One of the lesser-known talents of the late legendary lawyer Edward Bennett Williams was U.S. Supreme Court advocacy. He argued 12 cases before the high court between 1955 and 1977. Kannon Shanmugam, a partner at Williams & Connolly since 2008, is quietly resuming the firm’s sustained Supreme Court presence in a way the firm has not really seen since those days.
Shanmugam’s appearance before the Court on Nov. 8 will be his third argument there in three years. He’ll be arguing pro bono for a Louisiana death row inmate in Smith v. Cain, a case of prosecutorial misconduct. “The firm has always had a substantial appellate practice,” said Shanmugam, 38. “What the firm had not done was to hold itself out as having a discrete appellate practice.”
