Journal of Appellate Practice and Process articles from March 2007

Journal of Appellate Practice and Process archives from March 2007

Just a matter of time? Video cameras at the United States Supreme Court and the state supreme courts.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION The long-running debate over webcasting and broadcasting oral arguments in the Supreme Court of the United States has recently moved to the United States Senate. (1) As the material collected in this article suggests, all...

A modest proposal for regulating unpublished, non-precedential federal appellate opinions while courts and litigants adapt to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32.1.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION Federal appellate courts are overworked. To handle their overloaded dockets, appellate judges have adopted a wide variety of measures intended to promote efficiency, including deciding approximately eighty percent of...

Seeking best practices among intermediate courts of appeal: a nascent journey.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION In early 2006, a small group of appellate court judges, law school faculty, and law students in Oregon endeavored to research whether there were identifiable "best practices" (1) among intermediate courts of appeal. The...

When is oral argument important? A judicial clerk's view of the debate.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION To say that oral argument is important seems unremarkable. In truth, however, this statement may be accurate in only a few close cases. In these cases, litigants and courts might benefit from argument sessions that are...

A mechanism for "statutory housekeeping": appellate courts working with Congress.
March 22, 2007... This year the bipartisan leadership of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees called for the United States Courts of Appeals' widespread participation in a decades-old project to let Congress know about possible technical flaws in statutes....

Lopez v. Gonzales: a window on the shortcomings of the federal appellate process.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION Several years ago, I discussed in this journal (1) the Fifth Circuit's repeated error in dismissing as frivolous several strong legal arguments, among them the contention that an alien's state felony conviction for simple...

Experience matters: the rise of a Supreme Court bar and its effect on certiorari.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION During Maureen Mahoney's oral argument in the Michigan affirmative action cases, then-Chief Justice Rehnquist addressed his former clerk as "Maureen." (1) In that same case, Justices Stevens and Souter called one of the...

Class certification and interlocutory review: rule 23(f) in the courts.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION The law abhors a vacuum, and Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(f) created a vacuum in providing a new route for appellate review of decisions granting or denying class action certification. This new section of the Rule,...

Direct appeals from bankruptcy courts to the courts of appeals: the experience after two years.
March 22, 2007... I. INTRODUCTION Until recently, there was no way to appeal a bankruptcy case directly from a bankruptcy court to a court of appeals. Instead, the case had to be first appealed to the district court (1) or bankruptcy appellate panel. (2)...

Appellate Courts: Structures, Functions, Processes, and Personnel, 2d ed.(Book review)
March 22, 2007... The new edition of Appellate Courts: Structures, Functions, Processes and Personnel was produced to serve law students in a course on Appeals. It is well done. The course should be in the curriculum of every law school that hopes not only to...