Soon you won't be a member of the State Bar!

The MetNews reports that Senate Passes Bill Maintaining 2019 State Bar Dues at $390: 'Members" to become 'Licensees'

And the DJ reports Trump Nominates Magistrate Judge to Arizona Seat on 9th Circuit, about the nomination of MJ Bridget Shelton Bade "(pronounced BAY-DEE),"  "ending a two-year deadlock between the state's senators and the White House in negotiations to find a suitable nominee."

Magistrate Judge Bade front and center!

Josh Groban to be 2/5's PJ?

Josh Groban

Today's MetNews reports: Brown Readying to Appoint Joshua Groban As Court of Appeal Presiding Justice, i.e., for Div. 5. The article notes that apart from the vacancy for a PJ in 2/5, there is a vacancy in 2/4 for Justice Manella's seat, since she's replaced PJ Norm Epstein. The article recounts some history:

Several governors, through the years, have appointed their legal advisors to judgeships, going back at least to 1957 when Gov, Goodwin J. Knight placed his clemency/extradition secretary, Joseph Babich, on the Sacramento Municipal Court. Brown, in his earlier stint as governor, in 1980 named his legal affairs secretary, J. Anthony Kline, to the San Francisco Superior Court, elevating him two years later to his present post as a presiding justice of the First District Court of Appeal.Gov. George Deukmejian in 1988 placed his legal affairs secretary, Marvin Baxter, on the Fifth District Court of Appeal, elevating him two years later to the California Supreme Court.Gov. Pete Wilson in 1998 named his chief legal advisor, Daniel Kolkey, to the Third District Court of Appeal, and Gov. Gray Davis appointed Judicial Appointments Secretary Burt Pines to the Los Angeles Superior Court in 2003.

Post-Trial motions: should you or shouldn't you?

Today's DJ has Ben Feuer's Don't Walk Into A Post-Trial Motion Trap

If you lose a trial or dispositive ruling, your first instinct may be to file a post-trial motion. No doubt, objections to statements of decision, new trial motions, JNOVs and motions for judgment as a matter of law can be useful tools for relief when the trial court simply missed something critical the first time around or a jury clearly blew it.

Their most common purpose, however, is preserving issues for appeal. If a trial judge's written dispositive order doesn't address a key issue of contention, is ambiguous in its factual findings, or doesn't match what the judge said in court, objections may be the only way to get the mistake into the record. Or if you need to preserve an issue for appeal that wasn't fully fleshed out earlier on, have found evidence of juror bias or misconduct, or want to challenge the amount of damages awarded by a judge or jury, then a timely new trial motion may be essential.

But if you don't need to preserve an issue and the court didn't miss anything major, it can be a mistake to bring a post-trial motion without thinking strategically first. While it may feel like an opportunity to urge your cause one last time and persuade the judge that you were right all along, if you're essentially just repeating arguments and evidence you've already presented, your chances of success are probably pretty small. Worse, you might end up inadvertently weakening your position on appeal.

For "fun with writing decisions", see Law360 for Wild West Lives On In Texas Judge's Outlandish Opinions.

And see When the Supreme Court Lurches Right in yesterday's NY Times Magazine.

2d DCA pro tems & current line up

The following are currently sitting on assignment in the 2d District Court of Appeal:

• Judge Brian S. Currey of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division One until September 30, 2018
• Judge Ann I. Jones of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Three until October 31, 2018
• Judge Allan Goodman (Retired) of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Three beginning September 4 until October 31, 2018
• Judge Gary I. Micon of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Four until September 30, 2018
• Judge Laura A. Seigle of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Five until November 30, 2018
• Judge Lisa R. Jaskol of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Five until November 30, 2018
• Judge John Shepard Wiley, Jr. of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Seven until September 30, 2018
• Judge Allan Goodman (Retired) of the Los Angeles Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Eight until September 30, 2018
• Judge Kim Dunning of the Orange County Superior Court, will be sitting Pro-Tem in Division Eight until October 31, 2018

And here's the current listing of Justices by Division

Division One 
Presiding Justice Frances Rothschild
Associate Justice Victoria Gerrard Chaney
Associate Justice Jeffrey W. Johnson
Associate Justice Helen I. Bendix
Division Two 
Administrative Presiding Justice Elwood Lui
Associate Justice Judith Ashmann-Gerst
Associate Justice Victoria M. Chavez
Associate Justice Brian M. Hoffstadt
Division Three
Presiding Justice Lee Smalley Edmon
Associate Justice Luis A. Lavin
Associate Justice Anne H. Egerton
Associate Justice Halim Dhanidina
Division Four
Presiding Justice Nora M. Manella
Associate Justice Thomas L. Willhite, Jr.
Associate Justice Audrey B. Collins
Associate Justice (Vacant)
Division Five
Presiding Justice (Vacant)
Associate Justice Lamar W. Baker
Associate Justice Carl H. Moor
Associate Justice Dorothy C. Kim
Division Six
Presiding Justice Arthur Gilbert
Associate Justice Kenneth R. Yegan
Associate Justice Steven Z. Perren
Associate Justice Martin J. Tangeman
Division Seven
Presiding Justice Dennis M. Perluss
Associate Justice Laurie D. Zelon
Associate Justice John L. Segal
Associate Justice Gail Ruderman Feuer
Division Eight
Presiding Justice Tricia A. Bigelow
Associate Justice Laurence D. Rubin
Associate Justice Elizabeth A. Grimes
Associate Justice Maria E. Stratton

