizations -- nonprofits that are allowed to participate in politics as long as it is not their primary activity.

Groups on both sides of the political spectrum have increasingly turned to dark money in recent years to sway voters or push agendas without revealing their ultra-wealthy benefactors -- but the Marble Freedom donation dramatically eclipses even the largest of the previously known groups.

Marble Freedom's tax return covers its initial year of existence between May 2020 and April 2021. The gift of just over $1.6 billion came in the form of 100% of the stock of a privately held company, which Marble Freedom then sold to another company, according to the tax form.

The arrangement likely saved Seid a large amount of money in taxes, according to Marcus Owens, an attorney and former director of the IRS division on tax-exempt organizations, who reviewed the form for CNN. If Seid had personally sold the stock in the company, he would likely have had to pay capital gains tax on the proceeds of the sale. By donating the stock to Marble Freedom, he avoided having to pay that tax, and the nonprofit would be exempt from paying it.

Marble Freedom wrote that it was withholding information about which company was donated and who it sold to because "disclosing it would effectively disclose the identity of its donors."

Supreme Court issues rare emergency order favoring voters challenging elections rules

But details about the donation connect it to the sale of the Chicago-based electrical device firm Tripp Lite, whose longtime chairman was Seid.

After receiving the donated stock, Marble Freedom sold the company on March 17, 2021, according to the tax form. The same day, according to Securities and Exchange Commission documents, the American-Irish power company Eaton acquired Tripp Lite for $1.65 billion.

During the sale, "the sole shareholder of Tripp Lite" was represented by New York law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, Law360 reported at the time. Less than two weeks later,Marble Freedom paid Sullivan & Cromwell $940,000 in legal fees, the tax form shows. A spokesperson for Eaton said the company would not provide more details about the acquisition, and several lawyers involved in the transaction did not respond to requests for comment.

Seid served as chairman and CEO and listed himself as the "owner" of Tripp Lite in federal campaign donation records from 2008. He worked at the company, which produces power strips, surge protectors and other devices, for more than 50 years, according to a Facebook post from Tripp Lite. He grew up in Chicago, the son of immigrants from Russia, according to Census records, and graduated from the University of Chicago.

Seid has previously had a history of donating anonymously to conservative political groups and causes. An internal 2015 document from the Bradley Foundation, a right-wing nonprofit, stated that the conservative think tank Foundation for Government Accountability had received support from "Barre Seid (anonymously)." The document was part of a trove of records from Bradley that was hacked and released, and was later included as an exhibit in Senate testimony.

In addition, Salon reported in 2010 that "Barry Seid" was listed in tax documents as the identity of an anonymous donor who gave nearly $17 million to a group that produced an anti-Islam documentary and sent DVDs of the movie to millions of households during the 2008 election. An assistant for Seid told Salon that he did not contribute to the organization, although she didn't address whether he made the donation by routing it through another group.  

And publicly released emails suggest that Seid may also be the anonymous donor who pledged $20 million over five years to George Mason University's law school in order to rename it for former Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia in 2016. The emails were obtained through a public records request and published by George Mason Law alum Allison Pienta in 2019. The school has refused to identify the donor but has said that Leo coordinated the gift.

Seid and his wife make public donations through another nonprofit, the Barbara and Barre Seid Foundation, which mostly funds Chicago-based cultural organizations and universities but has given to conservative and libertarian groups such as the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the Heartland Institute. Seid also donated to various political campaigns in Illinois and elsewhere in the 1990s and 2000s.

Big spending and opaque groups

Even in its infancy, Marble Freedom Trust has already funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to other dark money groups.

Leo, Marble Freedom's chairman and trustee, is one of the most influential figures in the world of conservative dark money. A longtime executive at the Federalist Society, a national network of right-leaning lawyers, Leo has led or served on the board of more than a dozen different nonprofits. Several of his groups have been associated with political campaigns promoting conservative Supreme Court nominees, operating in complex networks of spending.

The new $1.6 billion donation "solidifies Leo as just an absolute gravitational force within the conservative political and legal world," Maguire said. "He was already the man behind the scenes raising money for reshaping the American judiciary, and this amount of money just takes it to a stratospheric level."

