The Appalachian School of Law (ASL) will survive. After a year that included the most devastating tragedies imaginable, the dedication of the faculty, staff, and students has ensured the success of the institution. Applications have increased more than twenty-five percent over last year, and admissions are up. We have hired six new highly qualified full-time faculty members and two visiting faculty members. The three students who were injured have recovered and are doing well academically. We continue to work toward full ABA accreditation, having received provisional accreditation in February 2001. Although we all hope that nothing like this will ever happen again, the lessons learned by ASL, and the example set by ASL, may help another school when faced with a similar tragedy.
On Wednesday, January 16, 2002, former student Peter Odighizuwa shot and killed Dean L. Anthony Sutin, Professor Thomas F. Blackwell, and a first-year student, Angela Dales. Odighizuwa also shot and injured three other female students. This news spread rapidly throughout the community of American law schools, which reacted with horror, grief, then support, assistance, and empathy. All classes were cancelled until the following week.
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A trial court in Florida is hearing a case concerning an alleged assault and battery. A pro-life activist, Lisa Swanson, is suing Cynthia Matthews for causing her severe head injuries. The incident that gave rise to the conflict took place during Lisa’s campaign at a local mall. After Lisa approached Cynthia and handed her a pro-life flyer, the two women engaged in conversation. Cynthia eventually revealed that she had once had an abortion. When Lisa became abrasive and started shouting insults in Cynthia’s face, Cynthia pushed Lisa away. As Lisa fell, her head struck a hard object and she lost consciousness. At the hospital, she received sixteen stitches to the back of her head and currently is undergoing physical therapy to regain full motor skills. Cynthia claims she never meant to injure Lisa; she was simply trying to get Lisa to give her some space.
In 1996, fulfilling his campaign pledge to “end welfare as we know it,” President William Jefferson Clinton signed into existence the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA). The PRWORA replaced the former federal system of welfare, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). As its title reflects, TANF is designed around the concept of temporary need, with emphasis on short time limits for assistance and transitioning recipients into the work force. Although the key word in the new welfare scheme is “temporary,” women who receive temporary assistance are subject to conditions that may require them to permanently alter their lives. Women applying for temporary public assistance under the PRWORA must cooperate in establishing the paternity of their children or be denied relief.
A few years back, a distinguished Florida judge complained to me that law-review scholarship was largely irrelevant to what he did as a judge. His view is shared by other notable jurists, who lament the decline of scholarship that is useful, or even understandable, to the practicing profession.
In this symposium, we hope to “swim against the current” by publishing a series of articles that the judiciary and the bar will find useful. When we solicited writers, we invited them to address legal issues relevant to the appellate bar but also welcomed them to share their personal insights into appellate practice. What follows is a combination of both.
The most important responsibility of an appellate court is to determine whether errors of sufficient magnitude occurred in the lower court or tribunal to warrant disturbing the judgment or ruling on appeal. The second most important responsibility, in my opinion, is to provide explanations for the decisions in the form of written opinions. In this Article, I seek to provide some insight into how judges write opinions, as well as to provide some insight into the processes and procedures in the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. In Part II, I will discuss the framework of the Eleventh Circuit and how appeals are handled within the Circuit. Part III contains a discussion concerning the decisions that are made with respect to opinions, such as whether the opinion should be published and whether a summary affirmance is appropriate. In Part IV, I discuss the structure of opinions, the style of opinions, and the audience. Finally, in Part V, I discuss what happens after opinions are circulated to the other judges of the panel and how opinions are released by the clerk.
Good amicus curiae briefs—supposedly “friend-of-the court” briefs—can impact the court’s decision-making process, either with respect to the outcome of the case or the rationale expressed by the court for reaching that outcome. Yet appellate judges and appellate practitioners complain that, all too often, amicus briefs bring nothing new or of value to the court and instead merely reiterate the arguments advanced by one of the actual parties to the appeal. Those briefs are not truly amicus briefs and, unfortunately, they cause courts to be wary of the value of the amicus brief, even though—when properly written—it can be the court’s best friend in reaching the right decision.
We will begin this Article by discussing amicus briefs in general and the specific use of them in the United States Supreme Court. We will then explore the Florida experience with amicus briefs, both by examining Florida decisional law and by reflecting on interviews with Florida appellate judges and practitioners. We will conclude by considering the possible need for changes in the Florida rule on amicus briefs.
The general procedures governing the preparation and filing of appellate motions are contained in Rule 9.300 of the Florida Rules of Appellate Procedure. In some instances, these procedures must be applied in conjunction with additional requirements established by a more specific rule relating to the subject matter of the motion. This Article discusses appellate motion practice in general and the special requirements that apply to the most common types of motions.
A party may file a motion in an appellate court to resolve any matter that is not addressed by some other remedy established by the Florida Rules of Appellate Procedure. Rule 9.300(a) states that “[u]nless otherwise prescribed by these rules, an application for an order or other relief available under these rules shall be made by filing a motion therefor.” This broad statement authorizes the use of motions in a variety of situations.
Despite the broad scope of Rule 9.300(a), the parties should attempt to minimize the need for filing motions in an appellate court. Motion practice is necessarily more limited in appellate courts than it is in trial courts. A final judgment is entered at the trial level only after many issues have been resolved through the pretrial and trial stages of the proceeding by orders and rulings on motions. In contrast, the merits of an appeal can be decided without preliminary rulings or decisions. The parties conceivably could obtain a decision on the merits of a well-presented appeal without filing a single motion.
Given these differences, the appellate courts repeatedly have cautioned lawyers to exercise restraint when filing motions in appellate proceedings. Many of the motions filed in appellate courts are unnecessary.
In addition to appellate jurisdiction, the Florida Supreme Court and Florida’s district courts of appeal have original jurisdiction to issue various types of writs. These original proceedings expand the scope of relief available in Florida’s appellate courts beyond the relatively limited appellate review. For example, while appeals are available only from final judgments and from a limited class of nonfinal orders, original writs often can be used to obtain relief from interlocutory orders for which no immediate appeal exists. In addition, original writs can be used to prevent harm that a final appeal would not adequately remedy.
An appellant dreads nothing more than the receipt of a thin envelope from the district court of appeal containing an adverse per curiam affirmance (not so affectionately known to appellate lawyers as a “PCA”). After months, and perhaps years, of effort in the trial and appellate courts, the appellant is rewarded with the equivalent of “you lose” without a word of explanation. Worse yet, in most circumstances, a PCA is the end of the line for an appeal. In Florida, with one possible exception, a PCA cannot be reviewed by the Florida Supreme Court.
In 1799, French troops in Egypt discovered a granite slab inscribed with a decree praising an Egyptian king. The decree appeared in hieroglyphic, demotic, and Greek. This slab, the Rosetta Stone, enabled scholars to compare the Greek writings to the other two languages. The stone “was the key to the deciphering of Egyptian hieroglyphics.” Sometimes, trial judges and lawyers need to look for a Rosetta Stone to decipher the meaning of decisions handed down by the appellate courts. In law school, students are trained to read appellate decisions and apply them to other cases. However, students are taught little about how to interpret and enforce appellate court decisions. Certain kinds of decisions, or certain language used in decisions, may have different meanings in different contexts, or in different courts. It is not always enough to read the court’s decision in the particular case. It sometimes is necessary to read other decisions to understand what the appellate court wants the trial court to do. Often, it is necessary to seek further guidance from the appellate court.
This Article will discuss some issues that arise after an appeal is concluded, and, as further proceedings are held in the trial court below, the need for clear directions from the appellate court to the trial court and to the parties and appropriate remedies when the trial court fails to understand or to comply with the appellate mandate.