Court Opinion

ID: 9474557
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:01:28.327389+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:10.763045
License: Public Domain

E. GRADY JOLLY, Circuit Judge,
with whom
JERRE S. WILLIAMS and ROBERT MADDEN HILL, Circuit Judges,
join, specially concurring:
When the panel wrote its opinion in this case, there was, as has been noted by the en banc opinion in Harcon Barge v. D & G Boat Rentals, Inc., 784 F.2d 665 at 668, 1986 (en banc), no exact method delineated in the cases of our circuit for treating motions to amend judgment. In other words, until today there has been no bright-line rule in our circuit distinguishing which post-judgment motions are to be treated under Rule 59(e) and which under Rule 60, the rules overlapping as they do. The panel, therefore, saved the appeal by holding that the motion in this case could be properly treated as a Rule 60(b) motion.
Today, we agree with the en banc court in Harcon that a bright-line rule is required in determining the applicability of the provisions of Rule 4(a)(4), Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure, to post-judgment motions. Accordingly, we are willing to acquiesce in the holding the court has reached that all motions served within ten days of entry of judgment (except those relating to clerical errors), are to be treated under Rule 59(e). We therefore concur in the result reached in this case that there was no timely notice of appeal filed and hence we have no jurisdiction to hear this appeal.