'I don't say his name, ever': Vulnerable Republicans seek to avoid Trump in 2022 midterms

On the Marble Freedom tax form, Leo is listed as being paid a $350,000 annual salary for 25 hours a week of work for the group.

The form states that the group's mission is to "maintain and expand human freedom consistent with the values and ideals set forth in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States." While politics can't be its primary focus, it can use at least some of its huge resources to influence this year's midterms or future elections.

"This is such a significant amount that it would be a game-changer if they do decide to devote even a portion of that to election-related spending," said Anna Massoglia, the Editorial and Investigations Manager at OpenSecrets, a group that researches campaign finance.

Marble Freedom reported making four donations to other nonprofits -- transactions that appear to have taken place between the sale of the stock in mid-March 2021 and the end of April 2021.

The largest contribution was a $153 million gift to the Rule of Law Trust, a dark money nonprofit led by Leo that has funded other conservative organizations. The group's tax returns show it received just under $80 million in donations in 2018 and no contributions in 2019 or 2020, so the gift from Marble Freedom represents a massive funding boost for the organization.

Marble Freedom contributed $41.1 million to Donors Trust, a nonprofit that distributes money to conservative and libertarian groups in addition to nonpolitical organizations. The group is a donor-advised fund, which means its contributors can recommend where their donations to the fund are sent. 

In the past, Donors Trust has funneled millions of dollars to groups that have amplified false claims about election fraud and advocated for more restrictive voting rules. The group has previously said that its donations are intended to "serve the public good."

Marble Freedom also donated $16.5 million to The Concord Fund, a nonprofit that has advocated for conservative nominees to the Supreme Court and other judgeships and is associated with a group that has pushed restrictive voting laws. Concord, which was previously known as the Judicial Crisis Network, raised $20.4 million from July 2019 to June 2020, according to its most recent tax return.

In addition to the three groups with political connections, Marble Freedom gave $18 million to Schwab Charitable Fund, another donor-advised fund.

Marble Freedom lists two other board members in addition to Leo, both of whom are unpaid.One is Tyler Green, the former solicitor general of Utah, who has represented the Republican National Committee and other GOP groups in multiple voting-related lawsuits in recent years. Green, who is listed as Marble Freedom's administrative trustee, is also a former law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The trust's address is listed as a home in North Salt Lake, Utah, that Green owns.

The board's third member is Jonathan Bunch, a former Federalist Society vice presidentwho has been involved with various groups led by Leo. Bunch is listed as Marble Freedom's successor trustee. Green and Bunch did not respond to requests for comment.

At the end of April 2021, Marble Freedom had more than $1.4 billion in assets -- positioning it to play a major role in conservative causes potentially for years to come.

"This group is emblematic of the corrosion and the breakdown of our campaign finance system," Maguire said -- and how it gives "wealthy donors, whether they be corporations or individuals, access and influence over the system far greater than any regular American can ever imagine."

CNN's Yahya Abou-Ghazala contributed to this report.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/5/29/1667026/-Cromwell-Sullivan-United-Fruit-Dulles-Gang-Banana-Republics-SEC

U.S. role in creating “banana republics”, the United States learned to love bananas, they were even portrayed as a weapon of war against Communism:

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Latin American governments were characterized by economic policies that allowed for liberal foreign investments from wealthy countries like the United States. Military dictators led a number of these Latin American governments. The United Fruit Company (UFCO), an extremely successful American owned and run company, profited greatly from investments it made in Guatemala. The business of United Fruit was bananas, and from bananas it had built a business empire in the Central American nations of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama.

The United States government was also interested in bananas, and had sponsored initiatives to promote the fruit in the American diet. Guatemala became known as a “banana republic,” a disdainful term for poor, developing countries that relied on a single cash crop, such as bananas, and were ruled by corrupt governments. Under the Guatemalan dictator Jorge Ubico, the United Fruit Company gained control of 42% of Guatemala’s land, and was exempted from paying taxes and import duties. Seventy-seven percent of all Guatemalan exports went to the United States; and 65% of imports to the country came from the United States. The United Fruit Company was, essentially, a state within the Guatemalan state. It not only owned all of Guatemala's banana production and monopolized banana exports, it also owned the country's telephone and telegraph system, and almost all of its railroad track.

