Richard J. Testa
AGE: 61
FIRM: Boston's Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault L.L.P.

Venture capital specialist who leads the hottest firm in the Northeast and one of the fastest-growing nationally; the firm has expanded from three attorneys in 1973 to 200 in mid-1997 to 310 today, with another 48 already hired for next fall; the firm recently announced it will pay $140,000 per year to first-year associates; has taken more than 70 companies public; represents some of the most prominent tech companies in the East and more than 175 venture capital firms; clients include Teradyne, Ionics, Eaton Vance Management, Sippican, The South Atlantic Venture Funds and One Liberty Ventures.

James R. Thompson Jr.
AGE: 64
FIRM: Chicago's Winston & Strawn

Former governor of Illinois and still a force in state and national Republican party ; close ally and adviser to Bob Dole in the 1996 presidential election and key supporter of George W. Bush in the upcoming one; combines firm chairmanship with vast practice for such clients as Owens Corning, USA Waste Services, Commonwealth Edison, FMC Corp. and the Illinois State Medical Society; recently hired by Illinois Governor George Ryan to represent him in the ongoing commercial drivers' license scandal; a mainstay of the Chicago civic scene, on the board of the Chicago Board of Trade, Jefferson Smurfit, Union Pacific Resources and the Japan Society.

Tobacco lawyers

Ronald L. Motley
AGE: 55

Richard F. Scruggs
AGE: 54

The pioneers in litigation against the tobacco industry, expected to make waves for the next generation as a result of the massive fees they earned through state settlements with industry; Motley, of Ness, Motley, Loadholt, Richardson & Poole, and Scruggs, of Pascagoula, Miss.' Scruggs, Millette, Bozeman & Dent P.A., were in at the beginning of Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore's lawsuit, which set off the other AGs' cases; Motley was already considered one of the country's most fearsome trial lawyers, amassing numerous substantial verdicts and settlements for asbestos plaintiffs; Scruggs, less well-known nationally, was a driving force in the spread of tobacco litigation to other states; both have announced their intention to use proceeds of the tobacco cases to go after other industries, with Scruggs targeting HMOs and Motley lead-paint companies. Special notice should also be paid to Wendell H. Gauthier, of Metairie, La.'s Gauthier, Downing, LaBarre, Belser & Dean, who led the first organized attack by the plaintiffs' bar on the U.S. tobacco industry.

Laurence H. Tribe
AGE: 58
LAW SCHOOL: Harvard Law School

Noted constitutional scholar; in recent years, has won two major U.S. Supreme Court decisions limiting class action settlements, 1997's Amchem v. Windsor and 1999's Ortiz v. Fibreboard; his most recent federal circuit court win was a 1999 First Amendment victory over FCC regulations; has a significant case pending in the 8th Circuit challenging the constitutionality of the federal Superfund law as applied retroactively; a major figure in tobacco litigation, both in the Mississippi case and in Massachusetts, where he assisted the attorney general; was instrumental in the nationwide settlement of the state AGs' suits; advises members of the U.S. House and Senate from both political parties; his treatise American Constitutional Law has been cited more than 5,000 times in briefs and court opinions.

Stephen Volk
AGE: 43
FIRM: New York's Shearman & Sterling

Founder of the M&A group at his firm, now up to more than 100 attorneys; noted for his ability to close sticky transactions; frequently involved in international mergers, including the Sandoz/ Ciba-Geigy alliance, British Telecommunications' acquisition of MCI and the merger between Pharmacia and Upjohn; recently represented SmithKline Beecham in its $76 billion merger with Glaxo Wellcome, which created the world's largest drug company; represented Viacom in its purchase of CBS; as senior partner, has led a transformation of the firm into global institution -- the number of lawyers outside the United States has tripled to 276; member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Richard H. Walker
AGE: 50
FIRM: Director of the Division of Enforcement at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

In the past four years, has led the SEC into the cyber-age, pushing an Internet enforcement program; brought the first criminal case this year charging insider trading over the Internet by a temporary worker at Goldman Sachs; has filed several significant securities suits against online stock-picking sites, including Tokyo Joe and Fast-trades.com; the enforcement division has stepped up other actions, including yield-burning charges against Salomon, PaineWebber and others that resulted in a $138.8 million settlement in April and the investigation and subsequent $38.5 million settlement of a fraud case against Bear Stearns, over company's use of a shady brokerage to process trades.

