Mapping Supreme Court Doctrine: Civil Pleading

Abstract

This essay, adapted from the video presentation available on Vimeo as #89845875, graphically depicts the genealogy and evolution of federal civil pleading standards in U.S. Supreme Court opinions over time. We show that the standard narrative — of a decline in pleading liberality from Conley to Twombly to Iqbal — is complicated by both progenitors and progeny. We therefore offer a fuller picture of the doctrine of Rule 8 pleading that ought to be of use to judges and practitioners in federal court. We also hope, through the video presentation, to introduce a new visual format for academic scholarship that capitalizes on the virtues of narration, graphics, mapping, online accessibility, and electronic dissemination.

Keywords: video article, video project, Twombly, iqbal, twiqbal, Rule 8, pleading, vimeo, conley, leatherman, swierkiewicz, skinner, matrixx, papasan, dura, broudo