The Firm

Seventy-eight years without interruption.

Precedent is a firm of nineteen partners and counsel, in practice since 1948, with one name on the door and one standard of preparation. What follows is the account we would give a client across the table: where the firm came from, what it believes, and why it has lasted.

1948

60 Wall Street, fourth floor · April 12

The firm opened with two lawyers, one clerk, and a single retainer — a family manufacturing concern facing a claim that would have ended it. Edmund R. Vance and Harold A. Alder prepared for eleven months as though the matter would be tried. It was, and it was won.

That client remained with the firm for forty-one years; its successors remain today. Nothing about the method has changed since: take fewer matters, know them absolutely, and treat the client's affairs as the client would — quietly.

The firm has never merged, never franchised its name, and never opened an office it could not staff with its own partners. Growth was never the object. Standing was.

The Philosophy

Three tenets, unchanged since 1948.

Prepared, always

Every matter is prepared as if it will be tried, examined, or contested. Most settle on terms that reflect that preparation. The few that do not are the reason clients came.

II.

Candor over comfort

The firm was retained to say what the client should do — directly, early, and on the record. Advice that merely reassures is not advice.

III.

Continuity

Matters at Precedent are led by partners and staffed for years, not quarters. The lawyer who opens a file expects to close it — however long that takes.

The Lineage

Three generations, entered in order.

Generations, one name on the door

Years of continuous practice

Merger offers declined

1948Edmund R. Vance and Harold A. Alder open the practice at 60 Wall Street.

1961Wilmington opens. The firm argues its first appeal en banc — and prevails.

1974Edmund R. Vance, Jr. takes the chair. The firm declines its first merger offer; it would decline four more.

1979Washington opens, one block from the courts it appears before.

2003The third generation of the Vance family enters practice; the third generation of client families follows.

2019Whitmore v. Continental Indus. — $310M for the family's minority stake, affirmed on appeal.

The Offices

Three cities. One firm.

New York

Since 1948

748 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10065

+1 (212) 555-0148

Wilmington

Since 1961

1201 N. Market Street, Wilmington, DE 19801

+1 (302) 555-0161

Washington

Since 1979

1601 K Street NW, Washington, DC 20006

+1 (202) 555-0179

Joining the Firm

The firm hires few, and keeps them.

Precedent engages three to five associates each year, almost always from federal clerkships, and expects each to argue within their first eighteen months. Lateral partners are considered rarely, and only where a practice meets the firm's standard of preparation. There is no recruiting brochure; there is this page, and a conversation.

Clerkship and lateral inquiries, in confidence: counsel@precedent.law

Precedent LLP · Est. 1948 · Attorney Advertising

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