MICHAEL FOX ORR: PRESIDENT OF THE FLORIDA BAR

Michael Fox Orr, the 76th president of The Florida Bar, has a megawatt smile and impeccable manners, is energetic and engaging, and doesn’t shy away from the spotlight. His approach to practicing law and service to the profession is simple: work hard to win — a mantra that has served him well as he becomes one of the youngest Florida Bar presidents since the Florida Supreme Court’s unification of the Bar in 1949.

“I’m so excited for him and I’m so excited for the Bar, for the types of things he can do,” says Fourth Circuit Judge Mark Mahon, who says his friendship with Orr grew from the new president’s leadership at the Jacksonville Bar Association. “Michael was this young, emerging star with the local Jacksonville Bar — very affable, very focused, got along well with everyone, and really did a great job.”

Among the civil judges who presided over his cases, Orr earned a reputation as one of the more knowledgeable members of the legal community who could be tapped for his expertise. President Orr loves the law and enjoys every aspect of practicing it, from working up a case to negotiating an out-of-court resolution or, most especially, being in the courtroom and walking away with a win for his clients. As he begins his term, Orr says he intends to focus on strengthening the Bar’s “core functions” — lawyer regulation and ethics guidance, promoting professionalism, and protection of the public — while working closely with the Florida Supreme Court to advance the administration of justice. He believes maintaining a strong, fair system of lawyer discipline and ethics oversight protects both the public and the profession, and he wants the Bar to continue serving as a reliable arm of the court as it addresses emerging challenges facing Florida’s legal system.

Although the 46-year-old loves practicing law, Orr is not quite as keen on talking about what he has accomplished; he half-jokingly requested a half-page article for this profile and no resumé. During his interview, he was thoughtful, soft-spoken, and unhurried, speaking with such deliberately pronounced slowness at times it seemed he was trying to run out the clock.

In 2019, Orr merged his firm with Kevin Cook’s practice to form Orr | Cook (the order of the names was decided by a coin toss), specializing in resolving complex commercial disputes. Since the firm opened, it has more than doubled in size from approximately 10 lawyers to around 25 — the sweet spot in terms of firm size, in Orr’s opinion, because a lot of firms that exceed 30 lawyers tend to “work deals out with other larger outfits, given the considerable administrative operations.”

Cook describes Orr as “a go-getter, somebody who was willing to do what it takes; very personable, gregarious, friendly, funny — but understated, in a way.”

One of Orr’s most charming characteristics, Cook finds, is that he never makes it about himself; “it’s always about helping others, the Bar, the judiciary, and our profession in general,” Cook says.

It’s no surprise that Orr’s page on the Orr | Cook website shows a selective smattering of information from his 20-year career. He doesn’t post his wins out of consideration for his clients’ privacy, he says. Only one non-Florida Bar News article about him could be found online — praising his work as president of the Jacksonville Bar Association Young Lawyers Section written by his successor more than a decade ago. This dearth of attention disguises his participation in more than 20 civil jury trials, many appellate arguments, years of volunteering with professional and civic organizations, and the accumulation of countless honors and awards.

Orr’s presidency was an inevitability, according to one of his closest colleagues. “He was born to lead the Bar,” says Patrick Kilbane, corporate counsel at Ullmann Wealth Partners in Jacksonville, who says he has “known Michael for almost half of my life.”

Kilbane and Orr became friends when the two met at a bar exam prep class in 2005 and served together on the Jacksonville Bar Association. Kilbane was struck by Orr’s clear vision and resolute sense of purpose.

“Michael was already essentially campaigning to represent the Fourth Circuit on the YLD [Florida Bar Young Lawyers Division] board. I said, ‘Holy smokes, this guy’s going to be the president of the Bar one day.’… He just took ownership of the profession before he even passed the bar exam,” says Kilbane.

Orr expressed an interest in an open seat on the YLD board shortly after being admitted to the Bar — only to be warned that a more experienced lawyer was already planning to run. Orr didn’t back down, figuring the least he could do was earn some name recognition.

“So I ran against her, and I won — by one vote,” he said raising a finger, “Just one.”

Orr served on the YLD board for a decade — “probably too long,” he says — between serving on the leadership track, being elected YLD president-elect, and serving as president. “But I enjoyed it…. I had the opportunity along the way to work with so many incredible people on the Supreme Court, the district courts of appeal, judiciary throughout the state, Bar leaders. It truly is inspiring to see all the people that are involved and all that they accomplish,” Orr said.

