On firm’s 20-year anniversary, Fishman reflects on law practice

Fishman Haygood partner Louis Y. Fishman recently published an article in the July 2016 edition of Seasoning, a publication of the Louisiana State Bar Association. 

The article, titled “Perspectives on the Practice of Law from 1966 on Up: From Firms and Fees to Technology and Collegiality,” reflects on Fishman’s fifty years of law practice in New Orleans.   It may be read here: http://files.lsba.org/documents/SL/July2016Tangy.pdf

After twenty-eight years of practice at the law firm where he started, Fishman co-founded Correro, Fishman & Casteix, LLP in 1994.  The firm made a mark for itself on the local community, closing twenty transactions, including a large number of bank mergers, in its first year.  Two years later, the firm merged with a group that included Paul Haygood, Robert Walmsley, Esmond Phelps, Scott Willis, and Jim Swanson to form what is today Fishman Haygood LLP.  The firm has added an outstanding group of laterals, but largely has grown internally from associate hires.  It is widely considered one of the best firms in its markets.

Fishman has established a reputation, according to Chambers & Partners, as “one of the most well-known and well-respected transactional attorneys in Louisiana.”  Fishman has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America, in corporate law, since that publication’s first edition in 1983.  In 2009, he was named that publication’s first New Orleans Corporate Lawyer of the Year and its first New Orleans Mergers & Acquisitions Lawyer of the Year in 2010. In 2011, Lawdragon named Louis to its “500 Leading Lawyers in America” guide, which represents far less than 1 percent of the legal profession, and called him “without question one of the very best corporate transactional attorneys in the South.”  He is ranked in Band 1 by Chambers & Partners in the Corporate/Mergers & Acquisitions category of America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, and is also listed in Louisiana Super Lawyers and New Orleans Magazine.

Fishman was a founder of Tulane’s Corporate Law Institute and has served since 1988 on its planning committee.  He has been a member of the Advisory Board of Editors for the Tulane Law Review since 1991.  He has held several key posts, including chairman, of the Louisiana State Bar Association’s Section on Corporation and Business Law and has served as a member of that Section’s Corporate Laws Committee.  For many years, he has taught a Corporate Governance mini-course at Tulane Law School.

Asked about retirement, Fishman said he expects to continue to practice as long as he remains interested and alert, and his wife, his physical and mental health, and the firm permit.