Jacob Appelsmith, the lead supervising attorney for the Employment, Regulation and Administrative Section in the attoney general's office, Sacramento, is a "lawyer for all seasons," said David Bass, a deputy attorney general and Appelsmith's good friend. "He is an example of what a terrific lawyer can be: bright, hard-working, creative, willing to think in novel ways about old issues, and always able to keep social justice in mind."

Appelsmith supervises all of the Attorney General's 31 Sacramento-based employment lawyers. Another 50 employment lawyers work for the Attorney General in various locations across the state. In addition, Appelsmith serves as in-house counsel to the executive staff, personnel office and affirmative action and equal employment office of the Attorney General Office. In that capacity, Appelsmith confidentially advises the attorney general's office on internal employment matters. He is the only person at the attorney general's office in that role, but he does not look like the person who would be playing that part.

Appelsmith has got sideburns "down to there" and wears several earrings (weekends only). But people trust him because he is a very talented lawyer and really knows employment law, Senior Assistant Attorney General Jim Schiavenza said.

Appelsmith's unique personal and legal style probably can be traced to his Berkeley upbringing. "Jake was exposed early on to the Berkeley community's general presumption of social justice," Bass said. It is probably that exposure, Bass said, that has influenced Appelsmith so that the concept of social justice is part and parcel of who Appelsmith is.

Appelsmith left Berkeley to attend college at Middlebury College in Vermont, but he returned to Berkeley after college for law school at Boalt Hall. With characteristic modesty, he says the only reason he was admitted to Boalt was because he wrote an interesting essay. After graduation, Appelsmith worked for six years at Pillsbury, Madison & Sutro, LLP (now Pillsbury Winthrop, LLP) as a commercial litigator. Appelsmith worked in Pillsbury's San Francisco office for four years and moved to Sacramento for his final two years.

While at Pillsbury, Appelsmith devoted a great deal of his time to public service. He did pro-bono work for a walk-in legal clinic in San Francisco and for VLSP in Sacramento. At VLSP, Appelsmith taught classes on how to prosecute hate-crime cases after he and Bass (who worked with Appelsmith at Pillsbury) successfully brought a lawsuit based on a hate-crime statute on behalf of a HIV-positive man whose neighbors were intimidating him.

Not only is Appelsmith concerned with social welfare, but he also has a diverse array of interests outside of his work. He proclaims that reading Charles Dickens "is a huge thing" for him. Others note his love of music. Schiavenza said that if you saw Appelsmith outside of work, you would likely find him at a bar listening to music. Bass, a former jazz pianist, said that he and Appelsmith fool around with music quite a bit outside of work and reflected on the time when the two lawyers parodied "A Streetcar Named Desire" for a select group of friends.

At work, Appelsmith juggles a variety of projects without missing a beat, Schiavenza said. Appelsmith is a man who "stretches everyone's imagination, is imaginative about solutions, and is willing to take risks," Schiavenza said. Those qualities fit neatly within the attorney general's office's new perspective on its role as the state's attorneys.

Appelsmith observed that the attorney general's office has changed its focus to provide more service for its clients and said that it is trying to operate more like a private firm. Part of that for Appelsmith is his goal to always remember the justice angle to the work he is doing and to make sure everyone involved in a lawsuit is treated fairly. Bass agreed that Appelsmith's goal of achieving social justice permeates all of his work, but noted that Appelsmith keeps it in perspective and can be a real shark when necessary.

Schiavenza noted that Appelsmith's capability as an excellent lawyer, intelligence and ability to fix problems before they start are part of Appelsmith's formula for success. Appelsmith modestly claims that he was in the right place at the right time when he was promoted to his new position but also noted that the office offers its attorneys tremendous opportunities. He said he joined the office in order to gain some of the practical experience that he was missing at Pillsbury. Even though he was one of the few associates to do trial work at Pillsbury, Appelsmith said he felt that he had reached a plateau and was not increasing his skill level.

Appelsmith found that the attorney general's office provides its attorneys with growth opportunities that are not offered elsewhere. He noted that there are some other significant differences between private practice and public service. For instance, he said that instead of handling four or five cases at a time, attorneys at the attorney general's office often carry a caseload of more than 100 cases. A real benefit of the attorney general's office, he said, is that the attorneys can concentrate on practicing law instead of focusing on running a business based on balance sheets. The real benefit to Appelsmith, though, is the fact that the attorney general's office has a mission of public service and working toward the public good.