This is a great day for the Illinois appellate bar.

Earlier today, the Illinois Supreme Court amended Supreme Court Rule 23 to allow unpublished Rule 23(b) orders issued on or after January 1, 2021 to be cited for persuasive purposes.  The amendment can be found here.

Today’s amendment follows years of advocacy by the Appellate Lawyers Association, working in conjunction with the Illinois State Bar Association and the Chicago Bar Association, for exactly this amendment to Rule 23.  Most recently, at the public hearing of the Illinois Supreme Court Rules Committee on June 24, 2020, ALA Rules Committee Co-Chair Seth A. Horvath argued that Rule 23 should be amended to allow the citation of Rule 23 orders as persuasive authority.  We are pleased to see that the Supreme Court Rules Committee, and ultimately the Supreme Court itself, was persuaded by the ALA’s arguments.

The ALA thanks the justices of the Illinois Supreme Court for approving this amendment to Rule 23, and the members of the Illinois Supreme Court Rules Committee for recommending it.  Special thanks also are owed to past ALA Presidents J. Timothy Eaton and Michael T. Reagan, who have advocated for amending Rule 23 for quite a long time.  We are also grateful for the tireless work of the ALA’s Rules Committee and its co-chairs, Seth A. Horvath and Garrett L. Boehm, Jr.

The ALA remains committed to the task of recommending rule changes to promote fairness and transparency in the appellate process.