Importance of CJRA List? Forum

[Anonymous User]

I am one of (what I assume to be) many judicial clerks working under the stressful CJRA deadline this month - my judge still has tens of motions on the report and I highly doubt that we will complete everything by March 31st. However, nobody else has talked much about the report and I seem to be stressing more than even the judge.

A few questions: Do attitudes toward this vary based on chambers? How bad of a look is it if we don't finish everything? And is it materially better to have a very small outstanding motions report, or do people have more of a binary approach (you either finished everything, or didn't?)

[Anonymous User]

I am one of (what I assume to be) many judicial clerks working under the stressful CJRA deadline this month - my judge still has tens of motions on the report and I highly doubt that we will complete everything by March 31st. However, nobody else has talked much about the report and I seem to be stressing more than even the judge.

A few questions: Do attitudes toward this vary based on chambers? How bad of a look is it if we don't finish everything? And is it materially better to have a very small outstanding motions report, or do people have more of a binary approach (you either finished everything, or didn't?)

Some judges care a lot, some don't at all. Most fall somewhere between. So yes, attitudes vary based on chambers. Why? To answer your second question, not too many people are paying attention to the list. But to the extent people do care about the list, I think the number of outstanding cases matters more than their existence. A judge with 3 outstanding cases looks a whole lot different than a judge with 300 such cases.

I would make sure you understand your expectations very clearly. My judge would be furious with more than 1 or 2 cases outstanding. It meant a lot to him/her. But that was no secret to me, so I am guessing your judge is more relaxed.

[Anonymous User]

Yeah, in contrast I had only the very vaguest understanding of the list when I was a clerk. Someone explained what it was but I never saw it and it was never discussed with me. (It probably would have helped, by nature I’m kind of slow, but there you go. I kind of wonder if it’s slightly less of a thing in districts with very high criminal caseloads? Because they don’t generate the same kind of motion practice as civil cases. But probably more just my judge’s opinion.)

[lavarman84]

My judge cared and wanted it cleared. But that was not hard. We stayed on top of things. Some other judges could not care less. Ultimately, it's just a shame technique. Federal judges have life tenure, so it's toothless.

[Anonymous User]

My judge cared and wanted it cleared. But that was not hard. We stayed on top of things. Some other judges could not care less. Ultimately, it's just a shame technique. Federal judges have life tenure, so it's toothless.

Same here. My judge made it known on Day 1 that she intends to never be in the list, and that was that. Ultimately, all it did was set hard deadlines for work. The work has to get done either way, and you end up with between 6 and 12 months to resolve each motion.

[Anonymous User]

Judges all read the list, so they’re aware of which of their colleagues are slow and worry about their colleagues thinking they are slow. Hardly anyone besides judges read it or even know about it though. It can be brutal on clerks in busy districts but it’s an ingenious enforcement mechanism.

[polareagle]

Yeah, in contrast I had only the very vaguest understanding of the list when I was a clerk. Someone explained what it was but I never saw it and it was never discussed with me. (It probably would have helped, by nature I’m kind of slow, but there you go. I kind of wonder if it’s slightly less of a thing in districts with very high criminal caseloads? Because they don’t generate the same kind of motion practice as civil cases. But probably more just my judge’s opinion.)

The list is only for civil cases/motions (the C in CJRA is civil). That said, a district with a high proportion of criminal cases would naturally have fewer civil motions to dispose of. Interesting that you never saw the list--you can generate it for yourself in the court user version of ECF.

[Anonymous User]

Judges all read the list, so they’re aware of which of their colleagues are slow and worry about their colleagues thinking they are slow. Hardly anyone besides judges read it or even know about it though. It can be brutal on clerks in busy districts but it’s an ingenious enforcement mechanism.

It brilliantly plays on the personality type of the people who become federal judges. Socially shaming them for lack of diligence on their work will do the trick, even if it's impossible for them to ever lose their jobs.

[Anonymous User]

Yeah, in contrast I had only the very vaguest understanding of the list when I was a clerk. Someone explained what it was but I never saw it and it was never discussed with me. (It probably would have helped, by nature I’m kind of slow, but there you go. I kind of wonder if it’s slightly less of a thing in districts with very high criminal caseloads? Because they don’t generate the same kind of motion practice as civil cases. But probably more just my judge’s opinion.)

The list is only for civil cases/motions (the C in CJRA is civil). That said, a district with a high proportion of criminal cases would naturally have fewer civil motions to dispose of. Interesting that you never saw the list--you can generate it for yourself in the court user version of ECF.

Lol, that shows you how well I understood it. No one ever really referenced it as something I should look at. I just now found copies of the tables on the US Courts website, and I have a super vague memory of seeing something like that once, and I may have been told to work on X before I worked on Y in the context of looking at that list, but it clearly didn't leave a strong impression on me.

TBF, because my co-clerk was a career clerk they may have assumed I knew all about this and was paying attention on my own, or conversely, they kept track and cleared away the old stuff.

And yeah, a criminal-heavy docket, which I think means both that there was less civil stuff to get bogged down in, and greater tolerance for some delays. For the last couple of lists I just found, my judge had just a few motions and a few more cases, but very much in line with the rest of the district (except for a sr judge with basically nothing outstanding, and a different judge who is notorious for overcomplicating and has pages of stuff).