The United Fruit Company was well connected to the Eisenhower administration. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and his New York law firm, Sullivan and Cromwell, represented the company. Allen Dulles, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and brother of John Foster Dulles, had served on UFCO's Board of Trustees and owned shares of the company. Ed Whitman, the company's top public relations officer, was the husband of Ann Whitman, President Eisenhower's private secretary. Ed Whitman produced a film, Why the Kremlin Hates Bananas, which depicted UFCO fighting on the front line of the Cold War. The company’s efforts paid off. It picked up the expenses of journalists who traveled to Guatemala to learn its side of the crisis, and some of the most respected North American publications, including the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, New York Herald Tribune, and New Leader, ran stories that pleased the company.

www.umbc.edu/…

The revolutions began in 1944, first in El Salvador:

The authoritarian and eccentric General Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez became president of El Salvador after a military coup overthrew the freely elected government of Arturo Araujo in 1931. After ordering the killing of thousands of peasants and political dissidents during his first two terms, Martinez suspended the constitution in early 1944 and declared he would serve a third without an election. An armed revolt by dissident military and other elite elements that April was quickly crushed, but, on May 5, students organized a general strike that crippled most of the economy and civil society. Mass rallies formed spontaneously and nonviolent protesters stormed the National Palace. Humiliated and isolated, Martinez fled to Guatemala on May 11.

www.nonviolent-conflict.org/…/

And spread to the United Fruit domain in Guatemala:

UFCO had its fingers in almost every pie in Guatemala. UFCO had the unconditional support of right-wing dictators who maintained their power by terrorizing the people and arresting prominent citizens who were either killed on the spot or tortured in prison to extract confessions. During one wave of repression under Jorge Ubico, hundreds were killed in just two days.

In 1944, the people of Guatemala overthrew the right-wing dictator then in power, Jorge Ubico. Guatemala held its first true elections in history. They elected Dr. Juan Jose Arevalo Bermej to the presidency. A new constitution was drawn up, based on the U.S. Constitution. Arevalo was a socialist and an educator who built over 6,000 schools in Guatemala and made great progress in education and health care.

rozylowicz.com/…

I utterly hate the Dulles Brothers and their nasty legacy of U.S. interference in the Middle East, the coup deposing democratically elected Mohamed Mossedegh in Iran; Africa, the coup deposing democratically elected Patrice Lumumba in Congo, the Dulles brother interference in Central America, their close interlinking with Sullivan & Cromwell.

Why am I kicking up a fuss about this old American history? A little news clip of the latest from the Trump administration, it involves the SEC:

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission chief Jay Clayton is expected to name Steven Peikin, a partner from his former law firm, to help lead enforcement at the agency, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Clayton worked with Peikin at Sullivan & Cromwell, noted for its representation of financial institutions, until the former left to become SEC chair.He was confirmed earlier this month.

www.reuters.com/…

Given its history with the Dulles Gang, I cannot like Sullivan & Cromwell. It seems that Sullivan & Cromwell has a little problem with fiduciary responsibility, as well:

wallstreetcrusader48.wordpress.com/…

It figures!

kinzer: managing partner (both bros) one joined 1917 cuba sugar, cement, mines (liberal party won election, conservative refused to give up power; revolution JF D went to DC to see uncle bert, sec of state robt Lansing; send 2 warships, next am did, 6K marines; occupied cuba several years .

schroeder bank (alan on bd) broken up, part in UK

iran nationalized oil (one co, schroeder) anglo-iranian --> BP mossadec

guate land reform UFC (schroeder) arbenz

s&C voted to close german office, but JF backdated a year? anti-bolshie (alan met hitler, JF jealous) krystalnacht said to be protecting for investment.

JF fronted for german bonds (900m$) in 30's, alan visited germany, less enchanted

founders in 20's council of for relations: ny now just a TT; tiny elite prep school ivy league, law firm invest banks pals (state dept embryonic) cf logo: pegasus; ubiquay "everywhere"

stub http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Sullivan_%26_Cromwell

http://www.politicalfriendster.com/showPerson.php?id=1841&name=Sullivan-and-Cromwell

http://ce399fascism.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/united-fruit-company-sullivan-and-cromwell-dulles-cia-guatemala/

JFD sr partner in which worked for bank tie to guate RR IRCA sullivan and cromwell

JF helped UF buy RR to keep out competitiors 106 Allen also helped, on bd of bank

JM cabot owned stock in UF; wife of UF pr guy whitman was Ike sec; amb robt hill costa rica

Kermit turned down coup job; internal fights, cork said UF must be involved?

arbenz bribe failed; wisner asst tracy barnes [julian?]

