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puld, Fortas, ai INCE it was founded in 1947, ‘the Wash: | ington Jaw firm of Arnold, Fortas & J Porter has served, in more than a hun- dred cases, in the difficult and unpopular role ar ns accused of dis- loyalty to ee vajned States, All of these cases, ‘inel th te trial of Owen Lattimore at several — which required weeks of “Tegal labor, have been handled without fee. bli is which the firm has received from this. singularly unremunerative practice has apparently created an impression, in some quarters, that Messrs. Thurman Arnold, Abe Fortas, and Paul Potter are impractical ideal- ists with a lofty scorn for monetary reward. This, happily, is not the case. If they did S they would now be very pienble men, for they are rolling in it. The exact figure of their annual income is a secret _ between themselves and the Bureau of In- ternal Revenue. But their prosperity is so envious colleagues have begun to _ out it—the ultimate tribute. One anaes bills which flutter, uanoticed, out of the door of the Arnold, Fortas & Porter suite. There is no mystery about the source of their impressive income. It comes from. the Coca-Cola Company, Pan American Airways, _ Lever Brothers, Western Union Telegraph. Otis and Company, the Sun Oil Cornpany, ‘the American Broadcasting Company, and _ several dozen other large and solvent corpora- tions which have retained the firm to handle their Washington legal affairs. Most law firms would be delighted to » build up such a well-heeled clientele over a period of two or three decades. Arnold, Fortas & _ Porter have done it in barely four years. It is evident, moreover, that they have at- tracted their corporate clients in spite of, rather than because of, their widely-publi- cized reputation for defending the civil lib- erties of alleged Communists, One cannot readily imagine Mr. Joseph Pew hiring them to represent his Sun Oil Company out of en- thusiasm for their stand in the Lattimore cast. It is obvious also that Arnold, Fortas & Porter are not cashing in on ‘good will which they built up in the business community dur- ing t their long service as pe officials.