Right for Any Reason

Authors

Jeffrey M. Anderson, Cumberland School of Law, Samford University

Abstract

The chances of winning an appeal in federal court are slim. One reason for that is an array of rules of appellate review that “stack the deck” in favor of the appellee and the lower court’s judgment. One such rule of review is “right for any reason,” the rule that an appellee may defend a lower court’s judgment on any grounds supported by the record—even grounds that the lower court rejected or ignored. The judgment may be right, even if the reasons are wrong. In 1924, the Supreme Court described the rule as “settled”—and felt no need to cite authority to support it—because the Court and other appellate courts had been applying the rule for nearly a century already, and commentators recognized the rule as a common feature of appellate review. This Article explains how “right for any reason” mitigates the strict technicality of writ-of-error analysis and promotes judicial economy by avoiding needless remand and relitigation where the outcome of a case is certain. Useful as this rule of review is in promoting judicial economy, however, it sometimes conflicts with other fundamental aspects of appellate review—including the principle that an appellate court is a court of review, not first view, and the principle of party presentation. To minimize such conflicts (because they cannot be avoided entirely), this Article argues that federal appellate courts should apply “right for any reason” as a discretionary, not a mandatory, rule of review; should not apply the rule when the appellee waived the alternative ground for affirmance; should raise alternative grounds sua sponte only in exceptional circumstances; and ordinarily should not consider alternative grounds that were not raised in the lower court in the first instance. “Right for any reason” is an important tool for an appellate court—and thus an important weapon in the hands of any appellee—but it should not be applied in a manner that undermines other important aspects of appellate review.

Keywords

Courts, Federal Courts, Appellate Review, Appeals, Legal Practice and Procedure, Bankruptcy Law, Bankruptcy

Disciplines

Bankruptcy Law | Courts | Law

Recommended Citation

Jeffrey M. Anderson, Right for Any Reason, 44 Cardozo L. Rev. 1015 (2023).
Available at: https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/clr/vol44/iss3/5