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William & Mary Law School

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Full-Text Articles in Law

Virtual Briefing At The Supreme Court, Jeffrey L. Fisher, Allison Orr Larsen Dec 2019

Virtual Briefing At The Supreme Court, Jeffrey L. Fisher, Allison Orr Larsen

Faculty Publications

The open secret of Supreme Court advocacy in a digital era is that there is a new way to argue to the Justices. Today's Supreme Court arguments are developed online: they are dissected and explored in blog posts, fleshed out in popular podcasts, and analyzed and re-analyzed by experts who do not represent the parties or have even filed a brief in the case at all. This "virtual briefing" (as we call it) is intended to influence the Justices and their law clerks but exists completely outside of traditional briefing rules. This article describes virtual briefing and makes a case …


Judicial Fact-Finding In An Age Of Rapid Change: Creative Reforms From Abroad, Allison Orr Larsen Jun 2017

Judicial Fact-Finding In An Age Of Rapid Change: Creative Reforms From Abroad, Allison Orr Larsen

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Separating Amicus Wheat From Chaff, Aaron-Andrew P. Bruhl, Adam Feldman Jan 2017

Separating Amicus Wheat From Chaff, Aaron-Andrew P. Bruhl, Adam Feldman

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


The Amicus Machine, Allison Orr Larsen, Neal Devins Dec 2016

The Amicus Machine, Allison Orr Larsen, Neal Devins

Faculty Publications

The Supreme Court receives a record number of amicus curiae briefs and cites to them with increasing regularity. Amicus briefs have also become influential in determining which cases the Court will hear. It thus becomes important to ask: Where do these briefs come from? The traditional tale describes amicus briefs as the product of interest-group lobbying. But that story is incomplete and outdated. Today, skilled and specialized advocates of the Supreme Court Bar strategize about what issues the Court should hear and from whom they should hear them. They then “wrangle” the necessary amici and “whisper” to coordinate the message. …


The Trouble With Amicus Facts, Allison Orr Larsen Nov 2014

The Trouble With Amicus Facts, Allison Orr Larsen

Faculty Publications

The number of amicus curiae briefs filed at the Supreme Court is at an all-time high. Most observers, and even some of the Justices, believe that the best of these briefs are filed to supplement the Court’s understanding of facts. Supreme Court decisions quite often turn on generalized facts about the way the world works (Do violent video games harm children? Is a partial birth abortion ever medically necessary?). To answer these questions, the Justices are hungry for more information than the parties and the record can provide. The consensus is that amicus briefs helpfully add factual expertise to the …


Allison Orr Larsen On Intensely Empirical Amicus Briefs And Amicus Opportunism At The Supreme Court, Allison Orr Larsen Jul 2014

Allison Orr Larsen On Intensely Empirical Amicus Briefs And Amicus Opportunism At The Supreme Court, Allison Orr Larsen

Popular Media

No abstract provided.