Talk:David E. Kendall

Witch-burning quotation
"When he first arrived in Washington to practice law, the senior partner advised him that in Washington they burn a witch every three months and it is best not to be the witch."
 * Cite, please. Who related this anecdote? The subject of the article? The senior partner? Who heard it, and how did it get here? -- Anon.
 * Kendall reported it in a 2001 interview for the Wabash College magazine. He was talking about his work defending the President Clinton during the impeachment trial. Here is the quote as he reported it:
 * "Edward Bennett Williams used to say, “Washington burns a witch every three months. It’s important not to be that witch.” And there’s a lot of wisdom in that." -- Robin22 00:57, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
 * IMHO, the best way to get rid of the tag is to mention his work with Clinton  during the impeachment trial.  That is quite significant.  PPI isn't as well known.  I've Googled his name on the Internet before (well, technically I was Googling my own name, I happen to have the same first and last name as Kendall) and his work with Clinton, especially during the impeachment trial, comes up again and again (and ranks much higher than instances of "David Kendall" that refer to me!  ;) )  The quote above too would be great for the Kendall article.  If someone who has an interest in doing more research on him than I would like to do this, I think it will improve the article a lot and be a good reason to get rid of the tag.  (And if someone could find a fair-use picture to put on the page, it'd be great!  I've always wondered what he looks like, since I share a name and all ... ) --Canuckguy 02:55, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

PPI references?
The PPI links seem to confirm that this is a different person than the one most readers will probably be familiar with.

The David Kendall who served as an attorney for the Clintons was (is?) a Washington attorney, and a Wabash College graduate. The PPI link at the bottom of this entry describes someone who works at a thinktank, and graduated from U. of Chicago. I have no idea how/why the latter is important; however, the Clinton attorney certainly did gain name recognition during Clinton's presidency.

Another entry ("Wabash College") mentions David Kendall as an alumnus; that entry should link to a bio of the Clinton attorney. There is a link to a Wabash College magazine interview of Kendall in one of the comments about this one-- so even the earlier comments about this entry are apparently referring to a different David Kendall. Markinia 06:09, 24 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Well then, as I mentioned above, maybe we should make another article about the Clintons' lawyer (there's lots of stuff on him on the 'net), perhaps have that be the main page for David Kendall, and relegate this one to another page (perhaps David Kendall (PPI)?) since he is (sadly) the most famous David Kendall it would seem and deserving of the primary page due to his significance. (I hope one day to unseat his position as the most famous David Kendall, though!  ;) ) --Canuckguy 03:40, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This article was IMO vandalized to refer to the PPI Kendall instead of the impeachment Kendall. This resulted (several months later) in an AFD. I reversed the edit so that this article's editing history regarding the attorney would be preserved, and moved it to David E. Kendall. Then I fixed David Kendall to be a human-name disambiguation page. Hopefully this clarifies the article history. --Dhartung | Talk 20:05, 12 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you for this clarification. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 19:47, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

David Kendall also David Petraeus lawyer
Kind of a high profile client in addition to the Clintons. [See ] "Petraeus’ attorney, David Kendall told ABC News he had “no comment” on the guilty plea" Popish Plot (talk) 13:42, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
 * This is a good fact to add, either in a new subsection under Career, or perhaps at least in the section on his defense of Secretary Clinton (in the context of which others are discussing the earlier successful Petraeus defense). See also Further reading. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 19:46, 3 March 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅ Subsection and stub added, using two better Wash Post reports, see article as of this date. Le Prof  Leprof 7272 (talk) 20:54, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Edits of this date
I came on for a quick primer on this notable individual, and stayed through my coffee break to complete and reformat the sources. After finishing, I went to one source, and noticed much of the material attributed to it was not in the source. (The source inline citation appeared at end of paragraph.)

This led to two excercises. One was reading the two most cited sources, and comparing it to the content of the paragraphs to which they were attached. This has resulted in paragraphs with too many inline citations, a temporary matter, that I ask to be left as is for the present, a situation that exists for the following reason. In doing this analysis of text and purported sources, it became clear that much of the material was not in the source indicated. Some of this could be rectified, as what was not in source [1] actually came from source [2] (and vice versa), so that what was required was simply the addition of further inline citations, to the source that wasn't acknowledged.