Orr has given two decades of consistent service to The Florida Bar and his local voluntary bar prior to becoming president. Among his many leadership roles, he has served as a member of the Board of Governors since 2017 and a member of the Executive Committee since 2020. Participation in committees keeps Orr knowledgeable about the profession, he says. In addition to recently having served as the co-chair of the Special Committee on the Sustainability Initiative for Attorneys and as a member of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence Tools & Resources, he served as vice chair of the Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics — which is a key concern of his presidential priorities. Orr also served on the 15-member District Court of Appeal Workload and Jurisdiction Assessment Committee, convened by retired Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Charles Canady, which recommended the creation of the Sixth District Court of Appeal in 2022 — the first new district court of appeal since 1979.

According to Third DCA Chief Judge Edwin A. Scales III, who chaired the statewide committee, the outlook for the new Sixth DCA had been bleak before Orr’s argument in favor of it turned the opinions of many workgroup members. “[H]e changed the tide of the workgroup. Because when we first met preliminarily, I don’t think there was an appetite for it. But by the time that we had finished, it was overwhelmingly favored by the workgroup, and I attribute a lot of that — if not the vast majority of that — to Michael’s persuasiveness,” says Chief Judge Scales, a former member of the Board of Governors.

His opponents sing his praises. “He played hard. He played by the rules and…we shook hands at the end of the game…. You could never ask for anything more from someone who you’re on the other side of,” says Curry Pajcic of Pajcic & Pajcic in Jacksonville, who has argued multiple cases against Orr’s clients over the past two decades. As a former president of the Florida Justice Association, Pajcic says he has seen how Orr conducts himself when no one is watching.

“In times like these, when forces threaten to unravel the fabric of our justice system. Mike is the right man for the job,” Pajcic said. “He is a man of character, whose moral compass points straight north. He is a leader, the strong leader we need at a time when legal norms and, frankly, the rule of law are under threat. From the content of his character…I’ve seen a man who is going to be a steady hand at the rudder during stormy seas that we’re experiencing now. He is thoughtful, deliberate, he considers all sides. He doesn’t fly off the handle. He’s levelheaded, evenhanded, and he always comes down on the side of — at least in my view — truth and justice.”

President Orr says his Bar service is inspired by the lawyers and judges he has seen volunteering with the Bar. “They’ve got a successful law practice or they’re a chief judge or a district court of appeal judge, and they’ve got all this responsibility. And yet, they’re dedicating hours they’re not getting paid for to the profession. And so that always stuck with me. I don’t know that I could have done it any other way than through Bar service.” He also learned a lot through that service. Orr explained that through Bar service “we learn and understand things over the years that a lot of people just don’t pay attention to. Every time there’s a rule change — a change to the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar, the Rules of Professional Conduct — you’re aware of it. Those changes matter in your day-to-day practice, and you can become a resource for some attorneys who maybe aren’t looking at it with a magnifying glass.”

Orr’s path to the presidency became clear in 2024, when he began getting encouragement to run for president-elect from fellow board members and friends. With support from his wife, Eileen — who, he suspects, was thrilled at the prospect of putting a definitive endpoint to the time he spends on Bar service — Orr ran for the office unopposed. Asked why he decided to serve as president, Orr said, “I love giving back. I’ve always loved service. I’ve been involved with Bar leadership for 20 years and this is an opportunity to serve that is really unmatched within the profession. I just hope that by being given this honor and opportunity I can meet everyone’s expectations.”

Presidential Priorities

Orr intends to dedicate his term to improving the “core functions” of the Bar and supporting the Florida Supreme Court.

“I want to focus on our court system and providing more resources for the judicial branch. And that effort will, hopefully, lead to public confidence and protection,” says Orr. “I think we’re fortunate to have a court that is engaged and wants to make the legal process better for the public; and so, anything I can do toward that goal will be my focus.”

Informed by his experiences as co-chair of the Bar’s Disciplinary Review Committee, which oversees the prosecution and appeals for disciplinary violations by Florida lawyers and recommends policy on lawyer regulation and disciplinary matters, and as chair of the Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics, which reviews advisory ethics opinions issued to Florida lawyers and appealed to the Board of Governors, he believes education and consistent regulation are the keys to delivering a better system for both the public and members of the Bar.