US cut off guata arms when wd not sign____; bought from czech, mostly old german junk but PO'd US

(earlier aborted Op Success had planted ussr arms?)

Armas tried to deal w/ US but Peurifoy an ~ commie dick

cia pirate radio (offical station down for repairs on critical day in coup, so pirates stole freq]

c?ia bombed missionary radio in screwup

diaz put in as pres but not acceptable to US armas and monzon almost fought?

armas shut unions, labor code changed

cia went after sukarno in indonesia and castro

UFC did not prosper, antitrust suit by state dept (despite moveWhy the Kremlin hates bananas 229

merger, ceo jumped out 44th floor of pan am bldg

rmn visited armas guate 55 corruption, casinos,

armas shot by guy wo apparnetly killed self

cia trained cubans in guate, later berets trained ~ insurgents (origin in Op success) 30K kia 1966

80's army became a caste, death squads

1400pp rept 36 yrsm, 150K killed m 50k disappeared (Bp author beat? to death 2 days later) 264

later study said 93% of death caused by gov, backed by US gov and biz

bitter fruit steve schlesinger and st kinzer Harv UP 1999

Dulles bros paid atten after UF land taken (it was mostly unused, they had way more than needed even if some fallow ~ disease

and they were offered compensation

wiki:[note wiki defend brown bro h on nazi]

Sullivan & Cromwell LLP is an international law firm headquartered in New York. The firm has approximately 800 lawyers in 12 offices, located in financial centers in the United States, Asia, Australia and Europe. Sullivan & Cromwell was founded by Algernon Sydney Sullivan and William Nelson Cromwell in 1879. The firm consistently ranks as one of the most prestigious law firms in the world, ranking as the 4th most prestigious in the 2013 Vault law firm rankings.

Contents

History

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2011)

Founding

From its earliest involvement in the formation of Edison General Electric Company in 1882 and United States Steel Corporation in 1901, to its present work with leaders of the global economy in the 21st century, the firm has been closely involved in the affairs of some of America's, and now the world's, greatest industrial, commercial and financial enterprises. Sullivan & Cromwell's efforts to bring about the building of thePanama Canal are chronicled in David McCullough's book, The Path Between the Seas. The firm represents the Panama Canal Authority to this day.

1929–1969

The Great Depression and its aftermath reoriented much of Wall Street, and Sullivan & Cromwell was called on to assist clients in confronting a burst of government involvement in business affairs and a new wave of business-related litigation. During this period the firm developed its expertise in defending shareholder derivative litigation and antitrust actions, and was among the first law firms to develop expertise in the field of federal income tax law. A series of new federal statutes, beginning with the Securities Act of 1933, was enacted to regulate the investment industry, and Sullivan & Cromwell prepared the first major registration statement under the Securities Act. The firm's substantial involvement in, and important contributions to, securities offerings and securities regulation have continued since that time.

Sullivan & Cromwell partner Rogers Lamont was the first American to die in World War II. Lamont had worked in the firm's Berlin office in the early 1930s and had seen the horrors of Nazi Germany firsthand. Lamont resigned from the firm in 1939 and joined the British Army. Lamont was killed at Dunkirk on May 27, 1940.On the other hand, Sullivan & Cromwell did business with I.G. Farben (the chemical manufacturer of ‘Zyklon-B’ poison gas used in the Nazi death camps) and its associated Nazi-era corporations. Their chief contact at the firm was an attorney named John Foster Dulles, who later became Secretary of State in the Eisenhower Administration. “Sullivan and Cromwell thrived on its cartels and collusion with the new Nazi regime,” say the firm’s chroniclers. In 1933 and 1934, when the Nazis' brutal course was obvious,Dulles led off cables to his German clients with the salutation, “Heil Hitler”. In 1935, he scribbled a screed for the Atlantic Monthly magazine dismissing Nazi state terrorism as “changes we recognize to be inevitable.”

