Walter, Conston, Alexander & Green

Infobox Law Firm
firm_name = Walter, Conston, Alexander & Green
firm_logo =
headquarters = New York City
num_offices =
num_attorneys = 50
num_employees =
practice_areas =
key_people = Otto Walter
revenue =
date_founded = 1843
founder =
company_type = Professional corporation
homepage =
dissolved = 2001

Walter, Conston, Alexander & Green, P.C. was a mid-sized full service New York-based law firm that existed from 1843-2001 until it merged with Atlanta-based Alston & Bird to launch the New York office of that national firm. The firm was formed with the merger of Walter, Conston & Schurtman established in 1955 by Otto Walter and Alexander & Green, an old-line firm established in 1843.

History

Alexander & Green was the launchpad for three former law clerks who went on to established Simpson Thacher & Bartlett in 1884. Henry Alexander of legacy firm Alexander & Green represented Samuel Clemens in a contract dispute. It was a white shoe firm that was one of the first of such historically Protestant institutions to accept Catholic attorneys and graduates from non-Ivy League law schools in the 1920s. Walter, Conston & Schurtman was a firm with an international orientation. Otto Walter was a German-born Jew who was prohibited from practicing law in Germany upon graduation due to Nazi restrictions. He fled to the United States and studied law at New York Law School. [http://www.walterfoundation.org/History.html] In the post-World War II years, Walter assisted in German-American reconciliation as an adviser to the German Ministry of Finance on various taxation and legal issues. ["Deaths: Otto Walker," "The New York Times," January 16, 2003.] Later his law firm went on to establish a strong German, Austrian and Swiss practice with a roster of bluechip German clients including Bertelsmann and Beiersdorf. It also had special expertise in e-commerce law, pharmaceutical, intellectual property, and telecommunications. The firm numbered some 50 attorneys in its New York headquarters and branch offices in Darien, CT and Munich, Germany.

References