Now that the court’s final three substantive decisions have been filed, the time has come for the first in a series of posts on the justices’ activities in 2017-18, comparing them to our findings from previous years.[Continue Reading…]

With the filing of the last substantive decision of the term earlier this month, the 2017-18 fantasy league season has concluded—and the Gavels of the State Public Defender’s Office have three-peated as champions.  The Gavels rebuffed spirited challenges from the Waivers and the Affirmed, both of whom finished with 73 points.  Although this total would easily have won the league championship in 2015-16, it proved insufficient to overcome the Gavels two years later.  They seized the lead in mid-January and clutched it with an ever-tightening grip all the rest of the way, finishing with 95 points and eclipsing their own record of the previous year.

Those unable to attend last week’s awards banquet may not be aware that Hannah Schieber Jurss was saluted as this season’s MVP for the 30 points that she contributed to the Gavels’ victory.  Her stunning total of five oral arguments even surpassed the number delivered by the most active attorney from the Department of Justice—this year, the Solicitor General himself—a rare accomplishment indeed.  Several other firms (most notably Quarles & Brady) were also recognized for their impressive performances, which are evident in the following table.

As the season comes to a close, the Executive Committee at SCOWstats would like to take this opportunity express gratitude for the recent listing in Feedspot’s compilation of the “Top 60 Wisconsin Blogs” in 2018.

The court did not file any decisions this past week—hence, no change in the standings.

Once again, the decisions filed this week brought points to all of the league’s teams.  However, the Affirmed stood out from the pack by tallying 16 points—all from John McAdams v. Marquette University: Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (10 points for a brief, oral argument, and favorable outcome), Gass Weber Mullins (5 points for a brief and oral argument), and Foley & Lardner (1 point for an amicus brief). 

This decision also distributed points to the Citations (2 points from Godfrey & Kahn for 2 amicus briefs), the Writs (1 point from Michael Best & Friedrich for an amicus brief), and the Waivers (1 point from Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren for an amicus brief).

As a result, the Affirmed pulled even with the Waivers in second place.  They also gained ground on the Gavels of the State Public Defender’s Office, although the league-leaders maintained some breathing room with a 10-point performance in State v. Patrick H. Dalton (brief, oral argument, and favorable outcome).

Click here for the current standings.

This is a monthly reminder to readers to “nominate” any Wisconsin Supreme Court cases from the 2017-18 term that contain surprising aspects.  I will maintain a collection of cases submitted and post them at the end of the summer.  “Surprising aspects” could include (1) decisions featuring odd combinations of justices dissenting or in the majority; (2) arguments in a majority or separate opinion that one might not expect from the author in question; (3) an unusual source in a footnote; (4) a popular-culture reference out of the blue; (5) a humorous passage; (6) a case in which a husband and wife delivered oral arguments on opposing sides; (7) something else unusual about the law firms involved—in short, pretty much anything unexpected.

Please email me your nominations (alan.ball@marquette.edu), as many as you wish, confident in the assurance that I will not reveal the names of nominators or their firms when I display our harvest at the end of the summer.  Please also include a brief explanation (just a sentence or two would likely suffice) indicating the case’s curious feature.  A number of nominations are already in hand, and I hope that the collection will continue to grow.

This week’s flurry of decisions^[1] distributed points across the entire league.  In fact, at least two members of every team scored—except, of course, for the Gavels, who are powered solely by the Office of the Public Defender (and who collected five points for a brief and oral argument in State v. Kyle Lee Monahan).

Here is the scoring for the other four teams:

The Waivers: 13 points
Quarles & Brady, 11 points (a brief, oral argument, and favorable outcome in Cintas Corp. No. 2 v. Becker Property Services LLC and an amicus brief in Tetra Tech EC, Inc. v. Wisconsin Department of Revenue).
Hawks Quindel, 1 point (an amicus brief in Wisconsin Bell, Inc. v. LIRC).
Henak Law Office, 1 point (an amicus brief in State v. Kyle Lee Monahan).