Board of Governors member Tad Yates, who co-chairs the Disciplinary Review Committee, says early in his career he was impressed by Orr’s work as chair of the same committee. “He really does understand the importance of our system of self-regulation,” says Yates. “While protection of the public is certainly the primary goal of the disciplinary system, Mike also really understands how important it is that we afford Florida lawyers fairness and due process. That’s always been a concern of his.”

Ben Gibson, who has served with Orr on the YLD board and partnered with him on cases, praises his ability to “motivate people toward whatever the big goal is,” describing him as “a ball of energy and positivity” who “doesn’t back down from any sort of challenge” and “does very well under pressure.” Gibson, managing partner of Shutts & Bowen in Tallahassee, especially commended Orr on the relationships he has built throughout the three branches of government.

“By building those relationships, I think that’s only going to benefit the Bar,” Gibson said. “I think the members — all the attorneys in Florida — should be excited about him being at the helm.”

Justice by Jury

Orr, a board-certified civil trial lawyer, loves being in the courtroom. As a member of the invitation-only American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA), he supports efforts to preserve the right to trial by jury, which he believes is the core strength of the U.S. court system, and he is concerned about the falling number of trials. Orr says his mentor, legendary Jacksonville attorney Carl Dawson — who started practicing in 1951 and is now 98 — painted a different picture of the profession before the emphasis on discovery made the cost of justice-by-trial prohibitive and media coverage of supposed “rogue verdicts” soured parties on the perceived risks. “They used to try a couple cases a week, and the process was completely different. You didn’t have discovery, and so you found out what the other side had when you showed up to trial and you ‘danced’— and that was it,” says Orr, borrowing the turn of phrase from Dawson. “Now, on the one hand, that’s not good because maybe there was information you could have uncovered before the trial that you didn’t, or maybe you missed something in the moment that you weren’t able to present to the jury because you didn’t have enough time to prepare, because you didn’t have the information,” he said. “But on the other side of the coin, people didn’t have to pay for two or three years of litigating just to get to that final resolution. With the advent of discovery, in the ’70s and ’80s, discovery started increasing, Carl would explain. And at some point, it just started ballooning to where the discovery became the case — how much you were uncovering and how much time and money you were spending in the discovery phase. And there was a correlation there to a drop in the number of jury trials.”

Terry Schmidt, a trial lawyer turned mediator with a 50-year career who has participated in mediations with Orr, says he researched the number of cases brought to trial in the Fourth Judicial Circuit about five years ago and found approximately 1% of cases are now decided by a judge or jury. By contrast, he says Dawson tried over 1,000 cases over the course of his career.

“A lot of lawyers aren’t trying cases; Michael tries cases, and he does a good job at it,” he said. “From a mediator’s perspective, I could call him a mediator’s nightmare because I’m trying to settle a case, and if it doesn’t seem right to him, he doesn’t settle. And if he goes to trial, he does a good job.”

Although Orr is in favor of using mediation to resolve disagreements, he says that doesn’t negate the importance of jury trials. “I hope that at some point we recognize as a society how lucky we are to have the system of justice that we have, and how we need to actively work to protect it. We can’t just assume it’s always going to be there,” he says. “Other countries, right now, have judges who are just using AI to generate their orders and their decisions. And other countries don’t have systems where you have a right to trial by jury in all the circumstances that we do.”

Orr is thankful for the Florida Supreme Court’s focus on making the court system better through the changes to the civil rules of procedure and active case management, even though he says it is a “big shift” that has been “tough” on judges and on the lawyers impacted.

“Having the courage to make those changes, I think, was just remarkable,” he says. “And, I commend the legislative and executive branches for all they do for the judicial branch. We hear the consumers of the legal process and want to respond with improvements. I know we will have partners in the legislative and executive branches who want the same result — a model judicial system.”

Orr is in favor of continuing to push that effort forward “as a profession — not just the Supreme Court but all members of The Florida Bar, the entirety of the judiciary, and the public weighing in with input, constantly looking to refine and say, ‘How can we make this system better?’ I’m sure there are a lot of thoughts and ideas in that area. Implementing some of those ideas may seem like a herculean task, but I think we can do anything.”

The Practice of Law

Orr’s success is attributable to a few key strengths, according to his family, friends, and colleagues — intelligence, work ethic, charisma, effectiveness, trustworthiness, and a “terrific sense of humor. He does not take himself too seriously,” in the words of Chief Judge Scales.

