Registration for Leahy competition begins

Leahy is perhaps Georgetown’s most high-profile competition.Registration for the annual William E. Leahy Moot Court Competition begins this week. The Leahy competition is a chance for upperclass J.D. students and LL.M. students to join the Appellate Advocacy Division of the Georgetown Barristers’ Council. This is a competitive team doing appellate advocacy, the type of oral argument and writing that happens in the appellate courts of the United States, including the Supreme Court.

Leahy is one of two qualifying competitions for the Appellate Advocacy division, the other, exclu- sively for 1Ls, is held in the spring, the Robert J. Beaudry Moot Court Competition.

 In both competitions, students first prepare briefs from a closed packet of information and case law provided by the Barristers Council, the organization that oversees moot court, as well as the Trial Advocacy and Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) teams.

After the brief is done, students will begin to compete in rounds of oral argument, alternately arguing each side of the case. After each round, students will be eliminated based on their scores in the oral argu- ment and briefs, and ultimately there will be one winner. Top students in the competition will also be offered a space on the moot court team.

The team’s 75 members compete in competitions throughout the year. “Appellate members usually compete in an inter-school competi- tion during their first year of mem- bership and then coach an inter- school team during their second year of membership,” said Emily Bruemmer, director of the Appellate Advocacy division of the Barristers Council. “We attend competitions involving both domestic and interna- tional law – including competitions focused on evidence, corporate law, environmental law, national security, telecommunications, immigration, and more.”

Bruemmer emphasized the myriad benefits of being involved in the Appellate Advocacy team.

“It’s an excellent opportunity to improve both written and oral advo- cacy skills – for each competition, participants work collaboratively to submit a written brief and then to prepare for oral argument,” she said. “Competitors also travel to inter- school competitions, from competi- tions at our neighboring schools in D.C. to those as far away as Brazil or Belgium, where they have the oppor- tunity to represent Georgetown and to compete against advocates from other schools across the country and (in the case of international competi- tions) the world.

“In addition, the division pro- vides training opportunities with practitioners from the field,” she said. “Students also gain coaching experi- ence during their second year with the  division.  Finally, it’s a terrific opportunity to meet fellow students with like interests.”

 Bruemmer also highlighted the successes of last year’s team. The two Georgetown teams swept the region- als of the Frederick Douglass Moot Court Competition and both advanced to nationals. The Georgetown team also reached the finals of the Manfred Lachs Space Moot and the Jessup International Moot Court Super-Regional (with the Georgetown team advancing to the international rounds in Jessup).

Finally, the  team attended the  Inter-American Sustainable Development Moot in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for the first time, where the team won Best Petitioner’s Brief.

Registration runs through September 30 this week. The packet of information for the brief and the rest of the competition will be released September 30. Briefs will be due October 10. Finally, the preliminary round of oral argument will begin Thursday October 13.