However, on many points, such as: 'neither of the principle sources appearing supported the material stated in the text. That is, either WP:OR is in play, or we are violating WP:VERIFY in this article, by adding material without sources.'
 * 1) his full Date of Birth,
 * 2) his term and title at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund,
 * 3) his affiliation with the Council of Federated Organizations,
 * 4) his relationship to the murdered civil rights worker Andrew Goodman,
 * 5) his reported affiliation with Worcester College at Oxford
 * 6) the report that it was at Oxford that he and former President Bill Clinton first met,
 * 7) his reported work for the  William J. Clinton Presidential Center and Clinton Foundation,
 * 8) his stated appearances before the Supreme Court on pro bono assignments,
 * 9) his work on the  MGM et al. v. Grokster case,
 * 10) his work on the Tasini et al v. AOL case,
 * 11) etc.

Moreover, a further deeper issue emerged once the source of all factual statements in the Sections Early life and education and Career were assigned. As a result of the analysis, 34 factual statements were assigned to just two sources, and these two sources were both essentially self-published; this accounts for 85% of the inline citations as of this date. The personal biography at his place of work, his law office, is pure self-published material (citation [2]). The information taken from the Wabash College announcement of his honorary doctorate, while a step removed, is nevertheless, also self-published information (citation [1]): in the consideration of candidates and preparation of such announcements, it is standard practice to solicit from the individual their CV or other biographical statement. The vetting by a college offering an honor degree is not that of a news organization; the Wabash announcement is, for all that, nothing more than a further biography based on self-published material.

Hence, after completing and standardizing all sources appearing, including those in further reading, and adding further possible useful sources, I conclude that the the article is largely based on the title subject, David J. Kendall's view of himself, and on his self-reporting, directly and indirectly.

It was for these reasons, that the article and section tags were placed, and the inline tags of "third-party" and "self-published" were placed (the latter to make clear the shear density of self-generated material that currently appears). Where superscripts [1] and [2] appear, for the Wabash announcement and the law firm bio, and where they are without inline tag, they nevertheless are problematic, as sole sources, because they are simply WP re-presenting Mr Kendall's self-generated resume.

Finally, the calls for expert and cleanup are aimed at having new eyes on the problem, which appears to have gone on for a long time, without any change. Overdue for departure, cheers, Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 20:06, 3 March 2016 (UTC)


 * I alleviated the overuse of self-authored sources a bit, but there is still more work to be done. I'm moving on to other articles, but below is some raw cut-and-paste that might be useful to whomever follows.--Rajulbat (talk) 03:52, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

"Encyclopedia of the Clinton presidency" "Levy, Peter B." "2002" "Greenwood Press" "https://archive.org/details/encyclopediaofcl00levy"

"May 2, 1944, Camp Atterbury, Indiana" "Served as Clinton's privaty attorney through much of Clinton's presidency. Began working for Clinton in 1993." "A partner at Williams and Connolly, Washington, D.C." "In 1993 began developing strategy for dealing with the Whitewater scandal. (p. 215)." "Earned BA from Wabash College in 1966 (p. 216)." "Studied at Oxford University on a Rhodes scholarship." "Earned law degree from Yale Law School in 1971." "Clerked for SCOTUS Justice Byron White" "Kendall knew Clinton from their days together in England and at Yale Law School."

"       "

"Raised in a Quaker family in Sheridan, Indiana, by a father who worked as a grain elevator manager and a mother who taught school, Mr. Kendall was educated at Wabash College and came of age in the liberal movements of the 1960s. In 1964, he went to Mississippi during Freedom Summer to register black voters and was arrested several times. A half-century later, the only framed item on his office wall is a receipt from the Marshall County jail for the food he had to pay for during three days behind bars."

"He earned a Rhodes scholarship and spent two years at Oxford University, just missing Mr. Clinton, who arrived for the next term. But he later met bot Clintons at Yale Law SChool, where he graduated in 1971. He clerked for a year for Justice Byron White on the SCOTUS and then after a year in the Army joined the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc. to work on death penalty cases."

