Practices

Litigation

Appellate Practice

Our lawyers have extensive experience before federal and state appellate courts, frequently taking over the appellate representation of a client that employed other counsel at the trial level. Questions that our attorneys have presented to appellate courts include:  

  • Whether the federal Help America Vote Act preempted a provision of the Pennsylvania Constitution requiring a voter referendum on the use of electronic voting systems (argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on behalf of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania);
  • Whether the Pennsylvania Secretary of Education has the implicit power to dissolve a state-appointed board of control for a local school district that was appointed by a previous Secretary pursuant to statutory authority (argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court on behalf of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania);
  • Whether an insurer had “abandoned” an insured during litigation, making the insurer liable for a settlement entered into without the insurer’s participation or consent (argued successfully before the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court on behalf of the insurer);
  • Whether Pennsylvania’s Governor had the constitutional authority to veto language in an appropriations bill and to enact the remainder into law (argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on behalf of the Governor);
  • Whether attorneys had standing to appeal nonmonetary sanctions, and the standards for imposing such sanctions (argued successfully before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of an attorney);
  • Whether a trial court appropriately granted summary judgment dismissing various tort claims stemming from Major League Baseball’s 1999 dispute with its umpires’ union (argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Superior Court on behalf of an attorney and law firm);
  • The showing that a litigant must make in order to receive pre-complaint discovery in Pennsylvania state court (argued successfully before the Pennsylvania Superior Court and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on behalf of the executor of a large estate).

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