During and after World War II, individual members of the firm, including partners such as John Foster Dulles and Arthur Dean, also played important roles in domestic politics and international affairs. In 1935, Dulles closed Sullivan & Cromwell's Berlin office; later he would cite the closing date as 1934. Sullivan & Cromwell's litigation department was led for many years by Harlan Fiske Stone, before he left the firm to become Chief Justice of the United States. Partner Robert MacCrate served as Counsel to New York Governor Nelson D. Rockefeller and as Special Counsel to the Department of the Army for its investigation of the My Lai Massacre.

1970–Present

During the past three and a half decades Sullivan & Cromwell has grown gradually in measured response to the increasing volume and complexity of their clients' affairs, developing leading practices in areas such as mergers and acquisitions, banking regulation, real estate finance, derivatives and private equity. The firm's work in cross-border capital flows has continued, including substantial involvement in foreign direct investment and project finance, the development of the Euro — and other global capital markets, and the financial flows to Asia and Latin America.

The expansion of the scope and nature of the firm's practice required Sullivan & Cromwell to have lawyers in locations more convenient to clients. Building on the legacy of John Foster Dulles and Arthur Dean, the S&C chairmen during this period, John Stevenson, John Merow and Ricardo Mestres, all aggressively expanded the firm's practice in the United States and around the world. Domestic branches were opened in Washington, D.C. in 1977, Los Angeles in 1984 and Palo Alto in 2000. Overseas, the Paris office, closed during World War II, was reopened in 1962, and offices were opened in London in 1972, Melbourne in 1983, Tokyo in 1987, Hong Kong in 1992, Frankfurt in 1995, Beijing in 1999 and Sydney in 2001. Now a fixture in U.K. legal circles after 35 years in London, Sullivan is widely regarded as a peer of the Magic Circle (law) firms.

In the late 1980s Sullivan partner Robert MacCrate served as president of both the New York State Bar Association the American Bar Association. MacCrate later chaired the ABA Task Force on Law Schools and the Profession. The Task Force's Report, widely known as the MacCrate Report,^[1] was issued in July 1992 and is widely viewed as template for modern legal education in the United States. MacCrate, a former S&C vice chairman, continues to be active as a Senior Counsel of the firm.

M&A practice

As mergers and acquisitions (M&A) became an increasingly important part of the corporate landscape in the 1970s, most of the leading white shoe firms of the day would not work on hostile takeovers, leaving it to other now leading law firms, like Wachtell Lipton and Skadden Arps. George Kern led the firm's M&A effort in the 1970s and 1980s. Kern was a colorful figure and was widely viewed, at S&C, as one of the early leading M&A lawyers. As the commercial banking industry began to consolidate in the 1980s, S&C partner and current chairman H. Rodge Cohen became involved in many of the key deals. Joe Frumkin is the managing partner of an M&A department that includes Jim Morphy and Frank Aquila, along with elders Ben Stapleton and Neil Anderson. Rodge Cohen continues to be the firm's leading financial institutions M&A lawyer.

With high-profile assignments from multinationals such as BP, Diageo, Philips, France Telecom, InBev, British Airways, Scottish Power, Endesa, and Vodafone, Sullivan & Cromwell has carved out a niche in cross-border M&A. Partners Rich Morrissey in London and Chun Wei in Hong Kong lead the firm's non-US mergers practice. The firm has consistently ranked at the top among law firms involved in worldwide M&A transactions. Globally, Sullivan & Cromwell leads the M&A league tables, ranking first by value among law firms representing principals in announced transactions in 2007 (as was also the case in 2006, 2005 and 2004), according to data from Bloomberg and Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC's Dealogic.