 

 

“Not a great golfer but a blast to be with,” jokes Todd Holder, who has known Orr as a friend and golfing buddy for more than 10 years. “He is a thoughtful, genuine person with a deep love for his family, the [East Carolina University] Pirates, the Jacksonville Jaguars, and his morning lattes,” Holder said. When Holder’s remarks were relayed to Orr, he replied, “Holder plays more than I do. I am more competitive against a golfer like Matt Devereaux.”

Fellow board member and Bar President-elect Paige Greenlee describes Orr as “one of the best humans that I’ve ever met.” Greenlee says she was leery of Orr’s vibrant personality when they first met and was prepared to dislike him, but all that vanished when she actually got to know him.

“He’s a really good person. He’s a really good leader. He’s really smart. He’s really fun to be around,” she said.

It also helps that Orr has an exceptional memory that allows him to cite caselaw under pressure. If he reads a notebook of 100 cases, he can remember them all in detail. It’s a talent that comes in handy in the courtroom, especially being able to recall and apply details from the extensive discovery, multiple jurisdictions, and regulatory entities common to his specialty — complex commercial litigation, with much of his caseload consisting of class action work.

Yates recalls an oral argument Orr gave before the Sixth DCA in Orlando a couple of years ago.

“I went to watch him do this oral argument, and I was just blown out of the water by his performance. This was a very complicated civil law issue and when Mike took the podium to begin his oral argument before the court, he went to the podium with no notes, with no device of any kind and delivered an incredibly articulate and well-reasoned oral argument,” Yates said. “He was even, during the course of his argument, asked by the three judges for citations to the record; and again, with no notes of any kind in front of him, cited to pages of the appellate record and to pages in the Southern Reporter in support of the arguments he was making. I just honestly could not believe it.”

One of Orr’s major cases was related to the 2007 Jacksonville T2 chemical lab explosion, which was the equivalent of 1,400 pounds of dynamite. A Coast Guard video captured dramatic footage of the explosion filling the Jacksonville sky and online videos showed the devastation recorded by on-site security cameras, which killed four and injured 32. The case, brought by a nationally recognized law firm on behalf of the estates and injured parties, had already dragged on for about a decade when Orr was tapped to defend the client, replacing his mentor Carl Dawson, who was retiring. The client owned the mechanical contracting company affected by the blast and, in addition to having lost friends in the tragedy, was facing the possibility of losing “everything,” including his company. Orr and firm partner John Leonard had a few months to prepare, putting in long hours with experts to understand mechanical and chemical engineering so they could cross-examine witnesses and explain the issues effectively to the jury. The case had been in process for more than 10 years, with numerous other defendants all settling claims, “which made preparation very difficult.” When the jury came back with a verdict of no liability and the client said it would be the first time he was able to sleep in more than 10 years, Orr felt the satisfaction of knowing he’d found his calling.

He enjoys working on convoluted cases, and his passion for practicing law shone through brilliantly as he delightedly ranged into the weeds, explaining his use of a sophisticated legal tool that earned him the distinction of obtaining the first Florida appellate opinion analyzing an obscure legal concept from Illinois and California that had only once before been cited in a Florida opinion. “We appealed the certification of a bilateral class action, which means not only do you have a plaintiff’s class — where someone’s suing on behalf of a class of people — you [also] have a defense class.” As a clarifying analogy, he says, “So, think: I’m suing Sony on behalf of all TV manufacturers.” He continues, “I was defending a company, and [the plaintiffs] were trying to sue that company and certify a defense class, essentially suing that company and all its competitors…. And we argued the juridical link doctrine to the Fourth District Court of Appeal. It may be the first case — and I don’t know if there’s been another one — that adopted and analyzed the juridical link doctrine.” Juridical link doctrine is a class action mechanism that allows a plaintiff to sue a class of defendants, particularly those who share a common legal relationship, even if they are not a named party in the plaintiff’s case. “You shouldn’t get me talking about cases, because I’ll drone on for forever,” he says good-naturedly, as he reviews the case on his phone, reading out indecipherable phrases to himself for a few minutes while the clock wears down.

