"Believe it or not, I always knew I wanted to be a lawyer," Ryan Clinton says. While a youngster in Baton Rouge, La., Clinton learned about Huey P. Long Jr., the state’s legendary populist governor. Long was known as a champion of the common man, Clinton says.

"That’s what introduced me to this concept of being for someone else," he says. "I think that probably was what brought me to law more than anything else."