August 2021 Bar Bulletin
By Howard M. Goodfriend
We are taught early in law school through the casebook method that the law gets made in the appellate courts and that the trial courts find the facts. For clients and their counsel, trial remains the “main event,” the culmination of months, if not years, of time and money. Trial is the main event for the appellate courts, as well.
The parties and their lawyers frequently overlook the fact that the trial drives the appellate court’s ability to fulfill its core law and policy making functions, as much as it controls the resolution of issues of historical fact. The trial judge...