It’s not just the big-money, class-action cases that animate Orr. Firm managing partner Kevin Cook shared an anecdote that epitomized Orr’s sense of altruism. Cook referred the daughter-in-law of his good friend to Orr. “I was just going to be meeting with her for some deposition prep, and typically that wouldn’t be too long. But she was going through a rough moment, and she was young, and she was fragile. She had been through a lot,” says Orr, respectfully enigmatic with client details. Cook says Orr cleared his calendar for the entire day when he realized how much help and attention she needed. “It’s my understanding she’s doing great now. All that stuff’s behind her and all resolved,” says Orr, eager to move away from the topic. Orr says some of the best cases aren’t the “significant, billboard-type legal win where you put up that you recovered this amount of money or you obtained this verdict,” but rather those he takes to help people, which is what he wanted to do since he was a child and wanted to help his sister and his father. Without offering any identifying details, he mentioned a case related to Individuals with Disabilities Education Act funding where Orr | Cook was able to improve a process that was “hurting kids and hurting the parents that were supposed to be getting resources” and “stop a practice that was, quite frankly, predatory. We helped a kid one time whose parents had the financial resources to bring a claim, but then when they came to us, they realized that there were so many people like them in a similar circumstance who didn’t have the resources to bring the claim,” said Orr. “And so even though we were trying to help them, for both the firm and the client, it became more about how can we help the whole group.”

Family

Michael Fox Orr was the second of four children born within five years. “Michael was always so smiley and, gosh, he was so cute. He was just the most precious thing ever, and always good. Always willing to help,” says his mother, Sharon Orr. “He was only 18 months old when the twins were born and he always seemed older — he was helpful at 18 months. He was just a great little guy. He was always wonderful, and always the one in charge, you know. He was the director of the group.”

Orr’s mother, Sharon, was a homemaker while he and his siblings were young, and later became a tax accountant when his father, a general contractor with a small home-building construction business, was forced to retire. The family moved around during Orr’s early years from Nashville, Tenn., where he was born, to northern Virginia for a short while to be nearer to his mother’s family in Washington, D.C., before settling in Raleigh, N.C., where he spent the bulk of his youth until college.

A comment made by his first-grade teacher proved prophetic, according to his mother. “When he was in first grade, his teacher came to me and said, ‘You know what? He’s either going to be a politician or an attorney when he grows up.’ Because he just, well, he always had to argue a point…. He could talk you into anything, you know?” Sharon says, smiling.

In addition to younger twin siblings, Katie and Patrick, Orr has an older sister, Angie, who was born with Smith-Lemli-Opitz Syndrome, a rare developmental condition. Initially, doctors warned that she wouldn’t live long, but Angie defied all odds. “She just kept going and she proved everybody wrong. But I saw how much help my parents needed with her and all the challenges she faced. Also, [with] my dad’s business, I saw and heard of things happening that made me think, ‘I wish he had somebody representing him who could help.’ I always wanted to help; I always wanted to advocate for people. And I don’t necessarily think that being in front of a jury or judge was something that clicked at first. It was more helping or advocating for people who couldn’t, or didn’t have access to resources,” says Orr.

Orr’s childhood hero was his maternal grandfather, Col. John Fox, who worked at the Pentagon for 25 years and now rests at Arlington National Cemetery. “He was just an amazing guy and had such a great impact on all of us. Anytime we’d go to D.C., whether there was a friend of mine coming with me, or we were on a family trip, you were excited to see what he had planned, because he’d be taking you to one of the museums, Air and Space, or take you to Union Station, or he’d take you to one of the government buildings, and he’d make it fun. He’d be educating you in the process. And one thing that always stuck with me [about] him was, no matter where we went, everyone was important. Every single person we interacted with he had to shake their hand and find out who they were and where they were from. It drove my grandmother and my mother nuts, because when we’d go out to dinner, he’d want to talk to the host and the manager, the assistant manager, and our server, and find out who they were, what they do, and everything else,” Orr said. “He was just really special.”

Orr inherited the colonel’s welcoming friendliness and an iron-clad respect for rules and order, along with a soldier’s sense of precision when it comes to his clothes, according to his mother. “If you’ve ever seen Michael, he’s always got to be dressed just right,” she says, adding that in high school, Orr would lay out his clothes for the next day and track what he wore, writing down a description of his outfit every day.

Mike Reilly and Orr have been friends since they met in Sunday School class at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Garner, N.C., when they were 9 years old. Now a commercial builder in Alabama, Reilly describes Orr as loyal, trustworthy, fun-loving, and funny.

“He’s the type of guy that’s going to be there for you through thick and thin…He loves people, and maintaining those relationships is something that he really values,” Reilly said.

Education

Popular throughout his high school years, Orr’s instinct for leadership led him to student government and sports at Garner High School. Reilly recalls Orr told him he wanted to be a corporate attorney when they were 16 or 17 years old. “He knew from a young age what he wanted to do, which is kind of a blessing, and [having] that vision and then being able to work toward it for however many years — having that consistency of purpose — served him.”