Abandoning of client facing possible death sentence

Maples v. Thomas is a 2012 United States Supreme Court ruling in which the court ruled 7-2 that Cory R. Maples, who had been convicted of murdering two people and was facing a possible death sentence, should get more time in court because his lawyers at Sullivan & Cromwell had abandoned him.^[2]

Notable alumni

Individuals who have worked at Sullivan & Cromwell include:

Louis Auchincloss, writer
Norris Darrell, former President, American Law Institute
John Foster Dulles, US Secretary of State
Ronald Dworkin, philosopher and law professor
Allen Welsh Dulles, Director of the CIA
Ann Althouse, blogger and professor of law

References

^ MacCrate Report
^ Justices Rule for Inmate After Mailroom Mix-Up, New York Times, January 18, 2012

External links

fundinguniverse

Address:

125 Broad Street

New York, New York 10004-2498

U.S.A.

Telephone: (212) 558-4000

Fax: (212) 558-3588

Website:http://www.sullcrom.com

Private Company

Founded: 1879

Employees: 1,265

Gross Billings: $395 million (1997 est.)

SICs: 8111 Legal Services

Company History:

Sullivan & Cromwell is one of the nation's elite law firms. For more than a century it has been closely involved in the affairs of some of the largest industrial and commercial enterprises in the United States. Sullivan & Cromwell also has been closely involved in the formulation and execution of U.S. foreign policy and the development and growth of global capital markets. It was tied, in terms of gross revenue, for fifth position among U.S. law firms in 1996.

Under Cromwell's Guiding Hand: 1879-1920

Sullivan & Cromwell was founded in 1879 by Algernon Sydney Sullivan and William Nelson Cromwell. The middle-aged Sullivan was senior partner; he had enabled the youthful Cromwell, formerly a bookkeeper, to attend law school. The firm established offices at the corner of Broad and Wall Streets, opposite the New York Stock Exchange. It earned about $22,500 in its first year. Law clerks were unpaid, and the payroll came to only $950.

Sullivan was a trial lawyer who thought corporations should be outlawed, but the firm increasingly turned from litigation (charging $950 for a criminal case and, if it lost the case, $250 for the appeal) to counseling clients on purely business problems. The major work involved rescuing companies stricken by reverses, forming new companies and merging existing ones into larger units, and obtaining financing, primarily from the foreign sources whose capital was then essential to the American economy. Among the earliest companies Sullivan & Cromwell helped organize was the Edison General Electric Co. in 1882. The firm also helped rescue Henry Villard's Northern Pacific Railroad from bankruptcy in this decade.

After Sullivan died in 1887, Cromwell chose William J. Curtis as junior partner. Curtis was instrumental in persuading New Jersey's legislature to pass an act making the state a haven for corporation filings. In addition to lowering fees, the act made it legally possible for one corporation to own stock in another one, which led to the formation of holding companies. Holding companies replaced the trusts that had been broken up by legislation and court decisions. The first companies to incorporate under New Jersey's new corporation law were Sullivan & Cromwell clients.

By 1900 Sullivan & Cromwell had 14 lawyers, working four to a room in bullpens surrounding the library. The firm was involved in the creation of the U.S. Steel Corp. in 1901, for which Cromwell received $2 million worth of stock in return for $250,000 in cash. By this time utilities were replacing railroads as the most powerful force in the U.S. economy. Sullivan & Cromwell helped them form holding companies with a trail of subsidiaries; in the case of Union Electric Co., the firm created more than 1,000 subsidiaries. The firm also added to its reputation for saving troubled corporations by means of the "Cromwell Plan," which involved an orderly liquidation and reorganization of companies such as American Water Works, Decker, Howell & Co., and Price, McCormick& Co. Essentially, the plan aimed at holding off creditors as long as possible in times of market panic while awaiting economic recovery.

Sullivan & Cromwell also represented foreign clients, including the French interests that had tried and failed to build a canal in Panama linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Cromwell's task was to bail out the French company by arranging the sale of its property--which included a railroad & mdashø the U.S. government. Cromwell launched a successful lobbying campaign to convince senators and other powerful insiders that Panama rather than Nicaragua was the right place for a canal. After the Colombian Senate rejected the treaty needed to proceed, Cromwell became a behind-the-scenes agent for the revolution that resulted in Panama's independence from Colombia. The firm's French client then was able to collect $40 million from the United States for its property. Sullivan & Cromwell billed the company $800,000 for its services but had to settle for an arbitration award of $167,500 and expenses.

