Supreme Court Practice

Goldstein & Russell, P.C. specializes in representing clients at all stages before the U.S. Supreme Court. Collectively, the firm’s lawyers have argued more than 50 cases on the merits and have filed in excess of 150 briefs in the Court.

The firm has represented clients on a broad spectrum of issues, including constitutional law, bankruptcy, criminal law and procedure, patents, telecommunications law, energy regulation, immigration, civil rights, property rights, employment, and international law.

The firm brings specialized expertise and experience to every stage of Supreme Court proceedings, including preparing and opposing petitions for certiorari, coordinating amicus strategy, advocating on behalf of clients to the United States Solicitor General’s Office in appropriate cases, and of course briefing and arguing cases on the merits. In addition, the firm regularly represents amici curiae filing briefs before the Court.

The firm also advises clients whether a petition for certiorari is worth pursuing in the first place, helping evaluate the likelihood of success and probable costs.

Because of the firm’s specialized practice, we are generally brought into a case at the Supreme Court stage. We do not, however, seek to displace the lawyers who have worked on the case, often for years, in the lower courts. We recognize that our co-counsel bring extensive knowledge about the case and, often, specialized expertise in a particular area of the law. We therefore work closely with co-counsel to provide our clients the advantage of the best each lawyer on the team has to offer.

Representative Matters

A few notable examples of our cases before the Supreme Court include:

• Google v. Oracle, -- S.Ct. -- (2021) – successfully represented Google in seeking review and reversal of adverse Federal Circuit decision in important copyright case concerning reuse of application programming interfaces in computer software.

• South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc., et al. 138 S.Ct. 2080 (2018) — successfully represented plaintiff state in overturning Quill Corp. v. North Dakota, 504 U.S. 298 (1992) and the Court's physical presence requirement for collecting sales tax on out-of-state sellers.

• State Farm Fire & Casualty Co. v. United States ex rel. Rigsby et al., 137 S.Ct. 436 (2016) – successfully represented the relators challenging State Farm regarding whether a seal violation mandates dismissal of a relator's complaint under the False Claims Act.

• Visa Inc. v. Osborn, 137 S.Ct. 289 (2016) – successfully represented respondents in antitrust case against Visa, convincing Court to dismiss the case as improvidently granted.

• City of Los Angeles v. Patel, 135 S.Ct. 2443 (2015) – successfully represented hotels challenging Los Angeles ordinance allowing warrantless examination of hotel registries.
• Gelboim v. Bank of America, 135 S.Ct. 897 (2015) – successfully represented bondholder plaintiffs in litigation arising from LIBOR scandal, obtaining immediate appeal of dismissal of antitrust claims in multidistrict litigation.
• Lane v. Franks, 134 S.Ct. 2369 (2014) – successfully represented state employee who raised First Amendment challenge to his termination in retaliation for testifying under subpoena in a federal corruption trial against a state legislator.
• Chadbourne & Parke LLC v. Troice, 131 S. Ct. 1058 (2014) – successfully represented securities fraud plaintiffs in opposing defendant's preemption challenge to state law claims under the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1988.
• BG Group v. Argentina, 134 S. Ct. 1198 (2014) – successfully represented energy company seeking to enforce international arbitration award against Argentina.
• Already v. Nike, 133 S. Ct. 721 (2013) – successfully represented Nike in trademark case involving question of when a covenant not to sue will moot a challenge to the validity of a trademark.
• Sorrell v. IMS Health, Inc., 131 S. Ct. 2653 (2011) – succesfully represented data mining companies in First Amendment challenge to state laws limiting use and sale of anonymized pharmacy data.
• Hamilton v. Lanning, 130 S. Ct. 2646 (2010) – successfully represented debtor seeking to require bankruptcy court to take into account reduced earnings in establishing Chapter 13 plan.
• Jerman v. Carlisle, 130 S. Ct. 1605 (2010) – successfully represented homeowner in arguing that the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act does not provide debt collectors a mistake of law defense.
• Georgia v. Randolph, 547 U.S. 103 (2006) – successfully represented criminal defendant challenging constitutionality of an allegedly consensual search of his home when his wife consented to the search, but he objected.
• Ledbetter v. Goodyear, 550 U.S. 618 (2006) – represented plaintiff in case involving the application of Title VII's limitations provision to claims of pay discrimination in employment. When the Court ruled 5-4 against our client, we assisted the client in testifying before Congress, which subsequently overruled the Court’s decision.
• Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557 (2006) - co-counsel in successful challenge to constitutionality of special military tribunals established to try war crimes charges against terrorist suspects who are foreign nationals.
• National Cable & Telecommunications Ass’n v. Brand X Internet Services, 545 U.S. 967 (2005) – represented internet service providers challenging Federal Communication Commission rules on governing broadband services.
• Spector v. Norwegian Cruise Line Ltd., 545 U.S. 119 (2005) – successfully represented disabled individuals seeking enforcement of the Americans with Disabilities Act against foreign-flagged cruise ships.
• Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000) – co-counsel and second chair in case resolving contested 2000 presidential election.