Appellate Advocacy Blog Weekly Roundup Friday, July 5

Each week, the Appellate Advocacy Blog Weekly Roundup presents a few tidbits of news and Twitter posts from the past week concerning appellate advocacy. As always, if you see something during the week that you think we should be sure to include, feel free to send Dan Real a quick email at[email protected] or a message on Twitter (@Daniel_L_Real).  You can also send emails to Danny Leavitt at [email protected] or a message on twitter @Danny_C_Leavitt. 

 

Supreme Court Opinions and News:

@Steven Mazie had an article in the Economist this week reviewing the past term of the Court, its movement to the right, and the emerging political alignment of Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch.

The New Yorker had an article this week addressing how the Court’s recent decision in Gundy v. United States  likely foreshadows a shift in the Court’s position with regard to allowing Congress to broadly delegate authority to agencies.  Gundy involved a challenge to Congress’ delegation to the Attorney General the decision of whether mandatory registration requirements under the Sex Offender Registration Act apply to individuals who were convicted prior to the Act’s passage.  Gundy is such a defendant, did not register, and was charged and convicted as a result.  He challenged Congress’ delegation as impermissible.  As the article notes, the Court has long allowed Congress broad authority to make such delegations.  In Gundy’s case, the Court was divided with the four more liberal Justices voting to continue allowing delegation, three more conservative Justices voting to deviate from prior law, and Justice Alito siding with the more liberal Justices but explicitly indicating that if a majority of the Court was inclined to change the law, he’d be on board.  The decision in Gundy strongly suggests that the next case to raise the issue to the Court will likely be decided differently because Justice Kavanaugh had not yet been confirmed when it was argued and did not participate.  The article notes that changing this practice of delegation may result in wide sweeping changes to federal government, as a substantial amount of federal law currently depends heavily on such delegations to agencies.

FiveThirtyEight.com had an article this week reviewing the voting habits of the members of the Court (especially the conservative members) since the retirement of “swing vote” Justice Kennedy.  The article suggested that the Court could be viewed now as having three swing Justices, depending on the issues presented – Justice Gorsuch joined the more liberal members of the Court in more closely divided cases than any of the other more conservative Justices, while Justice Roberts provided the decisive vote on the recent census case.  Additionally, the early voting trends suggest that Justice Kavanaugh is likely the current “middle” of the Court, pushing it more conservative even while he seems to be more ideologically moderate than Justice Gorsuch.

The ABA Journal took a look this week at Justice Thomas' 30 year career on the Court, emphasizing his enigmatic persona -- "supporters and detractors are still debating who he really is."  He's now the longest-serving member of the Court and the senior associate Justice.  On the bench, he's known for rarely speaking; off the bench, he's known for being quite jovial and chatty. 

 

Federal Appellate Court Opinions and News:

In the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Amazon was held strictly liable for injuries caused by defective products sold by other vendors on its website.  The case was Oberdorf v. Amazon.com.  More from the CA3blog.

 

State Appellate Court Opinions and News:

The Iowa Court of Appeals this week reversed a jury's decision that had awarded an Iowa couple $3.25 million after they claimed their adoption attorney failed to file paperwork on time and lead to them losing the child they planned to adopt.  The couple cared for the boy for a few months, but were then required to return him to his biological parents after the couple's attorney did not have the biological parents sign termination of parental rights documents.  The child died from severe head injuries a month later, and the biological father was convicted of second-degree murder.  In reversing the malpractice damage award, the appellate court concluded that the couple had failed to show that the attorney engaged in illegitimate conduct especially likely to produce serious emotional harm and had not show that he had a duty to exercise care to avoid causing emotional harm.  More here.

 

Practice Tips and Pointers:

#AppellateTwitter discussion this week on Twitter addressed lawyers and social media – many good thoughts throughout the Twitter thread started by @RachelGurvich  right here.