Opinion ID: 203971
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Searching for the Important Legal Question

Text: To the extent Arch argues that the mere absence of articulated reasoning in the order under review forecloses appellate jurisdiction, it is incorrect. Our case law suggests that, while it is always preferable for the parties to request clarification from the district court, where necessary, prior to seeking appellate review of an interlocutory order, the lack of articulated reasoning in the order under review is not a per se bar to jurisdiction. Instead, we have been willing to examine the circumstances surrounding the district court's actions to determine the court's basis for its decision. See Sobol, 709 F.2d at 130 (examining the parties' arguments to the district court and timing of the order to infer reason for dissolution where order dissolving attachment was issued without an opinion or statement of reasons). Indeed, although we admonished the appellants in Sobol for failing to seek an articulation of the court's reasoning, we analyzed the course of proceedings to conclude that the court's order likely rested on one of two possible grounds. Id. One of the possible grounds was the district court's determination that the plaintiff was not likely to succeed on the merits, and the second was a difficult state law question of whether trustee process was available to plaintiff. Id. Because of the timing of the order, we found that the more likely ground for dissolution was a determination about the plaintiff's likelihood of success on the merits, and we based our holding that the collateral order doctrine was inapplicable on that inference. [18] See id. (assuming that the district court concluded that plaintiff was unlikely to succeed on the merits, and, under those circumstances, holding that the dissolution of the attachment was not appealable under the collateral order doctrine). The district court in Bridge Construction Corporation v. City of Berlin, 705 F.2d 582 (1st Cir.1983), also failed to explain its reasoning for staying federal proceedings pending the resolution of a parallel state action. Id. at 583. Noting that the plaintiff could have sought an elaboration of the court's reasoning and thereby avoided the uncertainty created by the cryptic order, we concluded that [t]he order [did] not resolve `an important issue' separate from the merits of the action, because it may well involve only a fact-specific exercise of discretion rather than a controlling issue of law. Id. (emphasis added and citations omitted). [19] This language suggests that it was not merely the lack of articulated reasoning itself, but the ongoing ambiguity about the basis for the district court's decision, unresolved by contextual information in the district court record, that defeated our jurisdiction. See id. at 582-84. The mere possibility that the court had erred on a potentially important legal question regarding the proper scope of a federal court's power to resolve the merits of the case in light of a parallel state proceeding was insufficient to permit the application of the collateral order doctrine. Id. at 583-4. Bridge and Sobol tell us that although we may look beyond the text of the dissolution order itself in an attempt to discern the district court's reasoning, there must be limits to this exercise. Where the exercise does not permit us to discern the precise legal issue that is implicated by the ruling, it is not our responsibility to assume jurisdiction simply because one of the issues that may have been the basis for the district court's order may be an important one. It is the appellant's job to demonstrate that appellate jurisdiction is proper. In considering the application of the narrow collateral order doctrine, where our resort to context does not allow us to determine the important and abstract legal issue at the heart of the interlocutory appeal, we must conclude that the appellant has not justified the application of that doctrine.