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AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION
STANDING COMMITTEE ON FEDERAL JUDICIAL IMPROVEMENTS
INFORMATIONAL REPORT TO THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES
2013 MIDYEAR MEETING
The Standing Committee on Federal Judicial Improvements has continued to monitor legislative
developments, conduct ongoing analyses of the needs of the federal courts, prepare policy
recommendations on matters affecting judicial administration as well as maintain and create
liaisons with the federal judiciary and with other interested groups. Through these activities, the
Standing Committee will continue to work to improve communication among the various users
of the federal judicial system, to recommend improvements in the system, and to enhance public
respect for the federal judiciary.
Annual Meeting Programming
2013 Annual Meeting
The Standing Committee develops programming that highlights critical issues affecting the
judiciary. To continue to educate our communities and further highlight the national court
funding crisis, the Standing Committee is embarking on an ambitious and exciting program for
the 2013 ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco. The Standing Committee is assisted by an
Academic Advisory Board of diverse and preeminent legal scholars that provide doctrinal,
experiential, and research support. The current Chair of the Academic Advisory Board, Professor
Judith Resnik, Arthur Liman Professor of Law at Yale Law School, is working with Standing
Committee members to develop the 2013 Annual Meeting Program, titled “Are Courts Dying?
The Decline of Open and Public Adjudication.” The program has been selected for ABA
Showcase status and will be held on Thursday, August 8, 2013 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Chief
Judge Jonathan Lippman of the New York Court of Appeals, Chief Justice Tani G. CantilSakauye of the Supreme Court of California, and Chief Justice Wallace B. Jefferson of the
Supreme Court of Texas have confirmed their participation as panelists for this program. The
Standing Committee will present this program with the Standing Committee on Judicial
Independence, and has already secured co-sponsorship from the National Conference of Federal
Trial Judges, the Section of Litigation, the Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section, the Senior
Lawyers Division, and the Commission on Immigration.
2012 Annual Meeting
The Standing Committee presented two programs at the 2012 ABA Annual Meeting:
“Sensible Steps to Protect Your Personal Security – and that of Your Family” and “Leaving the
Bench, 1979-2009; The Choices Federal Judges Make, What Influences Those Choices, and
Their Consequences.” The personal security program offered resources and insights about how
to locate and remove personal information from the Internet. This information was valuable to
judges and non-judges alike. The program also provided judges with practical tips about personal
security in their homes and courthouses. The second Annual Meeting program presented new
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data that reveals why judges leave the bench and how current national policies may exacerbate
this phenomenon. This data will prove invaluable in future ABA reports or amicus curiae briefs.
Projects
Media Alerts on Federal Courts of Appeals
The Standing Committee continues to facilitate its Media Alerts on Federal Courts of Appeals
project (“Media Alerts”). The Standing Committee created a website that provides reporters,
lawyers, and the public with quick and ready summaries of, and electronic links to, noteworthy
cases in the federal circuit courts. The Standing Committee implemented Media Alerts to
increase the coverage of the Federal Courts of Appeals after receiving feedback from many
federal court news reporters that, though they had access to a wealth of information about U.S.
Supreme Court cases, they were at a disadvantage with respect to key cases in the Federal Courts
of Appeals. Thus, the website assists members of the media, as well as of the general public and
the legal profession, by providing timely, unbiased, and more extensive reporting about federal
appellate cases.
The Standing Committee partnered with law professors and teams of students at well-known law
schools within the federal circuits. These professors and their teams conduct Media Alerts
projects wherein they monitor their circuit’s decisions, write comprehensive summaries of
important opinions, and post them to the Media Alerts website. The Standing Committee
continually monitors the output of the law schools, and works with those schools to maintain
quality standards. The Media Alerts website automatically sends an e-mail containing the
summaries to all subscribers. The Media Alerts site has over 600 subscribers and continues to
receive positive feedback from subscribers. Significantly, subscribers include well-known
journalists Tony Mauro of The National Law Journal, CNN SCOTUS Correspondent Bill Mears,
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Linda Greenhouse, and Lincoln Caplan of the New York Times.
The Standing Committee is currently updating the Media Alerts website to feature a more userfriendly blog format. Currently, once an individual subscribes to Media Alerts, the subscriber
will receive email alerts of every case summary submitted from every circuit. However, a new
feature in development will allow subscribers to elect to receive email alerts from individual
circuits.
Spring 2013 Immigration Program
The Standing Committee is also hosting a program in Washington, D.C., in March 2013. The
Standing Committee will host this program jointly with the Criminal Justice Section, the
Commission on Immigration, and the Standing Committee on Judicial Independence.
This program will present two panels. Session one addresses the changing landscape of
representing non-citizens, and will give particular attention to the pending litigation in Chaidez v.
United States. In Chaidez, the Supreme Court will determine whether its decision in Padilla v.
