About Erik Lundegaard
Erik Lundegaard has been a senior editor at Super Lawyers since 2005 and its editor in chief since 2013—during which time the magazine has won close to 100 journalism awards around the country. His freelance writing has been published by The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Slate, Salon, MSNBC.com, The Christian Science Monitor, The Seattle Times and The Believer, among others. He has a B.A. in English from the University of Minnesota, studied Mandarin Chinese in Taipei, Taiwan, and lives in Seattle, Washington, where he is a long-suffering Seattle Mariners fan. In his spare time, he is working on a book about the movies of James Cagney.
Articles written by Erik Lundegaard
Q&A With Thomas Geoghegan
How the labor lawyer at Despres, Schwartz and Geoghegan almost broke the Watergate scandalYou wore a lot of hats this past year. You ran for Rahm Emanuel’s congressional seat in the spring, wrote the cover story in Harper’s Magazine in April [“Infinite Debt: How unlimited interest rates destroyed the economy”], and argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in October. So: lawyer, author, politician. Well, “politician.” I don’t know if I’m going to be continuing as a politician. I was glad that I ran the race, and it was great to get out of the office and meet people. You …
Q&A With Ward B. Coe III
The Gallagher Evelius & Jones attorney talks about taking on country clubs, S&Ls—and skunksSo who are Ward B. Coe I and II? (Laughs) They were both lawyers in Baltimore. There’s been a Ward B. Coe practicing law in Baltimore since sometime in the 1890s. In The Encyclopedia of Pleading and Practice, from 1895, there’s a definition of “affirmation” by a Ward B. Coe. Is that…? That’s my grandfather. He also codified the British statutes that were the law of Maryland by Constitution until the legislature replaced them. In my first year in law school, a very ancient …
The Pugilist (Not) At Rest
Michael Tarnoff of the Warshafsky Law Firm is boxing again—after 50 yearsLet’s ask the obvious question: You’re boxing … in your 70s? There were some who thought it was foolish and risky and so forth. But I’ve played sports all of my life. When I was young I’d drop anything for a ballgame. But you get to a certain age and you can’t play basketball anymore, you can’t play football. And I missed competition. Then I read this article about some of these older boxers and what they call “white collar boxing” in Gleason’s Gym in New York, and other …
Mr. Schpak, The Next Generation
How Andrew Schpak is helping save Hollywood … the theaterAndrew Schpak, a 29-year-old employment law associate at Barran Liebman, grew up in Los Angeles, where his father is a teacher and his mother designs and manufactures props and jewelry for movies and television. If you’ve been to the movies in the last 30 years, you’ve probably seen her work. She made the championship belt for Rocky, the tiaras in The Princess Diaries, and the pirate coins for Pirates of the Caribbean. Her talent meant one thing to young Andrew: “There were only two years …
Q&A With Murray Schwartz
Murray Schwartz of Schwartz & Perry has been practicing for 60 years. He currently focuses exclusively on all facets of employment law, including employment discrimination.You graduated from Brooklyn Law School ... in 1949? I guess you don’t know anyone else who did, am I right? True story. They wrote an article about me in one of the bar association newspapers, and [afterwards] I called up and said to the writer, “You have it wrong. You have it down as though I’m 57 years old. I’ve actually been practicing for 57 years.” She says, “Oh, I’ll change it, Mr. Schwartz!” I said, “Don’t you dare.” (Laughs) The LSAT was first administered …
Sullivan’s Travels
What happened when Wyoming's Michael J. Sullivan returned to the land of his forebearsShortly before he began his stint as the U.S. ambassador to Ireland, former Wyoming governor Michael J. Sullivan was interviewed by New York radio host Adrian Flannery, whose audience is mostly made up of Irish-Americans. Sullivan is, in fact, Irish on both sides of his family. "On my father's side, my great-grandfather was from a southwestern Irish peninsula in County Cork, where they were mostly miners," Sullivan told Flannery. "[But then] the mines ran out and the potato famine came along," …
Q&A with W. Henry Jernigan
W. Henry Jernigan, whose practice focuses on the defense of complex litigation involving corporate disputes and product liability claims, is managing partner of Dinsmore & Shohl's West Virginia offices. We spoke earlier this year. What drew you to the law? I had a close friend whose father was a lawyer and I was impressed by how much stock he placed on integrity. He was always looking for ways to accommodate the interests of, not only his clients, but the people on the other side, so …
Q&A with Robert F. Bauer
Robert F. Bauer, chair of the political law group at Perkins Coie, served as general counsel to Obama for America. He spoke with us in December. How did you become general counsel to Obama for America? When [Barack Obama] came to the United States Senate in 2005, his staff was organizing his operation and invited me to meet him. It was a natural consequence of [that] representation. Did you talk about a presidential run? Not at the time. We were just talking about a broad range of …
Q&A with James H. Landon
James H. Landon is a corporate tax and employee benefits attorney at Jones Day who has carved out a niche practice as the man to see when U.S. museums are negotiating for big exhibits from foreign collections. We spoke last fall. Super Lawyers: What drew you to the law? James Landon: I was influenced by some of the people I knew in Birmingham who were lawyers and who seemed to be just good, thoughtful people whose conduct and professional activity I admired. Birmingham? Was this …
Q&A with Philip Harris
Philip L. Harris received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1983. At Jenner & Block, he focuses his practice on the defense of substantial and complex product liability, mass tort and commercial cases for large corporations. Super Lawyers: When did you first think about becoming a lawyer? Philip Harris: Definitely in high school or early in college. My career plan was to go into politics, which I ended up not doing, thankfully. Why politics? I've always …
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