Baltimore, MD – Orthodox Law Firm That’s Closed For Shabbat Suits Its Employees

Baltimore, MD – Lots of observant Jewish attorneys refrain from working on the Sabbath.

Few prohibit their entire firms from working.

But at Snider & Associates LLC, the office closes well before sundown on Friday afternoon. The 20 employees — even the ones who are not Jewish — are not to do a shred of work for the firm until an hour after sunset on Saturday, when Shabbat ends.

Firm owner Michael J. Snider’s reasoning comes from the Torah’s decree that the Israelites were not allowed to work on Shabbat, and that their children, servants and animals should not work either. Snider said he consulted a few rabbis, who agreed that his firm should close on Shabbat.

The policy has only rarely presented a problem, Snider said. In one case, opposing counsel questioned why a non-Jewish lawyer at Snider’s firm could not attend a Saturday deposition.

“The opposing counsel was Jewish, not religious, and they said, ‘Well, if we can attend and we’re Jewish but not religious, then certainly you, as an African-American non-Jewish person, can attend even though you work for a Jewish firm,’” Snider said.

Snider spoke to the judge on the phone and explained the firm’s policy.

“We said, ‘We’re an Orthodox firm and I don’t allow my attorneys to do that,’ and he said, ‘What’s your basis?’ and I told him that I asked some rabbis and he said, ‘Oh, if you asked the rabbis, that’s enough for me,’” Snider recounted.

The firm even has a policy against travel on Fridays, just in case a plane is delayed.

“[It’s] because if we get stuck in an airport at sundown, we have to stay in that airport for 25 hours,” Snider said.

The firm is also closed on all Jewish holidays and open on other holidays, like Christmas and New Year’s Day. Employees may take those days off, but, since they are paid for their time off for Jewish holidays, they have to use personal leave for non-Jewish ones.

There is a (completely voluntary, Snider stresses) prayer service every afternoon and a (completely voluntary, he adds again) Talmud study session every morning. Non-Jewish employees are welcome to take time out to pray, if they like, Snider said.

Asked how many of the employees are observant Jews, Snider said, “We don’t ask,” but the employee pictures and biographies on the firm’s Web site seem to indicate that most of the 21 employees are.

One non-Jewish employee, paralegal Diane Sullivan, said she likes the schedule at Snider & Associates; she appreciates getting out of work at 3 p.m. on winter Fridays.

Another, lawyer Margaret Coons, said the early closing time on Fridays doesn’t mean staffers are slacking off.

“During the rest of the week we work harder, I would say,” Coons said.

She said some people might be puzzled by a lawyer working at a firm where the dominant culture is not their own, but she doesn’t see things that way.

“It is different than other firms I’ve been in, but basically, it’s different for the better,” she said.

Snider takes pride in bringing in a kosher lunch for all of the employees once or twice a week.

He and his firm do not “wear the religion on our arm,” he said, but even a casual observer would notice right away that there is something different about many who work at Snider & Associates. The men wear yarmulkes and some, like Snider, have full beards. Some hold rabbinical degrees as well as law degrees.

Though to most in Baltimore they are immediately identifiable as religious Jews, others are confused.

“Some of them think we’re Amish,” Snider said. “One guy thought I was — what’s the oatmeal? A Quaker.”

One of the lawyers who works for Snider, Jacob Statman, said that when he was clerking for the firm in law school, a classmate checked out their Web site and, seeing the long beards, asked Statman if it was a firm of bikers.

Mixed reactions

Snider said the law firm attracts “our strong share of evangelical Christians,” who identify with the lawyers’ devout observance.

Not everyone is so friendly, though.

One client asked a lawyer referred by Snider to take off his yarmulke when he entered the client’s home. The lawyer, who was also a rabbi, did it. (“I would have walked out,” Snider said.)

“The reaction’s mixed,” he said. “Many people don’t talk about it at all. Others are so excited to see a Jewish person that’s recognizably Jewish and proud of it that they will start talking about it and they’ll ask you a lot of questions. Some people try to convert us to Christianity or whatever. You don’t get into it with them.

“But other people, when I go to North Carolina, the union people won’t let me eat anything until they check and make sure it’s kosher,” he continued. “And people come over to me; they’ll remind me when it gets close to sunset: ‘Have you prayed yet?’ It’s kind of cute.”