Former Longtime Midland City Attorney Keith Stretcher Appointed to Eastland 11th Court of Appeals

Governor Greg Abbott appointed former longtime Midland City Attorney Keith Stretcher to Eastland Texas's Eleventh Court of Appeals yesterday, filling the vacancy created when the governor elevated Justice John M. Bailey to Chief Justice last September.

Stretcher likely got visibility in Austin by having been a President of the Texas City Attorneys Association.

Bailey was the Chief-Justice-designate after getting the Republican nomination last March-- no one ran against him-- and thereby becoming the last candidate standing for the post. Bailey replaced retiring Chief Justice Jim Wright.

Stretcher joins the Eagle-Scout, former-collegiate-gymnast, decorated-military-veteran, award-winning scholar Associate Justice Mike Willson as the second Midlander on the three-justice court. The Eleventh Supreme Judicial District covers 28 counties. On the map above it is the beige one directly under the panhandle. The Eleventh Court of Appeals sits in the tiny town of Eastland in tiny Eastland County very close to the east end of the SJD. Eastland is a remote exurb of Abilene, which is the county seat of Taylor County, the third-largest county of the SJD. The largest county of the SJD is Ector County which is in the southwestern corner, county seat: Odessa. The second-largest is Midland County, county seat: Midland. These two counties, along with Martin County, form the Midland-Odessa metropolitan area, which has the damnably cute slogan "Two Cities, no Limits," and which is in turn where the Permian Basin geological formation is. Midland-Odessa is where the votes are, so it is from where most of the justices come. Chief Justice Bailey lives in Cisco, near Eastland.

Still, why Midland instead of Odessa? The reason likely goes back to when the oil was discovered. The Ector County Commissioners built roads to the oilfields, which made it a more convenient place for roughnecks-- that's the name of a kind of worker-- while Midland had an office building and a hotel. To this day, Midland is comparatively more white-collar than Odessa.

Appeal from metro Abilene or metro Midland-Odessa or the deserts in between and you'll be before three old white Republican guys . . .

The Sneaky Extra Rule You Have to Remember Sometimes When You're Citing the Federal Fifth Circuit

Every part of the United States of America is served by a federal district court, and those-- in turn-- are served by federal circuit courts of appeals. Eleven of them are numbered. Each of those cover a geographical area.

First: Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Puerto Rico, and Rhode Island.
Second: Connecticut, New York, and Vermont.
Third: Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and the Virgin Islands.
Fourth: Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia.
Fifth: Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas.
Sixth: Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee.
Seventh: Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
Eighth: Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
Ninth: Alaska, Arizona, California, Territory of Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Territory of the Northern Mariana Islands, Oregon, and Washington.
Tenth: Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah, and Wyoming.
Eleventh: Alabama, Florida, and Georgia.

There are two other I will save for a later post: the District of Columbia Circuit-- I know, it's kind of geographical-- and the Federal Circuit, which is the only geographically general content-specialized federal court of appeal.

So what's the special rule about the Fifth Circuit? It is Rule 10.8.2 of the Bluebook, A Uniform System of Citation. On October 1 1981, the Fifth Circuit was divided to create the new, smaller Fifth Circuit and an Eleventh Circuit.

So:

1. Cite decisions rendered in 1981 and labeled "5th Cir." by month.
2. Give unit information whenever possible (it seems the court began the transition by having a Fifth Circuit Unit A and a Fifth Circuit Unit B.
3. Designate as "Former 5th" any nonunit judgment labeled as a Former Fifth judgment and rendered after September 30, 1981.

Knowing this rule separates the appellate children from the appellate grown-ups. Although the other circuits have had coverage changes, this separation is the only one the Bluebook cares about.

Federal Appeals in Texas and Other Parts of the U.S. South

U.S. federal courts are generally organized into district courts, courts of appeals and then the Supreme Court of the United States. The most common federal court that does not fit in this structure is bankruptcy courts, which are below district courts. District courts are the general trial courts of the U.S. federal government. Appeals from bankruptcy court can go to district court or a Bankruptcy Appellate Panel of bankruptcy judges, depending on whether the local federal jurisdiction has set up BAPs. Texas has four federal judicial districts- eastern, northern, southern, and western. I won't go into the boundaries of the districts- they're pretty common-sensical, and you can look them up with the link above.

The courts of appeals for federal district courts are organized into circuits. The Fifth Circuit covers appeals from Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. Before October 1, 1981, it also included Florida, Georgia and Alabama, but then an Eleventh Circuit was formed for them. It is important to remember if you are citing southern cases from around that time, that Fifth Circuit precedents bind the Eleventh Circuit for cases decided before October 1, 1981. Besides appeals from district courts, the Circuits also hear appeals from some federal agency decisions and from the Board of Immigration Appeals.

Federal jurisdiction is limited. Unless the United States Constitution or a statute allowed by it provides for federal jurisdiction of a matter, the presumption is that federal courts do not have jurisdiction. This contrasts with U.S. state court jurisdiction where there should be some court for nearly any dispute.