Herbert Wachtell

Last updated
Herbert M. Wachtell
Born (1932-05-24) May 24, 1932 (age 92)
Nationality American
Alma mater New York University
New York University School of Law
Harvard Law School
Occupation Lawyer

Herbert Maurice Wachtell (born May 24, 1932) is an American lawyer. He is the co-founder of the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.

Contents

Education and early career

Herbert Maurice Wachtell was born on May 24, 1932, in New York City. His parents were the children of Jewish immigrants from present-day Poland and Hungary.

Wachtell attended public schools in New York City, including The High School of Music & Art, (now part of Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School), followed by New York University in Manhattan. He graduated from New York University (B.S. 1952), New York University School of Law (LLB 1954, Order of the Coif), and Harvard Law School (LLM 1955). [1]

From 1955 to 1957 he was an Assistant U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York prosecuting federal crimes including racketeering. [2] In 1957–1958, he served as deputy chief counsel to the House Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight, investigating corrupt activities at certain of the government administrative agencies. [3] Upon leaving public service, he founded a small law firm specializing in litigation and lectured as an adjunct professor at NYU School of Law and authored a single-volume text, New York Practice under the CPLR, which then went through six editions. [4]

Later career

In 1965, he and NYU Law alumni Martin Lipton, Leonard Rosen, and George Katz joined to found Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. The firm is known for big risk and complex transactions and litigation. [5]

Wachtell has handled a wide range of litigation including, notably, landmark takeover fights in the Delaware courts involving Time-Warner and Paramount. [6] His international profile was enhanced by his role representing Silverstein Properties in litigation to secure rebuilding insurance proceeds following the World Trade Center attacks. [7]

Boards and awards

Wachtell is a recipient of the Chambers Lifetime Achievement Award in Litigation in 2006. [8] He and his wife are active in a variety of the philanthropic and cultural areas. He is a former co-chair of the board of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, former chairman of the board of Phoenix House Foundation and member of the boards of NYU School of Law and the former New York City Opera. [9] [10] [11] [12]

Personal life

Wachtell is discussed in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers . [13] He is married to Svetlana Stone Wachtell and has five children from previous marriages, as well as nine grandchildren. [14] His daughter Diane Wachtell is the executive director of The New Press, which she co-founded in 1992 with Andre Schiffrin.

Related Research Articles

Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz is an American white-shoe law firm in New York City. While many peer law firms have grown and become international brands, Wachtell has only a single, Manhattan office. It is one of the smallest firms in the AmLaw 100, but has the highest per partner profits of any law firm and pays significantly above the "Cravath scale" market rate for associates.

"Magic Circle" is an informal term describing the five most prestigious London-headquartered multinational law firms, which generally outperform the rest of the London law firms on profitability. The term has also been used to describe the most prestigious barristers' chambers in London. All of the 'Magic Circle' law firms and barristers' chambers specialise primarily in corporate law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Lipton</span> American lawyer

Martin Lipton is an American lawyer, a founding partner of the law firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz specializing in advising on mergers and acquisitions and matters affecting corporate policy and strategy. From 1958–1978 he taught courses on Federal Regulation of Securities and Corporation Law as a lecturer and adjunct professor of law at New York University School of Law.

Bernard William Nussbaum was an American attorney, best known for having served as White House Counsel under President Bill Clinton.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Lat</span> American journalist (born 1975)

David Benjamin Lat is an American lawyer, author, and legal commentator. Lat is the founder of Above the Law, a website about law firms and the legal profession.

George Calvin Kern Jr., a native of Baltimore, Maryland, was a leading New York corporate lawyer in the 1970s and 1980s.

The New York University Law Review is a bimonthly general law review covering legal scholarship in all areas, including legal theory and policy, environmental law, legal history, and international law. The journal was established in 1924 as a collaborative effort between law students and members of the local bar. Its first editor-in-chief was Paul D. Kaufman. Between 1924 and 1950, it was at various times known as the Annual Review of the Law School of New York University and the New York University Law Quarterly Review before obtaining its current name in 1950.

Leo E. Strine, Jr. is an American attorney and retired judge for the state of Delaware. He served on the Delaware Court of Chancery as vice chancellor from 1998 to 2011 and chancellor from 2011 to 2014, and as the chief justice of the Delaware Supreme Court from 2014 to 2019. Strine has worked in private practice since 2020.

