Blog of law articles

I don't know about you, but a significant part of my day consists of haranguing my paralegals and young associates regarding calendaring of motions and response times.

Frankly, it's often a highlight -- watching them use their hands, fingers, and other body parts to count, forgetting holidays no one knew existed, and getting wrong which day to start or stop counting and why.

Good times.

Unfortunately, those days will soon be gone:

On December 1, 2009, unless Congress acts otherwise, the way you compute time in federal litigation will change significantly. The Supreme Court has transmitted new rules to Congress that institute a “days are days” approach to computing the time periods in the appellate, civil, bankruptcy, and criminal rules. The new rules will include intermediate weekend days and holidays in calculating deadlines. Thus, the Court has also adopted amendments to a number of the rules that extend virtually all short deadlines. Of course, the district courts will have to revise their Local Rules accordingly, which may lead to some confusion if the revisions are not made quickly or accurately.

Who is in charge of coordinating the Local Rules -- "quickly and accurately" -- assuming these changes go through?

Oh boy, somebody better get on this fast.

UPDATED -- At Scotty's request and because he's such a good sport, I have included what some might argue are more flattering photos of our resident rule-writing king.

(To be honest, I'm not sure about that last one)