The Appellate Record Blog: On Foolish Consistency And Why My Head Explodes

Five (5) days ago, or maybe it was six (6), I got one (1) e-mail from a blog reader and appellate-lawyer-colleague. His head had exploded, and I don't blame him. Mine would have too.

On the whole, we appellate lawyers are quite used to collaborating with others. We can brief with a committee of twelve (12). We can harmonize three (3) sets of edits. We know that there's more than one (1) way to skin a cat.

But then, there are four (4) or five (5) things that make one's (1's) head explode. After the break, I'll disclose one (1) of the things that makes my head explode and try to draw a broader lesson that may be of use.

There are a certain class of edits that make a brief objectively worse than it was before. Are they big things? Not usually.