Message from the Chair, Karl J. Ege

Eleven months ago the ABA Business Law Section sensed the gathering storm of the economic crisis and created a Study Group on Financial Services Reform, co-chaired by Giovanni Prezioso of Cleary Gottlieb, former General Counsel of the SEC, and Bill Kroener of Sullivan & Cromwell, former General Counsel of the FDIC. Two months later, the ABA Board of Governors, upon the recommendation of ABA President Tommy Wells, elevated the Section's Study Group to an ABA Task Force. Since then, the ABA Task Force on Financial Markets Regulatory Reform has been meeting regularly to analyze regulatory reform proposals and to provide sage guidance to policy makers who are addressing the current global economic crisis. The Task Force will be focusing its efforts on the Obama Administration's long-awaited financial regulatory reform proposal "Financial Regulatory Reform - A New Foundation: Rebuilding Financial Supervision and Regulation" that was released by the Treasury Department on June 15 ( to access the report click here) and will continue its work in the coming months, providing the Association with an experienced voice in this most important process. For those of us counseling businesses, this has been a very challenging year. Not only have our clients been dramatically affected by the global financial crisis, our practices have also changed dramatically, from one focused on financing and acquiring for growth to one focused on restructuring and retrenchment. Throughout this dynamic and unprecedented period, the Business Law Section has endeavored to remain relevant as our practices have changed to adapt to our client's new demands.

The strength of our Section is measured by the commitment of its more than 60,000 members, who reflect a wide range of legal practices, from lawyers practicing at large global law firms to those at mid-size regional firms, from lawyers in small local partnerships to those who are solo practitioners, from in-house corporate counsel to academics, government lawyers, members of the judiciary, and law students. We are diverse in every sense of the word. I am particularly impressed by the number of law firms that have a significant proportion of their lawyers who are Section members. The following 10 firms collectively represent more than 3000 members of the Business Law Section. In addition, 24 of the Section's leaders are members of these firms. Although we thank each and every law firm, corporation and member that is active in the Section, we are particularly indebted for the support these firms provide.


I want to again remind you of the wide variety of timely programs the Section will be presenting at the ABA Annual Meeting in Chicago from Friday, July 31st through Monday, August 3rd. The Section will be sponsoring 45 CLE programs at this meeting, with the emphasis remaining on the economic crisis and the challenges the current business environment has created for our clients. In addition to formal CLE programs, most of our committees are planning meetings in Chicago to facilitate their continuing substantive work. For a review of the planned program offerings and committee schedules for the Chicago Annual Meeting, please click here. The Section headquarters at the Annual Meeting and the venue for all of our CLE program and committee meetings will be the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers, across the Chicago River and only a few blocks from the Hyatt Regency Chicago, the ABA Headquarters Hotel. I hope as many of our Section members as possible will be able to attend this very important Annual Meeting.

Once again I encourage you to contact me at kege@perkinscoie.com with suggestions as to how we can continue to make the Business Law Section more relevant to your and your client's needs.