The Tulane Corporate Law Institute is an annual two-day M&A and corporate law conference that takes place in downtown New Orleans every spring. It attracts the most high-profile lawyers and bankers from around the United States, as well as judges, journalists, and others who follow the dealmaking world. The event typically takes place on a Thursday and Friday in late March or early April, at a prominent Canal Street hotel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard J. Sullivan</span> American judge (born 1964)

Richard Joseph Sullivan is an American lawyer who serves as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He was formerly a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York from 2007 to 2018. He has been a member of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal organization.

Joseph Harold Flom was an American lawyer and pioneer of mergers and acquisitions, specializing in representing companies in takeover battles. By the 1980s, he had acquired a reputation of being "Mr. Takeover". Flom became a partner at what is now known as Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom in 1954, and helped transform it from a four-lawyer firm into one of the largest law firms in the United States. In 1999, The American Lawyer named him one of their "Lawyers of the Century".

The Root-Tilden-Kern Scholarship is a full-tuition public service scholarship for students at New York University School of Law. It is widely considered to be the most prestigious public interest scholarship for law students in the United States.

William T. Allen was a professor of corporate law at New York University law school, and the Chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery from 1985 to 1997. He also worked for the bank and business law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.

Leonard M. Rosen was an American bankruptcy lawyer, and a co-founder of the prominent New York firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.

Samuel James Rascoff is an American legal scholar and Professor of Law at New York University School of Law, regarded as an expert in national security law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Cole Jr.</span> American lawyer

James Cole Jr. is an American attorney who served as the acting Deputy Secretary of Education from 2016 to 2017, serving under the Obama administration.

Maura Robin Grossman is a research professor and former Director of Women in Computer Science in the David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science at the University of Waterloo. She is cross-appointed to the School of Public Health Sciences at the university and is also principal of Maura Grossman Law in Buffalo, New York. Previously, she was Of Counsel at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where she pioneered the use of technology-assisted review (TAR) for electronic discovery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Conway</span> American attorney and activist (born 1963)

George Thomas Conway III is an American lawyer and activist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth K. Lee</span> American judge (born 1975)

Kenneth Kiyul Lee is a South Korean-born American lawyer who serves as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Jerome H. Kern is an American lawyer, investment banker, consultant, and philanthropist. Kern was one of the founding members of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. After a career in investment banking, he served as a senior partner of Shea & Gould, then at Baker Botts, while holding senior leadership positions at Tele-Communications Inc. In the early 2000s, he was CEO of Linkshare, On Command, and Playboy. He was also chairman and CEO of Colorado Symphony and is currently a senior advisor to Moelis & Company.

References

  1. HERBERT M. WACHTELL (Partner, LITIGATION)
  2. Peter Lattman (December 5, 2005). "High-Profile Prosecutor Anders To Take Post at Wachtell Lipton". The Wall Street Journal.
  3. "Lawyer Paid Off FCC Member Asserts Schwartz". Daily Herald (Utah). February 13, 1958.
  4. Michael D. Goldhaber (September 8, 2015). "Distinguished Leaders: Herbert Wachtell and Martin Lipton". The American Lawyer.
  5. David J. Parnell (February 24, 2016). "Daniel Neff Of Wachtell Lipton: On Leading The Market's Most Prestigious Law Firm". Forbes .
  6. Kathryn Harris (November 30, 1993). "Delaware Supreme Court Agrees to Consider Paramount's Appeal : Merger: The state high court will decide whether studio can accept Viacom bid without entertaining QVC's offer". Los Angeles Times .
  7. Dan Ackman (July 23, 2003). "Larry Silverstein's $3.5B Definition". Forbes .
  8. Chambers USA: Herbert M Wachtell
  9. "Company Overview of Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law". Bloomberg L.P. December 12, 2016.
  10. "Phoenix House Annual Report 2013" (PDF). Phoenix House. December 2013.
  11. "Board of Trustees". New York University School of Law . Retrieved December 11, 2016.
  12. Jason Grant (May 3, 2011). "'Defying Gravity' - New York City Opera's Spring Gala". Hamptons.com.
  13. Gladwell, Malcolm (2008). Outliers: The Story of Success . London: Penguin Books. pp. 156–157. ISBN   9780316017923. OCLC   225870354.
  14. "Herbert Wachtell". Gawker. February 3, 2008.