The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is the U.S. federal court of appeals that has appellate jurisdiction over the U.S. district courts for the following federal judicial districts:
Frank Hoover Easterbrook is an American lawyer and jurist who has served as a United States circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit since 1985. He was the Seventh Circuit's chief judge from 2006 to 2013.
The Alien Tort Statute, also called the Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA), is a section in the United States Code that gives federal courts jurisdiction over lawsuits filed by foreign nationals for torts committed in violation of international law. It was first introduced by the Judiciary Act of 1789 and is one of the oldest federal laws still in effect in the U.S.
Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee v. McGrath, 341 U.S. 123 (1951), was a United States Supreme Court case that held that groups could sue to challenge their inclusion on the Attorney General's List of Subversive Organizations. The decision was fractured on its reasoning, with each of the Justices in the majority writing separate opinions.
Edith Hollan Jones is a United States circuit judge and the former chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
A plurality decision is a court decision in which no opinion received the support of a majority of the judges.
Diane Schwerm Sykes is an American jurist and lawyer who serves as the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. She served as a justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court from 1999 to 2004.
David Stephen Tatel is an American lawyer who served as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
José Alberto Cabranes is an American lawyer who serves as a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and a former presiding judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review ("FISCR"). Formerly a practicing lawyer, government official, and law teacher, he was the first Puerto Rican appointed to a federal judgeship in the continental United States (1979).
Stephen Roy Reinhardt was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, with chambers in Los Angeles, California. He was the last federal appeals court judge in active service to have been appointed to his position by President Jimmy Carter.
Bruce Marshall Selya is a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and former chief judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review who is known for his distinctive writing style.
Robert David Sack is a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Jerry Edwin Smith is an American attorney and jurist serving as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
In United States federal courts, a circuit split, also known as a split of authority or split in authority, occurs when two or more different circuit courts of appeals provide conflicting rulings on the same legal issue. The existence of a circuit split is one of the factors that the Supreme Court of the United States considers when deciding whether to grant review of a case. Some scholars suggest that the Supreme Court is more likely to grant review of a case to resolve a circuit split than for any other reason.
Pauline Newman is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as a U.S. circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. She has been called "the heroine of the patent system", "the Federal Circuit's most prolific dissenter", and "the greatest ally to inventors with respect to [calling out] the ignorance of the CAFC, district courts, and at times even the Supreme Court". Chief Judge Kimberly A. Moore commented of Newman that "many of her dissents have later gone on to become the law—either the en banc law from our court or spoken on high from the Supremes".
Wilfred Feinberg was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and previously was a United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Thomas Beall Griffith is an American lawyer and jurist who served as a U.S. circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 2005 to 2020. Currently, he is a lecturer on law at Harvard Law School, a fellow at the Wheatley Institute at Brigham Young University (BYU), and special counsel in the Washington, D.C. office of the law firm of Hunton Andrews Kurth. He is also a member of the Federalist Society.
Dubitante is used in law reports of a judge who is doubtful about a legal proposition but hesitates to declare it wrong. E.g., "Justice X acquiesces in the Court's opinion and judgment dubitante on the question of Constitutional preemption."
Stephanos Bibas is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as a circuit judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Before his appointment to the bench, Bibas was a professor of law and criminology at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he also served as director of its Supreme Court clinic.
