Kevin Newsom Mentioned in National Law Journal Article

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings partner Kevin Newsom recently filed an amicus curiae brief on behalf of a group of States in Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co., currently pending in the U.S. Supreme Court. The case presents the question whether – and under what circumstances – the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause might require an elected state judge to recuse himself from a dispute involving a company whose CEO had made independent campaign expenditures that inured to the benefit of the judge’s candidacy.

In its February 18 edition, The National Law Journal spotlighted Newsom’s brief, remarking that it “made a strong federalism argument against a federal due process rule” and “caution[ed] against ‘an entirely new body of federal constitutional law to govern day-to-day recusal practice in state courts.’” If “the justices are looking for a way of avoiding the tricky task of setting a uniform due process standard,” the article said, Newsom’s federalism argument “could be the ticket.” Bradley Arant Boult Cummings partner Marc James Ayers and associates Andrew Brasher and Mike Duffy assisted with the brief.