"In 1977, he won Coker v. Georgia, a landmark Supreme Court rulling written by Justice White declaring capital punishment unconstitutional for rape. Even after going to work for the celebrated Edward Bennett Williams at the white-shoe firm of Williams & Connolly in 1978, Mr. Kendall continued representing death row inmates, including John Spenkelin, who was executed in Florida the next year."

"The departure took place in Florida when John Spenkelink was executed. His lawyer, David Kendall, a Rhodes Scholar and Yale Law School graduate, was a white civil rights worker in Mississippi in 1964; he was arrested eight times during his first six weeks in the state. As a clerk to Justice Byron White, Kendall heard Anthony Amsterdam argue eloquently in the Furman case that the death penalty should be ended. Kendall himself contributed to that goal by winning another Georgia case, Coker v. Georgia, in 1977, which ended the death penalty for rape. But the 1976 Gregg decision, restoring the death penalty, meant there was more work to do."

"At the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's League Defense and Educational Fund, Kendall handled several cases that did not result in the death penalty. Then, in Florida, he took the case of John Spenkelink. p. 68-69."

p. 6: On the day of the death warrants, in Washington, D.C., a lean young lawyer named David Kendall arrived at work feeling a little ragged, his mouth dry, his head aching. He had overindulged a bit the night before at a swank fundraising party for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., his previous employer. ... p. 7: The Fund attracted lawyers of the highest caliber, lawyers who could, if they wished, easily find work in offices furnished in leather, dark wood, and brasss. kendall was such a lawyer when he joined the Inc. Fund in 1973; he had the sort of credentials that would arouse any blue-chip law firm. He was a Rhodes scholar, a graduate of Yale Law School; he had clerked for a Supreme Court justice and had been comissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army. But he also had certain values acquired duirng a Quaker boyhood in a small Indiana town. As a college student, those values took Kendall to Mississippi to register black voters during the Freedom Summer of 1964. Arrested and thrown in jail, he was bailed out by Inc. Fund lawyers. Later, during his term as a clerk for Justice White, Kendall marveled as the great legal scholar Anthony Amsterdam persuaded the Supreme Court to empy the nation's death rows in Furman v. Georgia, an Inc. Fund case. For Kendall, the Inc. Fund became the epitome of legal acumen and marshaled to the service of righteousness, and so he spurned the oaken offices for metal desk in an Inc. Fund cubicle.

"He had intended to practice all manner of civil rights law, but soon found himself consumed by the firestorm that followed the brief victory over capital punishment. Across the country, state legislatures joined Florida in the rush to restore the death penalty, and America's death rows steadily refilled. Like water in a hydraulic press, the rising tide of newly condemned inmates squeezed everything else from David Kendall's portfolio, until all his clients were people under a sentence of death."

"His cubicle contained a strange barometer of his burgeoning macabre practice. Early on, Kendall discovered that many death row inmates, locked in their cells some twenty-three hours a day, play chess to pass the time. He mae it his custom to challenge each new client to a friendly game through the mail. When the challenge was accepted, as it nearly always was, Kendall would buy a cheap chessboard with plastic pieces and set it up in his office to keep track of the game. He would move a piece on the little board, not the move in a letter along with any legal documents, then wait ofr his client to move by return mail. Soon, Knedall had half a dozen boards going, then a dozen. Ranks of pawns fell to advancing bishops while queens clashed with crusading kings in battles that"

p. 7: ranged over Kendall's bookcases and file cabinets.

"In 1976, the Inc. Fund lost the critical U.S. Supreme Court cases restoring--at least in theory--capital punishment. The following year, with Kendall leading the way, the Fund had struck back, persuading the Court to abolish the death penalty for rape. It was all-consuming work, exhausting bot physically and spiritually, and after five years Kendall had his fill as a general in the war. In 1978, he had joined a blue-chip firm with spacious offices, the influential Washington partnership of Williams & Connolly. But he took with him a pile of his most important death penalty cases. At the top of the pile, the most important of all, was the case of John Spenkelink."

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