If indeed the rumors are correct, and if Roberts's confirmation goes relatively quickly and Rehnquist's health holds for a little while, I note that Roberts will be, I believe, the first Supreme Court Justice to sit with a Justice for whom he clerked.

I argued just yesterday that the President should appoint the smartest possible judge, in order to facilitate approval. Though obviously it has nothing to do with me (or even David Brooks of the NY Times) I'm pleased to see that the President has nominated someone who is thought stone cold brilliant in John Roberts. The stupidity presumption is throughly rebutted, and I am delighted. And by more than the fact that another Harvard Law alum will hopefully join the Court.

UPDATE: I meant to add that Judge Roberts is prove-ably brilliant, in the way that the legal profession likes to prove things. Great grades, one of the top positions on the law review, clerk to the legendary Judge Friendly and then to Rehnquist, all followed by an outlandish career. If the legal world is a great, elaborate, hierarchy, than Roberts sits demonstrably at its pinnacle.

Yesterday's 30 Second Wine Advisor contained a poll: "What's Your Vacation Wine Strategy"?

Bring wine from home

Ship wine ahead to destination

The options continued, but the method used on my latest trip wasn't on the list:

Field strip

I've been trying to keep away from business law topics (practice for next year's clerkship in Delaware) but this call for business law books at the Volokh Conspiracy caught my eye - and I think I can comment safely. Most of what I had in mind has been mentioned either at the VC, or at the Conglomerate, by Christine Hurt. But as a history graduate student turned corporate law buff, let me mention a few more sources of importance.

George P. Baker, The New Financial Capitalists - Barbarians at the Gate is certainly an important book for those interested in private equity. But if you want to find out where Kravis, and Roberts, and their now burgeoning progeny came from, the book to read is this slim but difficult volume from Mr. Baker, approved and aided by KKR itself. When deciding on a law firm for my second summer, it was the book my corporate law professor recommended first. And I'll do the same here.

Bruce Wasserstein, Big Deal: Mr. Wasserstein is the former founding member of Wasserstein & Perrella, a once mighty investment bank, now heads Lazard Freres' investment group, and is thought to be the driving force behind the ancient and secretive bank's public offering. The book is a little disorganized and hectic, perhaps like "Bid'em'up Bruce" himself, but it is fabulously informative for the novice - and even has a chapter explaining what precisely a corporate lawyer does in the room with the businessmen. Wasserstein, of course, used to be a corporate lawyer himself.

And finally, I have two rather more esoteric articles to recommend, both from former professors of mine, and useful in a limited sense to the law student trying to figure whether or not they should become a corporate lawyer. The first is by Bob Mnookin & Ronald Gilson, Sharing among the Human Capitalists, 37 Stan. L. Rev. 313. This isn't as much about business law as about the business of law - but was very useful in figuring out how the various law firms structured their compensation schemes, how this might matter to life at the firm over the longer term, and how different schemes might affect the atmosphere at a law firm. Second, I recommend Guhan Subramanian's Post-Siliconix Squeeze Outs, Theory, Evidence & Policy>, which begins to add teeth to Ronald Gilson's argument (in his article Value Creation by Business Lawyers) about the lawyer as transactional engineer by showing that experienced mergers and acquisitions firms are quicker to adapt to possibly value enhancing developments in deal structure than less experienced firms. In other words, if you wonder whether being a good corporate lawyer accomplishes anything, Prof. Subramanian provides at least a beginning answer.

Jacob Levy discusses L'Ancien Regime in Yglesias's comments.

In a few hours I'll have the chance to ask questions of Supreme Court super-reporter Jan Crawford Greenburg. I can think of a few of my own, but does anybody have any suggestions?

Comments.