Melvyn I. Weiss
AGE: 64
FIRM: New York's Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach L.L.P.

The leading plaintiffs' lawyer in securities, insurance, environmental and consumer class actions; won $800 million for investors and policyholders in the Drexel/Milken litigation, $775 million for investors in Washington Public Power Supply System securities litigation; has built and led the largest and, according to many observers, most influential law firm in the field of plaintiffs' class action litigation; now with 140 lawyers in five cities; has become the arch-nemesis of the U.S. insurance industry, prosecuting class actions on behalf of policyholders in sales practices cases, including settlements with Prudential of more than $2.5 billion and Met Life of $1.7 billion; in pro bono work, has played principal role in Holocaust litigation.

Theodore V. Wells Jr.
AGE: 50
FIRM: New York's Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison

White-collar criminal defense specialist who often wins acquittals in high-profile prosecutions, with a spectacular record during the past two years; in 1998, won acquittal for Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, who faced charges of illegally accepting gratuities; in 1999, won the acquittal of San Francisco-based investor Calvin Grigsby, who stood accused of embezzlement, fraud, bribery and theft in a scandal involving the Port of Miami-Dade County, and the acquittal of Franklin L. Haney, a Tennessee financier and friend of Vice President Gore, who was accused of 42 violations of campaign contribution laws; in 1998, he persuaded U.S. attorney's office in New York to close its 18-month criminal investigation into alleged probation violations by Michael Milken; current clients include Mitsubishi, indicted in federal court on charges of involvement in an international price-fixing conspiracy, and Ernst & Young, in the civil securities fraud class action surrounding Cendant Corp.; recently joined Paul Weiss as co-chair of the firm's litigation department; served as national treasurer for the presidential campaign of former New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley; formerly at Roseland, N.J.'s Lowenstein Sandler P.C.

Richard E. Wiley
AGE: 65
FIRM: Washington, D.C.'s Wiley, Rein & Fielding.

Widely recognized as the leading communications attorney, he heads the firm with the largest communications practice nationally; former general counsel and chairman of the FCC, where he pushed for communications deregulation; clients include CBS, Viacom, Gannett, Belo, Hearst-Argyle, the Newspaper Association of America, SBC, BellSouth, AOL, Motorola, Comsat Corp. and GTE; his service as chair of the FCC's Advisory Committee on Digital Television, which set policy on digital and high-definition television, won him an Emmy from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences; chair of the advisory board of Columbia University's Institute for Tele-Information and of the Media Institute's Board of Trustees.

Evan Wolfson
AGE: 43
FIRM: Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund

Top litigator on gay and lesbian issues; joined Lambda in 1989, after serving as associate counsel to Lawrence Walsh in the Office of the Independent Counsel in the Iran/Contra investigation; director of Lambda's marriage project and coordinator of the National Freedom to Marry Coalition; a pioneer in the creation of legal theories in area of gay litigation, was co-counsel in the landmark Hawaii case, Baehr v. Anderson, which launched ongoing discussion about gay people's right to marry; argued this spring before the Supreme Court for client James Dale, the Eagle Scout expelled in 1990 for being gay; also has represented gay and lesbian military personnel fighting for the right to serve and gay couples wishing to adopt children; has won numerous cases, including a jury trial for a Florida deputy sheriff fired for being gay and a lawsuit on behalf of New York city employees seeking equal health benefits and recognition for their partners.

Charles Alan Wright
AGE:72
LAW SCHOOL: The University of Texas School of Law

A giant in the area of federal procedure; his work Federal Practice and Procedure, begun in 1969 and now up to 54 volumes, is the bible of the field; as president of the American Law Institute since 1993, has been pushing the organization to become more international -- it now has 79 members from 21 foreign countries; ALI is scheduled to complete a project this year on Transnational Insolvency and has started new ALI projects in international jurisdiction and judgments and on transnational rules of civil procedure; noted litigator before the U.S. Supreme Court and other appellate courts; represented the University of Texas in the unsuccessful Hopwood; in 1999, successfully argued Rhurgas A.G. v. Marathon Oil Co. before the court; in 1998, received Learned Hand Medal from the Federal Bar Council and in 1999, elected a corresponding fellow of the British Academy.

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