Court Opinion

ID: 9494305
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:34:48.722872+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:56:20.693745
License: Public Domain

*344HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting in part:
Remand of this case in order for the Tax Court to address the Hillmans’ alternative argument is inappropriate. Accordingly, I dissent from Part III of the court’s opinion.
Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(b) provides, inter alia, that an appel-lee’s brief must conform to the requirements of Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(a)(5) and (a)(9)(A). Thus, an appellee’s brief must contain a statement of all issues presented for review, Fed. R.App. P. 28(a)(5), and argument with re*345spect to each of those issues consisting of the appellee’s “contentions and the reasons for them, with citations to the authorities and parts of the record on which” the appellee relies, Fed. R.App. P. 28(a)(9)(A). This court has previously deemed a claim abandoned on appeal where the appellant failed to comply with Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(a)(9)(A) with respect to that claim. Edwards v. City of Goldsboro, 178 F.3d 231, 241 n. 6 (4th Cir.1999). This result only makes sense, given that without negative consequences to a party’s failure to comply with Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28, the requirements of the rule would be hollow.
Here, the Hillmans, as appellees, did not include their alternative argument in the “Issues Presented” section of their appellate brief; nor did they address the argument in the “Argument” section of their appellate brief. Rather, they merely requested, for the first time at oral argument, that in the event the panel rejected the legal basis upon which the Tax Court ruled in their favor, the panel remand the case for the Tax Court to consider their alternative argument that they made below, but which the Tax Court expressly did not reach. Under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(b) and Edwards, 178 F.3d at 241 n. 6, such a belated request is insufficient to preserve the Hillmans’ alternative argument for appellate review, and, a fortiori, remand. As for the substantive legal argument/relief distinction made by the majority, common sense dictates that if the Hillmans waived their right to have this court consider their alternative argument on appeal, they have also waived their right to have the district court now, following resolution of the appeal, consider it in the first instance.
For these reasons, I would reverse the Tax Court’s decision without honoring the Hillmans’ unpreserved request for a remand.