The Affirmed: 8 points.
Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, 7 points (a brief and oral argument in E. Glen Porter, III v. State of Wisconsin, an amicus brief in Wisconsin DWD v. Wisconsin LIRC, and an amicus brief in Tetra Tech).
Axley Brynelson, 1 point (an amicus brief in Ascaris Mayo v. Wisconsin Injured Patients and Families Compensation Fund).

The Citations: 6 points.
DeWitt Ross & Stevens, 5 points (a brief and oral argument in Tetra Tech).
Godfrey & Kahn, 1 point (an amicus brief in Mayo).

The Writs: 6 points.
Habush Habush & Rottier, 5 points (a brief and oral argument in Mayo).
Nash, Spindler, Grimstad, & McCracken, 1 point (an amicus brief in Mayo).

With their impressive performance, the Waivers chopped eight points off the Gavels’ lead and have pulled within striking distance if they maintain their recent pace.

Click here for the current standings.

[1] We are excluding Kristi Koschkee v. Tony Evers, which was an order pertaining to two preliminary motions.

The Waivers stood out in the decisions filed this week, gaining 11 points in Adams Outdoor Advertising Limited Partnership v. City of Madison—10 points from Boardman & Clark (brief, oral argument, and favorable outcome) and another point from von Briesen & Roper (amicus brief).  With this performance, the Waivers leaped over the Affirmed into second place.

The league-leading Gavels from the State Public Defender’s Office also distinguished themselves, picking up 10 points for a brief, oral argument, and favorable outcome in State v. Andre L. Scott.

Click here for the current standings.

This week’s pair of decisions brought points to three teams but did not reorder the standings.  At the top, the Gavels of the State Public Defender’s Office added 5 points (for a brief and oral argument in State v. Cox), while, at the bottom, the Citations picked up 3 points from Tracey Wood & Associates (brief but no oral argument in State v. Pico).  The Waivers gained a point from Henak Law Office (an amicus brief in State v. Pico), leaving them just a single point behind the second-place Affirmed.

Click here for the current standings.

These tables are derived from information contained in 245 Wisconsin Supreme Court decisions that were turned up in a Lexis search for decisions filed between September 1, 1978, and August 31, 1979.  The total of 245 decisions does not include rulings arising from various motions and petitions.

I am omitting the following cases that did not include briefing or oral argument at the supreme court level and that resulted in per curiam decisions labeled “UNPUBLISHED LIMITED PRECEDENT OPINION”: General Casualty Co. v. Hopfensperger; Tews Lime & Cement Co. v. Department of Industry, Labor & Human Relations; State ex rel. Hacker v. Wolke; Lund v. State; Yoss v. State; and Ingram v. State. 

Also omitted is State ex rel. Steiger v. Circuit Court for Dane County, where the court concluded in a brief per curiam decision that it would be inappropriate to reach the constitutional issue presented in the case.

Nor do the tables include State v. Barrett and State ex rel. Cholka v. Johnson, Sheriff of Jackson County, where the justices ruled, per curiam, on a question of whether certain types of decisions from the court of appeals are appropriate for supreme-court review.

The tables are available as a complete set and by individual topic in the subsets listed below.

Four-to-Three Decisions
Decisions Arranged by Vote Split
Frequency of Justices in the Majority
Distribution of Opinion Authorship
Frequency of Agreement Between Pairs of Justices
Average Time Between Oral Argument and Opinions Authored by Each Justice
Number of Oral Arguments Presented by Individual Firms and Agencies

As one would expect, the host of cases decided this week provided scoring opportunities for several players.  The Affirmed gained the most ground, with 5 points from Foley & Lardner (brief and oral argument in Winebow, Inc. v. Capitol-Husting Co., Inc.), 5 points from Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (brief and oral argument in Voters with Facts v. City of Eau Claire), and 3 points from Stafford Rosenbaum (a brief in Golden Sands Dairy LLC v. Town of Saratoga).

Nearly as impressive were the Writs, who picked up a full 10 points from Michael Best & Friedrich (brief, oral argument and favorable result in Golden Sands) along with a point from Pines Bach for an amicus brief in Golden Sands.  The Waivers matched this total by adding the 10-point maximum from Quarles & Brady (brief, oral argument, and favorable result in Winebow) and another point from von Briesen & Roper for an amicus brief in Golden Sands.

Click here for the current standings.