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DeWitt LLP

Open-knowledge reference entry

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 7, 2025
Entity authorityQ5244194
Source-derived summary

DeWitt LLP is a U.S. law firm based in Madison, Wisconsin. It is the largest firm in the Greater Madison Area, with an office in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and is among the ten largest firms in the State of Wisconsin.

History

The firm was founded in 1903 by William Bagley (1860-1938), an attorney and the designated master of ceremonies when William D. Hoard was inaugurated as the 16th Governor of Wisconsin in 1888. The firm as it exists today is the result of a 1994 merger between two Madison firms, DeWitt Porter and Ross & Stevens. Ross & Stevens brought expertise in employee benefits and intellectual property law, and DeWitt Porter brought environmental law and lobbying practices. Jack R. DeWitt, a founding partner, died in 2012. In 2013 DeWitt Ross & Stevens combined with the Minneapolis, Minnesota law firm of Mackall Crounse & Moore. Its office in Minneapolis conducts business as DeWitt Mackall Crounse & Moore. On January 1, 2019, DeWitt Ross & Stevens S.C. and DeWitt Mackall Crounse & Moore S.C. reorganized into one entity to become DeWitt LLP.

Practice

The firm has lawyers in areas including corporate law, employment, environmental law, employee benefits, government relations, health care, litigation, real estate, tax, estate planning, family law, immigration, personal injury, intellectual property law, patents, trademarks and copyright law. The firm’s Government Relations Team has the largest group of lobbyists in the state.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “DeWitt LLP” is open-knowledge reference entry. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through DeWitt, Open-knowledge and entry, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1903, 1860, 1938, 1888—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1903. For this dossier, DeWitt, Open-knowledge and entry is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “open-knowledge reference entry” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 7, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q5244194. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1903, 1860, 1938 and 1888.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from DeWitt LLP” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.