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  • Inside Track
    February 17, 2016

    Bring Out Your Briefs: Appellate Practice Section Kicks Off Outstanding Brief Competition

    Have you or a colleague written an exceptional appellate brief in the past year? Think it could serve as a model for others? Enter the State Bar of Wisconsin Appellate Practice Section’s first-ever competition to identify and recognize outstanding appellate briefs.

    Feb. 17, 2016 – You’ve spent hours working on it – now’s the time to let it shine.

    The State Bar of Wisconsin Appellate Practice Section is seeking nominations of any opening or response brief submitted in a case that has been decided in the last year.

    Entries are due March 31; winners will be announced in the fall. The brief writers (and their firms or agencies) will be publicly recognized, and the briefs will be posted to the Appellate Practice Section’s website to serve as models for appellate practitioners.

    Anonymous Entries – Confidential Nominations

    Anyone can nominate a brief – author, colleague, friend, judge, clerk, or other admirer of great legal writing. Nominations will be kept confidential.

    After identifying information is removed from the briefs, section board members will choose several as finalists. These finalists will be evaluated by a panel of retired appellate judges to identify the most effective, persuasive briefs. There could be one or more winners, depending on how many briefs are worthy of special recognition.

    To qualify for the competition:

    • The primary author must be a State Bar member in good standing.

    • The brief must have been submitted to an appellate court.

    • The appeal in which the brief was submitted must have been resolved – the remittitur must have issued – during 2015 or 2016.

    • The briefs will be judged on clarity of writing, depth of analysis, and persuasiveness. They will not be judged on the apparent merits of any issue.

    How to Nominate a Brief

    To nominate a brief, please send the following to briefscompetition@wisbar.org by March 31, 2016:

    • PDF version of the brief;

    • Copy of or link to the docket sheet so we can quickly determine that the case has been resolved; and

    • Copies of or link to the other briefs submitted in the case – to be used only to help the judges understand the case, if necessary, not to assess the merits of any issue.

    Questions? Email briefscompetition@wisbar.org.



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