“We have just anything you could think of,” Amy Small says of the Texas State Law Library, where she is executive director. Open to all—no attorney license required—the library serves everyday Texans and the Supreme Court alike. In this episode, hosts Jody Sanders and Todd Smith invite Amy to unpack the library’s often-overlooked resources:
This is the fourth post in the Flipping the Script series, drawn from Episode 162 of the Texas Appellate Law Podcast. The series examines what Texas appellate courts could do to make appellate practice better.
If you practice appellate law in Texas, you file motions for extension of time. A lot of them. You do
Election law in Texas is “very demanding” and “stressful because of the accelerated nature of the calendar,” says Elizabeth D. Alvarez. Elizabeth is head of civil litigation/election litigation at Guest & Gray and a 12-year election litigation practitioner who has represented state parties, national parties, and candidates on both sides of the aisle. She
Judge Amy Clark Meachum, the Local Administrative Judge for Travis County, joins hosts Todd Smith and Jody Sanders to unpack recent legislation affecting the Texas judiciary and what it means for how courts operate today. Judge Meachum traces the escalating reporting and accountability mandates imposed on Texas trial courts through the 88th and 89th
This is the third post in a series I’m calling “Flipping the Script,” inspired by Episode 162 of the Texas Appellate Law Podcast. The series examines what Texas appellate courts could do to make appellate practice better.
There’s a conversation appellate lawyers dread. You call your client to report on a mandamus petition in the
This is the second post in a series I’m calling “Flipping the Script,” inspired by Episode 162 of the Texas Appellate Law Podcast. The series examines what Texas appellate courts could do to make appellate practice better.
The civil appellate docketing statement is outdated, and the case for fixing it is straightforward. It’s a fillable
When a lawyer messes up by using an AI platform that produces mistakes, they might get sanctioned by a judge. When a judge messes up using an AI platform, “it could become precedent. So, it’s a much different conversation.” Judge Scott Schlegel, of Louisiana’s Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, speaks from his experience
This is the first post in a series I’m calling “Flipping the Script,” inspired by Episode 162 of the Texas Appellate Law Podcast. The series examines what Texas appellate courts could do to make appellate practice better.
Two Texas Supreme Court transparency tools that genuinely helped practitioners do their jobs have disappeared. Both should come
I have clients who don’t know where I live. Not my home address—the city.
That reality became clear when I recently saw a client in person for the first time since before we started working together several years ago. Great client: pays his bills, no drama, easy to work with. Somewhere in the conversation it
The final version of rewritten Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 166a—the summary judgment rule—became effective March 1, 2026. In this episode, Michael Duncan, an appellate and motions practitioner in Austin who clerked for a Texas Supreme Court justice, unpacks the updated rule with hosts Todd Smith and Jody Sanders. Together, they examine what