Orr earned his bachelor’s degree in finance and philosophy from East Carolina University in Greenville, N.C. Once there, he immediately got involved in leadership and service. “I did everything there,” he says. He was heavily involved in student government and was class president multiple years including his senior year. He was chair of the school’s media board and hosted his own radio show for a short time. One of the more impactful things he did was lead a group effort to establish the ECU Chapter of Chi Phi Fraternity — the nation’s oldest fraternity, which was founded at Princeton in 1824.

“I had a lot of friends joining fraternities, and one of them told me that I needed to make a decision on which one I was joining, and I joked that I was going to start my own fraternity. And somebody else says, ‘If you do that, then I’ll do it too.’ And then another friend of ours said that. So next thing you know, there were about 12 of us, we got together and started the chapter. Now, I haven’t looked today, but over the past several years they’ve been the largest fraternity on campus and they regularly do well at all the competitions between the fraternities,” Orr says with pride.

Mike Reilly, Orr’s college roommate and one of the founding chapter members, recalls, “One funny thing from our fraternity days is Mike was always a big stickler for the rules. You could be best friends with him walking through the fraternity but when the gavel hit to bring the meeting to order, if you weren’t up on your dues or you weren’t following the rules, he would definitely hold you to account.” But when the meeting ended, so did Orr’s punctiliousness.

Orr decided to get a job at a law firm at the beginning of his sophomore year. He walked around downtown Greenville, saw a sign for a firm called “Michael Fox and Associates,” and decided to apply. “I went back to my house, drafted a resume, and I made my name really prominent. I walked down and just submitted it. I did not know what I was applying for and there was no job listing,” says Orr. “I left my resume, walked back to my house, and I got a phone call about five minutes after I got home. ‘We’d like for you to come in. Can you come in today?’ So, I returned and sat down with two attorneys; one was Michael Fox. He says, ‘That’s your name?’...We weren’t related, but he offered me a job. I was an investigator/doer-of-all-things…. I worked for him in that firm for the next three years, throughout college. At one point, I think I was working full time and going to school full time. I enjoyed working more than I did class. I loved it because I felt like I was helping people.”

Even as a young man with all the demands and distractions of being away at college, Orr didn’t lose sight of what was important. Reilly tells of a moment that illustrates Orr’s character.

“We were around 21 years old when my dad had been diagnosed with terminal cancer,” says Reilly. Orr had gotten them both a job doing statistics for the basketball team and the two Mikes were sitting in the front row at a game when Reilly received a heartbreaking phone call to come home right away; his father didn’t have long. But there was a problem — Reilly’s car was at the shop. “Mike dropped everything on a Friday and drove me two and a half hours so that I could be with my father for those last moments. That gives you an illustration of the type of guy that he is. Friday night for a 21-year-old in college is a pretty important time, and he was willing to sacrifice that and take me halfway across the state to go be with my father. That’s something that I’ll never forget,” says Reilly.

When sharing three anecdotes that shaped the trajectory of his career, Orr paused and said, “I’ll never forget that,” and it seemed he was reliving moments that modified his perspective. The first of those moments came at a point of triumph, with a cuttingly fact-of-the-matter remark from his hero.

As senior class president at East Carolina University, Orr was selected to give the class speech at the graduation ceremony before an audience of more than 10,000 people. He had experience with public speaking through student government and his fraternity, but it was his first time speaking to such a large group.

“I loved it, and I’ll never forget walking off the stage and thinking, ‘That wasn’t so bad.’ My family came up to me and said, ‘Oh, you did a great job.’ ‘Good job.’ And, probably sensing how high I was riding, my grandfather, John Fox, said, ‘You know, Michael, if you talk that slowly, people are going to think you’re slow.’ I’ll never forget that humbling dig.”

His grandfather taught him that no matter how well he thought he was doing, he could always improve. Of course, his grandfather taught him countless lessons, as did his parents. His mother always impressed Orr with her honesty and respect for people. “You took your hat off when you went inside. You said ‘yes sir’ and ‘yes ma’am.’ And always ‘please’ and ‘thank you.’ She even made my friends follow the basics of being a southern gentleman.” And his dad was all about hard work. Orr recalls those early mornings working construction in his teenage years. “We would get up before 6 a.m., head to McDonalds for a sausage and egg biscuit, pick up some co-workers, and then get to the jobsite. We would do it all. Roofing, rough carpentry, plumbing, electrical. And it was not easy.”

