Lawyers bankrolling candidates

Lawyers from around the country, many of them at major Boston firms with clients before state government, have pumped more than $1.7 million into the campaigns of three leading candidates for governor since 2003, a Globe analysis shows.

Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly, whose office is constantly engaged in litigation and negotiations with lawyers, has collected the lion's share -- just over $1 million -- that attorneys have donated to the three best-known candidates. His rival for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, Deval L. Patrick, a former Clinton administration official who has also worked at two law firms in the city, has received at least $472,000 from lawyers since he began fund-raising a year ago.

Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the probable Republican nominee, collected $300,000 from donors who identify themselves as an executive -- for example, corporate presidents, vice presidents, and CEOs. She received at least $205,000 from lawyers. State workers have given her about $55,000 since she and Governor Mitt Romney took office, making them her largest bloc of donors when analyzed by employer.

Executives were also big givers to Reilly, donating about $700,000 to the Democratic attorney general.

The donations, which are legal and hardly unusual in political races, nonetheless represent continued interest in the gubernatorial race by lawyers and others who often donate to be seen by clients, fellow lawyers, and their firms as influential players in the political process. The campaigns insist their candidates are not influenced by the money.

Many of the attorneys who have given the most to Reilly work at elite law firms with offices in Boston. They included Nixon Peabody, whose employees donated about $38,000 to Reilly; Greenberg Traurig, $33,000; Cooley Manion Jones, about $31,000; Foley Hoag, just over $29,000; and Goulston & Storrs, roughly $23,000.

Some of Patrick's funds came from Ropes & Gray (where his wife, Diane, practices), whose employees gave about $22,000; Mintz Levin, whose donors gave about $21,000; and Goulston & Storrs, whose lawyers gave approximately $17,000. Patrick also collected about $9,800 from donors at Brown Rudnick, which, in a bitter court battle that divided much of the legal community, lost a fight against Reilly to get an additional $1.3 billion in legal fees for its handling of the 1998 tobacco settlement.

The Globe analysis also found that professors and others at Harvard University donated almost $55,000 to Patrick, comprising the largest chunk of donations when they are organized by employer. He has received at least $114,000 overall from those who work in education, more than twice what Reilly has received from that profession.

The computer-assisted analysis examined donations since January 2003, when Romney took office. Reilly has raised about $6.3 million in that period, and Patrick, who began fund-raising about a year ago, has taken in about $2.7 million. Healey has collected nearly $2.7 million since 2003, the review found.

Donors can give up to $500 a year to Massachusetts candidates, who are required to disclose the contributors, their profession, their employer, and their addresses in reports to the state. Because of inconsistencies in the data, such as misspellings, the amounts revealed by the review are estimates, not comprehensive totals, but represent the clearest snapshot to date of the money race in this year's campaign for governor.

The review did not examine the campaign donations to two other candidates who have raised relatively little money. Democrat Chris Gabrieli formally joined the race for governor last week and is expected to use his personal fortune to finance much of his campaign. Independent Christy Mihos, a wealthy businessman, is also expected to finance much of his race.

Most striking in the hundreds of donations are the donations from lawyers, who see two of their own -- Reilly and Patrick -- in a battle for the Democratic nomination. Lawyers made up about 18 percent of Patrick's total donations and about 17 percent of Reilly's.

''Lawyers have been always be involved in politics, but this is an unusual year, because we have two candidates with so many connections to the legal world," said David Yas, editor in chief of Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.

''Law firms like to be in the political game, because it's good for business, and it tends to pay off in the future," Yas said. ''Law firms are wrapped into the business of the clients, and it never hurts to have a friend in the corner office."

For some, having access to Beacon Hill powerbrokers and regulators is critical to their practice. That access helps clients deal with issues of permitting and regulations. Some firms also depend on lucrative legal business from the issuance of bonds by the state.

Reilly's campaign finance chief, Alan Solomont, who has extensive experience raising money in Massachusetts and nationally for Democrats, said attorneys' interest in the political process stems from the nature of their profession. They seek to shape the law in the Legislature and in regulations and policies that affect everyone's lives, he said.

But he said that the Reilly campaign has created a vetting process in which all donations are ''handled in a legal manner and an appropriate manner." He declined to outline how the process works or what standards are used. He said no donors have wielded undue influence with Reilly.

''Not a single contribution that has been received by this campaign has had one iota of influence on how the attorney general carries out his duties," Solomont said.

He said on occasion donors have asked him to help them in their dealings with Reilly's office. ''But my experience with the attorney general is that he does not interfere with his people, whom he has hired to carry out their professional responsibility," he said.

Reilly says he keeps fund-raising separate from the sensitive legal decisions that come with his office.

Robert Sherman, a former prosecutor and now a partner at Greenberg Traurig, is a longtime associate of Reilly and a contributor to his campaign. In 2004, he represented Kohl's Department Stores in a false advertising case that was being investigated by the attorney general.

Sherman declined to be interviewed but said in a statement that he has ''found [Reilly] to be a man of integrity and vision" and said donations generated from his law firm are from individuals and do not represent the firm.

''Our lawyers are politically active and are free to contribute to candidates on either side of the political spectrum in races at the local, state, and federal level, including this gubernatorial race. I am delighted that so many of my partners have decided to support Tom," said Sherman, who is co-managing shareholder at Greenberg Traurig's Boston office.

The Globe reported last May that Reilly has been able to build a large political war chest -- which now tops $4.1 million -- by increasingly turning to special interest groups that have legal and regulatory business with his office for donations. That process began in early 2003, as Reilly, who did little significant fund-raising in his first term, set his eyes on the governor's office shortly after his 2002 reelection.

The donations flowed into his campaign account from healthcare providers, insurers, auto dealers, and liquor distributors -- along with their lobbyists and lawyers -- which are dealing with regulatory issues and consumer complaints filed with his office.

In 2004, the Globe reported that Reilly, who is heading the efforts to recover cost overruns in the Big Dig, had taken $35,000 from lobbyists, lawyers, and executives of companies working on the project. He returned $5,000 of the donations.

Reilly, who has practiced law in Boston and has been a county and state prosecutor for over two decades, has strong connections in many of the firms. For example, his former first assistant, Dean Richlin, is now a partner at Foley Hoag. Another partner, Michele A. Whitham, whose clients include Polaroid Corp., which had legal conflicts with Reilly's office in 2002, has hosted an event to raise money for Reilly.

The firm's chief of marketing, Mark Young, said the donations to Reilly from lawyers at Foley Hoag do not represent the firm's political position.

''This is about the individual efforts by our lawyers who personally feel that this is a way we can contribute to the civil society," Young said. ''Michele has been personally active in his campaign, but our policy is that any event or hosting at the firm is entirely the personal decisions of the lawyers here."

Healey is getting a big boost from corporate leaders, including those that have been the major financial stalwarts of GOP candidates and governors in the past and again are answering the party's call to make sure the Democrats, who haven't won a gubernatorial election in 20 years, don't take back the governor's office.

Healey is drawing on several of the state's major companies that have traditionally funded Massachusetts Republicans, including about $22,000 from employees of Fidelity Investments and roughly $17,000 from those at Liberty Mutual. Executives at Affiliated Managers Group, the investment firm where her husband, Sean, serves as chief executive, have donated about $13,000.

Healey's fund-raising from individuals is expected to be far less than the millions of dollars that the lieutenant governor, drawing on her husband's wealth accumulated through AMG stock, will use in the race for governor.

Frank Phillips can be reached at phiilips@globe.com