Cromwell increasingly absented himself from the firm's quarters, and Alfred Jaretzki became managing partner of Sullivan & Cromwell about 1900. By 1915, when Royall Victor succeeded Jaretzki, Cromwell was living in Paris, where the firm had established an office in 1911. He spent most of World War I and considerable time after the war, until 1937, in France. Even when in New York, he rarely came to Sullivan & Cromwell's offices, becoming a semirecluse residing in a midtown mansion crowded with tapestries, paintings, and statuettes. He survived until 1948, after which Rockefeller Center pulled down his residence to erect a high-rise office building.

Prosperity, Depression, Hot and Cold Wars: 1920-53

During the 1920s Sullivan & Cromwell's basic business was "green goods": drafting the indenture agreements under which financial institutions advanced money to corporations and foreign governments. It was active in restoring the international commercial links broken by World War I; between 1924 and 1931 the firm handled 94 securities issues involving more than $1 billion in loans to European parties, especially in Germany. Many of these loans fell into default during the world economic depression of the 1930s. By the end of 1928 Sullivan & Cromwell had offices in Paris, Berlin, andBuenos Aires. John Foster Dulles succeeded Victor as managing partner in 1926.

When the firm moved to larger quarters at 48 Wall Street in 1929, there were 63 lawyers, of whom 14 were partners and 37 were associates. Four women lawyers--the firm's first--were hired in 1930. During the 1920s and 1930s Sullivan & Cromwell revived its trial practice under the leadership of Harlan Fiske Stone, who later became U.S. attorney general and chief justice of the United States.

During the 1930s and most of the 1940s Sullivan & Cromwell was the largest law firm in the world. Through the Depression years Dulles established a litigation group to fight a New Deal measure designed to break up public utility holding companies.After the firm's legal challenge failed in the courts, the firm stayed busy dissolving the holding companies it had once helped put together. It also was very active in the legal work made necessary by stringent new federal regulations in the securities field. Overseas, Sullivan & Cromwell closed its Berlin office in 1935[claimd 34?] , but Dulles was criticized--both at the time and after World War II--for trying to maintain good relations with the Nazi regime to serve its clients. Among these clients was General Aniline & Film Corp., the biggest subsidiary in the Western Hemisphere of the notorious German cartelI.G. Farben, which employed slave labor during the war.

Dulles resigned as Sullivan & Cromwell's chairman in 1949 and was succeeded by Arthur H. Dean. The firm's influence on foreign policy reached its zenith in 1953, when Dulles became secretary of state and his brother Allen (also a Sullivan & Cromwell partner) became director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Dean took leave to serve the government in a number of posts, including as negotiator in the talks that ended the Korean War in 1953.

Specialized Units: 1950-90

During the 1950s Sullivan & Cromwell's most lucrative work was in the area of antitrust defenses. It successfully defended five of the largest investment banking firms in the nation against antitrust charges filed by the federal government. The general practice division dealt with the complexities of increasingly large public stock offerings. In 1956 it handled Ford Motor Co.'s $643 million initial public offering, the largest ever to that time. Sullivan & Cromwell reopened its Paris office--closed during World War II--in 1962 and opened a London office in 1972. The firm also opened a Park Avenue office in midtown Manhattan in 1971 to handle estates and personal affairs and one in Washington, D.C., in 1977. It moved headquarters to 125 Broad Street, overlooking New York Harbor, in 1979.

William Ward Foshay succeeded Dean as chairman in 1972. Sullivan & Cromwell now consisted of litigation, general practice, and tax groups, plus a group for the administration of estates and trusts. A mergers and acquisition group was formed in 1980. The firm opened offices in Melbourne in 1983, Los Angeles in 1984, and Tokyo in 1987.

To settle a class action suit Sullivan & Cromwell agreed in 1977 to recruit, hire, and pay women lawyers on the same basis as men. The firm at that time had 59 partners, all men, and 116 associates, of whom 26 were women. The first woman partner was appointed in 1982, and by the summer of 1987 there were four, but no blacks. The firm was continuing its quaint practice--unique among major law firms--of simply charging its clients a fee it considered "appropriate" rather than submitting hourly billing. A management committee of ten partners was in charge of setting Sullivan & Cromwell's policies, and a smaller committee of seven decided on how the firm would distribute more than half of its annual profits. The firm had a mandatory three-year phaseout retirement plan that went into effect when the partners reached age 67.

