A Specialized Bar for the Califonia Supreme Court?

That's the title of today's Moskovitz on Appeals in today's DJ by Christoper Hu, in which he notes that "While clerking on the California Supreme Court a few years back, I was struck by how different our state high court seems to be. I saw plenty of excellent advocacy, but as far as I could tell, there were relatively few repeat players. Most of the attorneys appearing before the court were the same ones who'd handled the case below, rather than specialists brought in for their Supreme Court expertise." He concludes that he "warily support[s] greater specialization," i.e., a specialized California Supreme Court bar.

From August 2008 to August 2018, only nine private attorneys argued five or more times in the California Supreme Court, compared with 34 such attorneys in the U.S. Supreme Court over a similar time frame. Those nine California specialists accounted for well under 10 percent of all arguments by private attorneys, compared with 35 percent in the U.S. Supreme Court. None of the California specialists argued more than seven times in the decade I analyzed, whereas the Reuters report identified eight attorneys who argued more than 15 times each in the U.S. Supreme Court ....

Of the nine top advocates on my list, only five fit the standard big law mold. The other four lawyers are at smaller outfits that routinely represent workers, tort victims, public entities, and small businesses. That may be due to the composition of the state high court's docket. All of its cases are important, but the average litigant in a family law or contract case may not have the means (or the desire) to hire a Supreme Court expert from a big firm. This pattern mirrors trends in the California Court of Appeal, where many appellate specialists are solo practitioners and small firm lawyers willing to work on contingency or for a flat fee on behalf of clients of modest means.

Speaking of specialized bars:

UPDATED FEDERAL CIRCUIT RULES OF PRACTICE AND ELECTRONIC FILING PROCEDURES

The new edition of the Federal Circuit Rules of Practice is available on the court’s website.  The Electronic Filing Procedures have also been updated regarding revised procedures for briefs and appendices.  These procedures are available on the court’s website.

Finally, today's Gilbert Submits column in the DJ (titled Thanks, and I mean it), PJ Gilbert relates how he tripped Justice Lillie at a COJA hearing in the distant past, passed his drivers license test recently, and caps things off by asserting that if any of his columns this year have offended anyone, even in the slightest way, he refuses to apologize!