Legal world conjures up a conscience

[Gormy Cuss]

Legal world conjures up a conscience
- Joan Ryan
Thursday, April 6, 2006

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/04/06/BAGASI3NPQ1.DTL

When attorney Clem Glynn worked at Pillsbury, Madison & Sutro in San Francisco, he arrived two hours before the law firm opened its doors at 8:30 a.m. And every morning, Martin Macy was already there. He always seemed to be there.

"The firm was his life,'' said Glynn, who is now at Glynn & Finley in Walnut Creek. Macy didn't marry or have children. He walked to work from his apartment on Battery Street....


Macy wasn't a lawyer. He was a messenger, beginning in 1965 at the age of 17. He delivered the mail office to office, desk to desk. He did this for 41 years. He was a company man, an emblem of an era when businesses were local and the bosses stopped you in the hall to ask about your mother's cataracts.

Now he's an emblem of a new era.

Last week, at age 58, he was laid off by what is now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman, a firm with 16 offices around the world, 900 lawyers and $600 million in revenue.

While it is heartening that so many of the lawyers are writing checks, I wonder if Macy wouldn't prefer having his old job back for a few more years.

[ThomCat]

1. He was loyal to them, but Corps aren't loyal to anyone.

He was making $34k. I'm sure they replaced him with some kid making a fraction of that.

[Gormy Cuss]

2. I'm betting they outsourced the job

to a legal messenger service that charges them a fraction of the cost, because after all, a messenger isn't a core human resource for the firm.