One day Orr had skipped class with his friends. His dad was not amused and took him to a job site where he handed him a tilling machine. “For hours I was tilling the dirt for a new home’s foundation. When we were done, I could not open my hands. We got in the truck and my dad said ‘skip class and you’ll be doing hard labor like me for the rest of your life.’ I didn’t skip another class.”

While in law school, Orr met his wife, Eileen, but they did not start dating until they met at a random ping pong tournament hosted by a local bar. “She’s so incredibly talented and smart,” he says. The couple now has four children, Michael, Max, Tucker, and Eloise, all in elementary or middle school. “She hasn’t actively practiced for quite awhile, but she maintains her Bar license,” he adds. “If it was not for her, I would not be able to spend hundreds of hours volunteering for and serving the profession each year.”

As a 2L in law school, he interviewed for a summer associate position at some of the largest firms in Philadelphia. A firm he liked offered a position, but the opening was in Tampa. Orr was still intent on practicing in Philadelphia or New York, so he declined and accepted a different offer that put him on Rittenhouse Square in Center City Philadelphia. He was living his dream. But fate sent him another detour. “One day I was checking out at a Fresh Market in West Philly, right near the University of Pennsylvania, and I looked at the clerk and I said, ‘How are you doing today?’ And she looked at me, and she said, ‘You’re not from here, are you?’ I’ll never forget that. I went back to my apartment, and I said, ‘How am I going to try jury trials if they don’t think I’m from here?’”

Orr called Sharon Foster — who later helped coordinate his swearings-in (he had two; one with 11th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge James Hill and one with her husband, Fourth Circuit Chief Judge Robert M. Foster, a local legal legend in Nassau County for whom both a street and the judicial complex are named) — and told her he thought he’d better come back to Florida. Foster introduced Orr to Michael Obringer and Michael Decandio. They were prepared to hire him, but their Jacksonville firm had ironically just been acquired by a Philadelphia-based firm, and Orr had to meet the approval of the Philadelphia hiring partner, Butler “Buck” Buchanan III. As luck would have it, Orr had already been interviewed by Buchanan in Philadelphia for the Tampa summer associate position he had turned down. Orr took it as confirmation that he was meant to be in Florida, and a couple of days later he accepted an associate position in Jacksonville.

Favor smiled on Orr from the start of his legal career. Kevin Cook recounts how Orr, in his final semester of law school, happened to get a last-minute invitation by former Bar President Hank Coxe to attend the Bedell Law Firm’s Super Bowl party. Orr thought he was going to be a guest at the party.

“All of the legal community and the business community in Jacksonville were invited, and we had a band, a big barbecue/outdoor cocktail party. There were probably 1,000-2,000 people,” says Cook. Coxe told Orr to see Gem Davis, his longtime assistant. “Michael tells the story, he wasn’t sure what that meant, but he went over and met with Gem and she said, ‘All right, well, come with me,’ and she takes him back behind the bar and says, ‘This is where you’re going to be.’ And Michael, as a law student, became the bartender at the Bedell Super Bowl party. And in classic Michael Orr-style, he never missed a beat and said, ‘Of course,’ and for the next four or five hours, he serves the Jacksonville legal and business community cocktails and probably met more people doing that than if he had just been a guest,” says Cook.

In Jacksonville, Orr became active in community service organizations from the start. He served on the Clara White Mission Board of Directors, the board of the Family Nurturing Center of Florida, and on the board for the Cummer Museum. He also volunteered with the Special Olympics for several years, in honor of his older sister.

“I tried to do as much within the community as I could,” he says. But by six or seven years into his career, volunteering with The Florida Bar and the Jacksonville Bar was taking up all his extra time.

Around 2008-2009, Orr was getting so many referrals that he realized he had an opportunity to grow a practice of his own. A client suggested that he reach out to Jacksonville law legend Carl Dawson, who opened his firm in 1953 in the obelisk-shaped Bank of America tower that is now home to Orr | Cook. Over the decades, mayors, judges, and the elite of Jacksonville law had worked at Dawson’s firm as partners and associates. After operating for more than half a century, the firm had scaled down.

“I was really looking for his thoughts and advice,” says Orr. “We sat down, and it was like I was talking to my best friend.”

At the end of the meeting, Dawson told Orr that his son, who was a real estate developer, had sold some properties and was going to be out of the office, traveling for a while. He casually invited Orr to rent out his son’s office, saying, “[T]hen we can help each other out if we have something the other might want to work on.” Orr jumped at the opportunity. “I said ‘yes’ — I didn’t even think about it. ‘Absolutely, I’m in.’”

