From the dog bites man file:  the National Law Journal reports that the country’s biggest law firms hire most of their entry-level associates from elite East Coast law schools (Largest Law Firms Hire from Elite Schools, by Leigh Jones):

With a few exceptions, the nation’s largest law firms continued to rely on renowned private schools in the eastern half of the country to fill their first-year associate ranks in 2006. Columbia Law School was the top pick among the country’s 250 biggest law firms for hiring first-year associates last year. Some 69.6% of the law school’s graduates who earned juris doctor degrees in 2006 went to work for law firms included in The National Law Journal’s 2006 annual survey of the nation’s 250 largest law firms. Of the 450 graduates at Columbia Law School, 313 took jobs as first-year associates at NLJ 250 firms. …

Rounding out the top five schools that sent the greatest percentage of juris doctor graduates to NLJ 250 firms were University of Pennsylvania Law School, at 68.2%; University of Chicago Law School, at 65.1%; Harvard Law School, at 59.2%; and Duke Law School, at 56.8%. Yale Law School, routinely ranked No. 1 in U.S. News & World Report’s annual ranking of graduate and professional schools, ranked 15th among the law schools recruited most often by the NLJ 250 law firms. Among its 203 juris doctor graduates, 46.8%-or 95 graduates-went to NLJ 250 firms. Contributing to Yale’s relatively lower percentage are the large numbers of graduates who apply for judicial clerkships after earning a juris doctor degree, said Janet Conroy, director of public affairs at Yale Law School. The same held true for Stanford Law School, ranked second in this year’s U.S. News & World Report but eighth among the schools from which the NLJ 250 firms recruited.

Here are the Top 20:

1. Columbia (69.6%)
2. Penn (68.2%)
3. Chicago  (65.1%)
4. Harvard (59.2%)
5. Duke (56.8%)
6. NYU (56.6%)
7. Cornell (56.0%)
8. Stanford (54.9%)
9. Michigan (54.3%)
10. Virginia (54.1%)
11. Northwestern (54.0%)
12. Georgetown (53.0%)
13. Berkeley (49.0%)
14. Vanderbilt (48.0%)
15. Yale (46.8%)
16. Boston College (39.1%)
17. George Washington (38.8%)
18. Fordham (38.8%)
19. Texas (38.6%)
20. USC (36.3%)