§ 1.1 Role of Appellate Courts

• Jurisdiction: United States

§ 1.1 ROLE OF APPELLATE COURTS

Our judicial system relies on trial courts to resolve disputes in the first instance. Trial judges manage the cases, interpret law, and sometimes determine facts. Juries resolve factual issues and apply law to facts. While their decisions typically involve both law and fact, the focus is on resolving the case at hand, and decisions in trial court often turn on factual determinations.

Appellate courts play a different role. First and foremost, they ensure that the lower tribunal—trial court or administrative agency—applied the correct rule of law and that the trial or hearing was conducted fairly. Although appellate courts also apply law to facts, they must maintain a broader perspective than a trial court does, because they also set precedent for lower courts to follow in future cases. Of necessity, appellate courts keep one eye on the case at hand and the other on the decision's impact on future cases.

In the trial court, at least at the pleadings stage, the lawyers have a comparatively wide-open field of play. That is, they can choose which legal theory or theories to plead, and the record is open for whatever evidence best advances the client's position. On appeal, however, the record is what it is, and only rarely can a party advance a new legal theory. In trial court, sometimes a good strategy for the plaintiff is to ask for the moon—or, for the defendant, to disclaim all responsibility—even though the facts and law don't support...