Kentucky, which held that an attorney provides ineffective assistance of counsel by failing to
inform a client that a guilty plea carries a risk of deportation, applies retroactively. Whatever the
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outcome, the decision will address the roles and responsibilities of attorneys everywhere, and
will also affect the caseloads, operations, and resources of both state and federal courts. The
panel will address these issues, as well as provide attorneys and judges with information and best
practices that they need to navigate this developing area of law.
Session two will address the current state of immigration policy and enforcement, including a
discussion of the Supreme Court’s decision in Arizona v. United States. A distinguished panel
will discuss how the ruling fits into the Court’s jurisprudence regarding the role of states in
enforcing federal immigration law and the impact of this decision with respect to future litigation
and immigration reform.
Federal Courts Data Project
During the 2012 Annual Meeting Convocation on Public Understanding About and Support for
the Courts, questions were raised about the current state of information on the courts, and about
how to gather relevant and reliable data upon which to base sound policy recommendations and
prescriptions. Subsequent to the Convocation, the Standing Committee discussed these issues
further during its business meeting and decided to develop a project to identify and evaluate the
data currently available to learn how better data might be collected, and to assess the benefits and
costs of undertaking the steps necessary to collect such data on an ongoing basis. The proposed
project will have two main areas of focus: data about federal civil cases (including bankruptcy)
and data about federal judges. The Standing Committee will convene a roundtable event to
discuss these issues and to identify particular shortfalls about the current state of data on the
courts. The roundtable event will yield a publication that will describe the current landscape and
set out recommendations for steps that would improve the quality, accessibility, and usefulness
of data about civil cases and federal judges.
The members, liaisons, and advisors to the Standing Committee include representatives from the
Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, the Federal Judges Association, and Judicial
Conference of the United States. Thus, the Standing Committee will be able to utilize the unique
expertise of its members, liaisons, and advisors to successfully pursue this project. The Standing
Committee also has the relationships necessary to collaborate with other entities within the ABA
and with outside organizations. The publication that results from this project will aid in the
effective administration of the federal courts.
Aging and the Judiciary Project/Wellness
Through its Aging and the Judiciary Project, the Standing Committee has studied judicial
wellness issues extensively, including how age and the process of aging affect the process of
judging. Judicial wellness is a critical issue that deserves greater attention, particularly given the
substantial contribution of senior judges in managing ever increasing caseloads. Accordingly,
the Standing Committee is urging each circuit court to examine wellness issues and develop
wellness programs and resources for its judges. The Standing Committee has identified the Ninth
Circuit’s established and innovative Wellness Committee, which develops and oversees wellness
programs for judges, as a potential model for other circuits. The Standing Committee is prepared
to assist with the development and implementation of similar wellness committees and the
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Standing Committee is beginning outreach to each federal circuit to gauge interest and offer its
assistance.
Federal Judicial Pay Restoration – Beer v. United States Litigation
The Standing Committee remains dedicated to supporting adequate compensation for the federal
judiciary. The Standing Committee continues to work closely with the Administrative Office of
the U.S. Courts, the Judicial Conference of the United States, the Federal Bar Association, the
Federal Judges Association, the ABA Judicial Division, the ABA Governmental Affairs Office,
and other interested entities in promoting the issue of the importance of federal judicial pay
restoration, as well as appropriate cost of living adjustments for Article III judges. Daniel
Cunningham, Esq., Deputy Director of Legislative Affairs, Administrative Office of the U.S.
Courts, provides the Standing Committee with a detailed briefing at every meeting. At its most
recent planning meeting and at the 2012 ABA Annual Meeting in Chicago, the Standing
Committee also received a detailed report on this issue from Judge Robert Katzmann from the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and Chair of the Judicial Branch Committee of the
Judicial Conference of the United States.
The Standing Committee’s role as an independent entity makes it uniquely positioned to
participate in litigation impacting the federal judiciary. Of immediate concern is the case Beer v.
United States, in which congressional failure to provide cost of living adjustments is challenged
as violating the Compensation Clause of Article III of the U.S. Constitution. On July 9, 2012, the
ABA filed an amicus curiae brief in support of Petitioners to the United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit. In this amicus effort led by the Section of Litigation, the Standing
Committee provided research assistance to the ABA’s Office of General Counsel. The Standing
Committee continues to monitor the case and collaborate with the Office of General Counsel and
the ABA Standing Committee on Amicus Curiae Briefs on this matter. Although the Federal
Circuit ruled in favor of Petitioners on October 5, 2012, an appeal to the United States Supreme
Court is anticipated. The Standing Committee is prepared to lead any future amicus efforts
should the case be appealed to the Supreme Court.
Respectfully Submitted,
Judge Norma L. Shapiro
Chair, Standing Committee on Federal Judicial Improvements