A new source for Cal Supreme Court concurrence data

Announcement: The Concurrence Matrix

CALIFORNIA CONSTITUTION CENTER

Announcing a new data analytics tool for SCOCA watchers:
a justices voting relationship matrix, available here:

SCOCA Justices Concurrence Matrix

Similar to the SCOTUSblog voting relationships
chart on its statistics page (scroll to the bottom),
this tool tracks the agreement rate of the justices
relative to each other as a percentage value.
The methodology is simple:
any justice who concurs in the judgment counts
as an “agree” in a given case even if that justice
writes separately. SCOTUSblog does the same,
counting agreement “in full, in part, or in judgment.”

Be a 9th Cir. Appellate Rep!

Ninth Circuit Seeks Candidates for Appellate Lawyer Representatives

The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is seeking applicants from among the federal appellate bar to serve as Appellate Lawyer Representatives to the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference. Those selected will serve three year terms commencing October 1, 2018, during which they will participate in meetings throughout the circuit, coordinate activities with District Lawyer Representatives, and attend and participate in the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, an annual gathering of federal judges, attorneys, agency representatives and court staff. This is a hard-working committee, so familiarity with this court's rules of practice and the ability to serve on one or more sub-committees will be important. Applications are due by September 14, 2018.

Article roundup

Today's DJ has many appellate-related articles.

• First Muslim, five others confirmed to state court of appeal, details yesterday's CJA hearings in which Halim Dhanidina (2/3), Alison Tucher (1/4), Maria Stratton (2/8), Dorothy Kim (2/5), Michael Raphael (4/2) were confirmed as Justices and Nora Manella was confirmed as 2/4's PJ. See more here.
• 
• State Appellate Court Employees Renew Push for Harassment Policy, noting that 127 appellate court employees (a "majority" from the 2d DCA) have now signed a petition calling for "increased transparency and accountability when reporting allegations of sexual harassment."
• Master Storyteller, profiles GMSR's award-winning novelist "C.E. Tobisman," who says "writing never gets easier," and: "I really enjoy being an appellate lawyer, and part of what I like about it is I think it really is sort of the cutting edge of creativity for the law."
• Also of note from back on August 21 is Lenny Gumport's Stare Decisis Lite in the U.S. Supreme Court describing the three-tiered approach SCOTUS uses, as explained in The Law of Judicial Precedent (2016):

The treatise states: "The U.S. Supreme Court gives strong effect to statutory precedents, medium effect to common-law precedents, and weaker effect to constitutional precedents" (pp. 334-35). The treatise also states: "Although the idea may seem counterintuitive, constitutional precedents are somewhat more protean and mutable than others" (p. 352). The treatise explains: "The doctrine of stare decisis applies less rigidly in constitutional cases than it does in statutory cases because the correction of an erroneous constitutional decision by the legislature is well-nigh impossible. Yet stare decisis should and does play a significant role in constitutional adjudication" (p. 352).

CJA hearings today!

Commission on Judicial Appointments Public Hearings

Commission to consider six appointments to courts of appeal.

Thursday, August 23, 2018
9:00AM — 2:50PM

The hearings will be webcast live here.

Six public hearings have been scheduled by the Commission on Judicial Appointments for August 23, beginning at 9 a.m. in the Supreme Court Courtroom, 300 South Spring Street in Los Angeles, to consider the following appointments by Governor Edmund G. Brown, Jr.:

9-9:30 a.m. Justice Nora M. Manella, as Presiding Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Division Four (Los Angeles)
9:50-10:20 a.m.: Judge Dorothy C. Kim, as Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Division Five (Los Angeles)
10:40-11:10 a.m.: Judge Halim Dhanidina, as Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Division Three (Los Angeles)
11:30 a.m. to noon: Judge Maria E. Stratton, as Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Division Eight (Los Angeles)
1:30-2 p.m. Judge Alison M. Tucher, as Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, Division Four (San Francisco)
2:20-2:50 p.m. Judge Michael J. Raphael, as Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, Division Two (Riverside)

Justice Hoffstadt is No Joker

Today's DJ profiles 2/2's Justice Brian Hoffstadt in No Joker: Fellow jurists think highly of Justice Brian Hoffstadt's scholarship and knowledge of the law. [The print version title is Valuable Resource] The DJ last profiled him when he was a superior court judge in July 2011. He has written over 50 legal articles and is the author of California Criminal Discovery.

The profile starts off by asserting that he has an "active imagination" and "looks forward to the day he can return to his unpublished fiction novels." It then notes that he has an "aggressive," "first-to-ounce," yet "far from off-putting" approach at oral argument: "At a random session of oral arguments in July, Hoffstadt allowed an average of 20 seconds to elapse before engaging attorneys with questions about the record."

"What I try to do is to focus them on the things that are bothering or concerning me. Then, you’ll notice, I step back and let them talk about whatever they want, but I want to make sure that I have the opportunity to get the benefit of their insight on the issues that I think are the turning points of the case.” “I would say probably half of the time I will go back and make some substantive changes to the opinion.” “I can’t give a percentage how often it changes the result, but it oftentimes changes the rationale or the reasoning."