Trial runs

How do you get to the Supreme Court? For lawyers, it’s like the old joke about Carnegie Hall: Practice, practice, practice.

That can mean a visit to the Supreme Court Institute, where veteran lawyers, law professors and former court clerks play the parts of justices to help attorneys prepare for their big day arguing before the high court.

Out of about 8,000 federal appeals each year, only 80 or so are chosen for Supreme Court arguments, generally in one-hour morning time slots from October through the end of April.

About two-thirds of those appeals also are argued the previous week in a dress rehearsal at the Supreme Court Institute about a mile from the real court.

“Think of it as an Olympic event or a ball game: You practice first,” said Michael Newdow, the California atheist who is challenging the reference to God in the Pledge of Allegiance recited in public schools.

Before Mr. Newdow, a newly minted lawyer, argued his Supreme Court case last month, he fielded tough questions and tested his material in nearly a dozen trial runs, part of a tradition for lawyers facing the intimidating prospect of an argument before the nine justices.

Mr. Newdow, 50, dressed in a suit for some of his moots, was barefoot or in tennis shoes during others. At some, the mock justices wore robes. At others, they, too, were casual. They drank from paper cups, unlike the silver tumblers at the court.

Generally, moot courts are held in private. Some are videotaped. Mr. Newdow allowed the Associated Press to follow him to several practices.

The mock justices at the 5-year-old institute, run by Georgetown University, spend hours getting ready for their role as questioners, said Washington lawyer David Frederick, who has volunteered as a justice and used the practices to prepare for his own Supreme Court cases.

Other law schools and public organizations also run practice courts, some in fancy mock courtrooms, others in tiny conference rooms. Government lawyers have their own Supreme Court practice sessions. The Georgetown institute soon will have a new on-campus practice room, modeled after the actual court.

“Supreme Court advocacy is like Major League Baseball. I can tell you the pitch is going to come in at 95 miles per hour. I can tell you to stand this way. I can tell you how to swing,” said Richard Lazarus, the Georgetown professor who directs the institute. “It doesn’t mean you’re going to hit it.”

The easy part is making sure lawyers remember to start their remarks with: “Mister Chief Justice, and may it please the court.” Then there’s preparation for rapid-fire questions that make it impossible to stick to a prepared speech.

Mr. Newdow received some tough critiques, with those playing the justices telling him he was too antagonistic and needed to focus.

“I tried out different openings, but most of them got torn to shreds. Some of them sounded great, then bombed big time,” said Mr. Newdow, a doctor who made the unusual choice to argue his own case even though he has been a lawyer less than two years.

In the Supreme Court, he told justices in the opening minute: “I am an atheist. I don’t believe in God. And every school morning my child is asked to stand up, face that flag, put her hand over her heart, and say that her father is wrong.”

He was immediately interrupted by a justice who asked if he had the authority to bring the case on behalf of his 9-year-old daughter, given that he does not have full custody of her. It was a question he had been asked repeatedly in practice. His answer was ready.

Mr. Newdow said that when his daughter is forced to pledge her allegiance under God, “That is an actual, concrete, discrete, particularized, individualized harm to me, which gives me standing.”

In newspapers the next day, he was praised. The New York Times called it a “spellbinding performance.”

“You have to know the facts cold and the law, but beyond that you need a well-crafted response to just about any question that might come at you,” said Susan Hankin, with the University of Maryland moot court program.

The nonprofit Public Citizen Litigation Group does about 20 moot courts a year as part of its 14-year-old Supreme Court assistance project. Director Brian Wolfman recommends two practice sessions before an argument: a bare-knuckled one, which reveals weaknesses, then a second reconstructive practice intended to rebuild the lawyer’s confidence.

“We put them through the wringer, and they write us a letter later and say: ’Your moot court was much harder … than it was in front of the real court,’” Mr. Wolfman said.