Miller & Martin has lost 37 Nashville lawyers to rival Butler, Snow, O’Mara, Stevens and Cannada, ravaging the ranks of the firm’s Music City office. 

Founded 145 years ago in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Miller & Martin ventured into Nashville in 1995 with just two lawyers and had expanded its office in the city to house as many as 60 lawyers by the late 1990s. In 2009 the firm furthered its commitment to Nashville by reaching into that office to select its new chairman, Melvin Malone. But last fall, Malone lost a contested reelection bid to Chattanooga-based James Haley, and soon afterward, lawyers in the Nashville office started seeking new homes.

Malone, who focuses on telecommunications, government relations, and litigation, led the other Miller & Martin defectors to Butler Snow with Dan Elrod, a health care and government relations lawyer who now sits on Butler Snow’s executive committee. Elrod told The Am Law Daily Tuesday that the abrupt leadership change at his old firm was offputting to those in Nashville. “That seems to not be a very good way to have a transition of leadership,” he says. “It caused us to think maybe there are some other things being done better [at other firms] also.”