John R. Stevenson, who like his predecessors had considerable diplomatic experience, became chairman and senior partner of Sullivan & Cromwell in 1979. He retired in 1987 and was succeeded by John E. Merow. Merow took the helm during one of the most tempestuous periods in the firm's history. George C. Kern, Jr., head of the mergers and acquisitions unit, was accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission of violating disclosure rules while defending a company against a hostile bid. In addition, a court-supervised disciplinary panel was investigating charges that a partner had bribed and bullied witnesses in the court battle over the estate of the pharmaceuticals heir J. Seward Johnson, and an investor group accused the firm of improperly withholding vital information while fighting the group's lawsuit against a corporate client of Sullivan & Cromwell.

Some of the lawyers working for Sullivan & Cromwell's competitors suggested that the blue-chip firm's troubles stemmed from an air of arrogance. One likened opposing Sullivan & Cromwell to "having a thousand-pound tuna on the line." "They know the rules," another told a reporter, "but sometimes they act as if the rules just don't apply to them." All the above matters, however, apparently were disposed of without penalty to the firm. Kern continued to be Sullivan & Cromwell's star because his mergers and acquisitions unit was the firm's most profitable group, bringing in as much as one-third of all billings. In 1986 alone the unit was involved in more than $50 billion worth of acquisitions.

Before 1968 Sullivan & Cromwell's banking practice consisted of a couple of partners in estates and trusts performing routine work such as rolling over term loans. A separate banking practice was established in 1968. Within Sullivan & Cromwell's lucrative mergers and acquisitions group, bank mergers emerged in the 1980s as a major source of activity and profit for Sullivan & Cromwell. The firm helped structure more than 60 major banking mergers in the United States, valued at more than $40.2 billion, during this decade.

Sullivan & Cromwell in the 1990s

In 1991 Sullivan & Cromwell played a part in nearly every major banking deal, including the merger of Manufacturers Hanover Corp. and Chemical Banking Corp. and the acquisition of C&S/Sovran Corp. by NCNB Corp. to form NationsBank Corp. There were seven Sullivan & Cromwell partners and 25 staffers in all engaged in this field at the time.

By the mid-1990s Sullivan & Cromwell partner H. Rodgin Cohen was presiding over the firm's banking practice area, supervising nine partners and ten to 12 associates. The caseload was heavier than ever because of the increasing globalization of banking and the worldwide convergence of financial services. Cohen was recognized as "king of the bank lawyers"--"Mount Everest surrounded by the Appalachians," according to one mergers and acquisitions banker. Either he or one other lawyer represented one of the principals in 18 of the top 25 bank deals in the United States in 1997. Cohen was one of the partners serving on the executive committee charged with overseeing the firm.

In mergers and acquisitions, Sullivan & Cromwell was ranked fourth among law firms in 1997, acting as legal adviser in $91.5 billion worth of announced deals through October. The firm ranked third among underwriting legal advisers during this period, involved in domestic new issues totaling $14.6 billion in proceeds. New offices were established in Hong Kong in 1992 and in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1995.

In 1996 Sullivan & Cromwell had four divisions. General practice (corporate and financial work) was the largest and included mergers and acquisitions as one of its many units. The other divisions were litigation, tax, and estates and personal. (A fifth, practice development, had been added by 1998.) Securities work accounted for 25 percent of the firm's activity, mergers and acquisitions, 22 percent, and litigation, 21 percent. Half of the firm's clients were outside of the United States. Sullivan & Cromwell had 484 lawyers, including 114 partners, in November 1997. It has maintained a longstanding policy of not recruiting its partners from other firms.

Principal Operating Units: Departments: Estates and Personal Practice Group; General Practice Group; Litigation Practice Group; Practice Development Group; Tax Practice Group. Practice Areas: Asset-Based Finance; Broker/Dealer Regulation; Commercial Banking; Commercial Real Estate; Commodities, Futures and Derivatives; Corporate Reorganization/Bankruptcy; Environmental Law; Insurance and Tort Liability; Intellectual Property; International Trade and Investment; Investment Management; Labor and Employment; Mergers and Acquisitions; Project Finance.