Father’s Day is our first order of business in today’s blog.
We honor Father’s Day as a day of tribute, not only to fathers but to all the men who have influenced our lives with kindness, wise counsel, and generosity.
Principal Law wishes a Happy Father’s Day. And special wishes to the step-fathers, brothers-in-law, uncles, and brothers who nourish and nurture our families! In the famous words of Phillip Whitmore, “Any fool can be a Father, but it takes a real man to be a Daddy!”
Father’s Day: Fun Facts for Fathers and a Principal Law Tribute to their Special Day
A Tribute to Fathers on Father’s Day
Father’s Day crowns this weekend with family joy and love. In fact, we interrupt our series on taxes and trusts to wish you a Happy Father’s Day. And we wish to bring you other exciting news. Here at Principal Law, we thought you’d like to know a few of the characteristics and fun facts behind this holiday.
1. A Huge Father’s Day Statistic: Did you know Father’s Day is the fifth most popular card-sending holiday? Daddy’s Day will reap an estimated $100 million in greeting card sales. Now, we are certain this does not include our children’s handmade cards! We cannot assign a dollar value to these because they are priceless.
Special Calls on Father’s Day
2. Surprising Calls, E-mails, and Texts. MSN reports, “If you thought Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day was the most connected day of the year, you’re wrong. Father’s Day is the busiest day of the year for collect phone calls.”
3. Happy Father’s Day, International Style. A Celebration for Dads happens in Many Countries. But it doesn’t always occur in the summer. In Australia, Families celebrate the first Sunday of September as Father’s Day. Finnish people fete fathers on the second Sunday of November. But in Thailand, Father’s Day falls on Dec. 5.
4. A Little Father’s Day History: We turned to the history experts to fill in the backstory of this holiday. If we turn back the clock we discover that, “On July 5, 1908, a West Virginia church sponsored the nation’s first event explicitly in honor of fathers. A Sunday sermon was held in memory of the 362 men who had died in the previous December’s explosions at the Fairmont Coal Company mines in Monongah…” However, when we investigate the records, we discover it was only “a one-time commemoration and not an annual holiday.”
We honor Dad’s Special Day with love, dignity and a little humor.
Official Equivalent Holiday
Then, in 1909, in Spokane, Washington, a very special “woman named Sonora Smart Dodd, one of six children raised by a widower, tried to establish an official equivalent to Mother’s Day for male parents.”
She started a grassroots campaign and went to government and business officials to create support. Thus, Washington State created the first statewide Father’s Day Celebration on June 19, 1910
5. Making Father’s Day National and Legal: Many communities celebrated Father’s Day long before it became a national holiday, beginning as early as 1910. Likewise, in “1924, President Calvin “Silent Cal” Coolidge recommended that Father’s Day become a national holiday.” However, the administration quietly took no action.
Then, in 1966, Lyndon B. Johnson created an executive order to declare the third Sunday in June as the official day for Dad’s Day. But Father’s Day was still was not official. We had to wait until 1972, during the Nixon administration, for Father’s Day to become an officially recognized National Holiday.
Introducing Some Super Heroes of the Law
However, Fathers are not the only heroes to whom we dedicate this special blog. We wish to send our congratulations to all of the attorneys listed in this year’s 2018 Florida Super Lawyers. (®) The Super Lawyers list is a very significant honor and highly cherished by members of the legal profession.
Attorneys Listed by Florida Super Lawyers, 2018: To Whom Roses are Due
Every year Super Lawyers selects attorneys from all firm sizes and over 70 practice areas throughout the United States for their prestigious work. Let’s take a brief look at the requirements for such a listing from Florida Super Lawyers 2018.
Step 1: Nominations
Lawyers enter the candidate pool for this honor through nomination by a peer. Those peers nominate the top attorneys they’ve personally observed in action. “Lawyers cannot nominate themselves, and must limit their nominations to others who practice in the same state.”
The nomination process has safeguards that prevent back-scratching. Thus lawyers cannot nominate each other. Likewise, the members of a law firm cannot submit and “block nominations” in which members of the same law firm all cast identical nominations.
Step 2: Super Lawyers Research Candidates
The nominating process “puts lawyers on our radar for further research and evaluation and awards points in our rating system. But we limit the value of those points so that no matter how many nominations one receives, it will not guarantee selection.”
An attorney-led research staff searches for lawyers who have achieved certain honors, results or credentials. They look for lawyers who exhibit a high degree of professional competence. Then, they search out attorneys with certification as specialists in particular areas of practice. They look for research attorneys who have won admission to prestigious colleges or academies such as The American College of Trial Lawyers.
During this intensive research process, Super Lawyers finds lawyers who might have been missed by Step 1. This is not a popularity contest. Perhaps some lawyers were missed in the nomination process because:
- They rarely appear in the courts of their home jurisdiction.
- The lawyers come from very small firms or communities.
- They practice in almost invisible areas of specialty.
Step 3: Independent Evaluations
Law Books, Scales, and Lady Justice Symbolize the Best in Florida Law
The Super Lawyers research department evaluates each lawyer. To do so they use 12 rigorous indicators of peer recognition and professional achievement:
Verdicts/Settlements
Transactions
Representative Clients
Experience
Honors/Awards
Special licenses/certifications
Position within the law firm
Bar and/or professional activity
Pro bono and community service
Scholarly lectures/writings
Education/employment background
Other outstanding achievements
Step 4: The Blue Ribbon Review
Super Lawyers conducts deep peer evaluation of each attorney, according to their practice area. The third step of the selection process is peer evaluation according to their practice area, also known as the “blue ribbon review.”
The candidates in each practice area with the highest point totals from steps one and two above serve on a panel which reviews and rates the candidates from 1-5.
Step 5: Prior to Publication
The Blue Ribbon Review Panel casts candidates into four categories according to the size of their firms. Only the lawyers with the highest points from each category are eligible for selection. Five percent of the total lawyers in the state are selected for inclusion in the lists of the Super Lawyers.
The research staff checks each candidate’s standing with the local licensing authority. Super Lawyers conducts Internet searches and they meticulously check other records. Furthermore, they contact the candidates before publication to make sure all information is accurate.
Step 6: Finally, the Reward of Publication
Some Super Heroes Work At Desks.
The final published list represents no more than 5 percent of the lawyers in the state. The lists are published annually in state and regional editions of Super Lawyers Magazines. City and Regional magazines also publish the lists of names.
The Super Lawyers and Rising Stars Selection Process
The selection process for Rising Stars within Super Lawyers is identical. The big exception is that, for Inclusion to the listing as Rising Stars, the candidate must be “40 years of age or younger or in practice for 10 years or less.”
After knowing the rigorous qualifications for Super Lawyers, you would not expect Rising Stars could be more difficult. However, while up to 5 percent of the lawyers in the state can be named to Super Lawyers, no more than 2.5 percent are named to the Rising Stars list.
The Terrific Take-Away: Not All Super Heroes Wear Capes
You might be wondering why we have spent so many words on this award. We will keep you in suspense no longer: Now that you understand the significance of this listing, we are very pleased to announce that our own Shivon Patel, founder of Principal Law here in Sanford Florida has been selected to the Florida Super Lawyers Rising Stars List of 2018 for Real Estate Law.
Shivon and others like her prove that not all superheroes wear capes. Some simply practice law. And they possess the super-power of knowing the law can be better and stronger than the power of flight or fisticuffs.