Terry Schmidt, who was also a trial lawyer during the first half of his 53-year career, has great respect for Dawson and says, “Michael got instant credibility when he associated with Carl.” He recalls becoming acquainted with Orr in the early days of the Dawson Orr firm. “Carl was, to me, one of the icons of Jacksonville as a trial lawyer…he was someone I always looked up to,” says Schmidt. “Carl Dawson is the only lawyer I know who could quote the Bible in front of a jury and not sound hokey. He was a southern gentleman, genteel. He was everything you would want a lawyer to be in terms of professionalism…. And Carl made the right move to name the firm Dawson Orr very quickly — it wasn’t like Michael was an ‘also-ran’ with him…and then Michael started growing the firm from there.”

Dawson predicted the firm — which initially consisted of Dawson, Orr, and Dawson’s longtime paralegal, Sue — would ramp up quickly. “He came in one day, and we had just hired a law clerk and an associate, and he said, ‘You’re going to grow so fast. I’ve seen it before,’” says Orr. Dawson was right and the firm quickly grew from five to 20 employees, including lawyers and paralegals. Jeremy Paul is one of the attorneys they recruited as a law student. He would watch Dawson and Orr try cases together and was struck by how well the two complemented each other — a dream team of trial attorneys. Paul says the example that Orr set in serving clients shaped his own sense of responsibility to his clients. “His perseverance and the work ethic that he brought to it, and the sincerity that he had for the case and his clients, never wavered one bit. And that was very eye-opening to me to understand this is the standard, and if you start a case and you’ve got clients that are hiring you to represent them,” he says, adding, “What [people] don’t always see is the work behind the scenes. The light in Michael’s office is often the last light to go out in the evening,” says Paul.

Orr’s family was growing, too. In 2013, hours before Orr was named YLD president-elect, he and his wife welcomed their first child. He recorded his acceptance speech at the hospital in Jacksonville and a courier delivered it to the YLD board meeting in Daytona Beach. Meanwhile, Dawson, then in his 80s, was shifting into a lower gear as he began to consider retirement. Between the courtroom, a growing family, and his volunteer Bar service, Orr needed help with the firm. He knew exactly who he wanted to ask. “I had a friend, Kevin Cook, who I really wanted to partner with,” says Orr. “I looked up to him and was always impressed by his work ethic.” At the time, Cook was partnered with Florida Bar past President John DeVault, who was his former boss, and Hank Coxe. Cook declined at the time; he decided to take an offer from a large firm that he had already been considering. A couple of years later in 2019, Cook and Orr finally joined forces. Cook says Orr is “the best law partner anybody could ever hope for…. He works harder than anyone else. He works till midnight, one o’clock, almost every night, but that isn’t why…. He and I fit together, and I think we both were trained in similar ways about what it means to run a law firm.” Both Cook and Orr had mentors who were cut from the same cloth. “The old-timers seemed to have more reverence for the mere practice of law, as opposed to making it a business. John [DeVault, Cook’s mentor] and Carl [Dawson] were both stalwarts of ‘you serve the client,’ the rest of it will take care of itself.”

Immediately after sharing his thoughts for this profile, Orr was scheduled to meet a member of the sports booster club for his undergrad alma mater, ECU, for coffee. He is proud that his kids, in addition to being Jaguars fans, are also ECU Pirates fans. “I still have tickets and go up for games…. I remind all my UF friends that we played them in the playoffs in baseball last year, beat the you-know-what out of ’em. Twice,” he repeats cheerfully with a mischievous smile, “Twice.”

Michael Fox Orr works when it’s time to work and is fun when it’s time for fun; and sometimes he’s a bit of both. He leans into his style and his strengths, and he pays attention when he hears something that makes him want to say, “I’ll never forget that.” A final unforgettable moment President Orr shared was a conversation he had as a relatively new lawyer with Laura Reinhardt, who had been a paralegal for decades. “I came to her and I said, ‘[Michael] Obringer is not the most social person. Sure, he’s OK at golf, but he comes across [as] very strict, you know? How does he get all that work? Why does he have all these people trying to hire him?’ And she says, ‘Michael, if you work hard and win, you’ll never have to market to get a client.’ I’ll never forget that, ‘if you work hard and you win.’ And so, my whole career, I’ve just tried to work really hard, to be prepared, and win.”