Cases Argued by Edwin S. Kneedler
Edwin S. Kneedler argued 143 times in the U.S. Supreme Court (as of January 2019), most of which are listed by Oyez, with the exception of four cases:
- Boos v. Barry, No. 86-803
- United States v. Taylor, No. 87-573
- Fifth Third Bancorp v. Dudenhoeffer, No. 12-751
- Argentina v. NML Capital, Ltd., No. 12-842
which we have included in our tally and listed below.
Just as Chief Justice William Rehnquist had recognized Lawrence Wallace’s long service in 2002, Chief Justice John Roberts recognized Edwin Kneedler’s 100th argument on March 17, 2008, at the close of oral arguments in Republic of Philippines v. Pimentel:
Mr. Kneedler, if you could return to the lecturn for a moment.
Mr. Kneedler, our records reflect that you have now presented oral argument before this court in 100 cases, beginning with your first argument in October, 1979.
You are the first to reach this rare milestone this century.
On behalf of the court, I extend to you our appreciation for the many years of advocacy and service to the court during your tenure in the Office of the Solicitor General.
We look forward to hearing from you many more times in the future.
We note two discrepancies. First, although the Chief Justice implied Mr. Kneedler first argued in October 1979, we cannot find any evidence of that. His first argument appears to have been on November 7, 1979.
Second, we recently noticed that Mr. Kneedler argued twice in Montana v. Blackfeet Tribe of Indians. The case was first argued on January 15, 1985 [transcript] and reargued later that same term on April 23, 1985 [transcript].
On another occasion, Mr. Kneedler argued twice on the same day. On April 24, 2001, he first argued in Calcano-Martinez v. INS, and then later that same morning, he argued in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. St. Cyr.
Perhaps due to one of those anomalies, or to some difference in argument-counting methodology, what was previously described as Mr. Kneedler’s 100th argument must now be listed below as his 101st argument. However, we will be double-checking his first 100 arguments to verify the accuracy of our list and will post an update if we learn anything new.
Note: Since arguing for the 100th time, Mr Kneedler has since argued another case twice: Sessions v. Dimaya. It was first argued in the 2016 term and then reargued in the 2017 term.
