Wis. Stat. § 809.19: Wisconsin Table of Authorities Rules

The table requirement and its limits

The table of authorities is distinct from the contents table, which identifies sections and argument headings. The court's self-represented appellate guide uses the heading “Table of Authorities” and suggests cases alphabetically, constitutional citations next, then statutes in ascending numerical order. That checklist supplies practical organization; subsection (1)(a) itself expressly specifies alphabetical treatment for cases. Include other cited legal authorities rather than stopping at the checklist's examples.

This guide addresses appellate briefs, principally Court of Appeals briefing and corresponding Supreme Court briefing under Rule 809.63. A petition for review, original-action petition, special expedited filing or circuit-court memorandum has its own rules. Do not apply every principal-brief requirement to those documents merely because they contain citations.

Complete citations are more than a case name

Rule 809.19(1)(e) directs citation practice to the Uniform System of Citation and SCR 80.02. The latter requires the citation of a published Wisconsin appellate opinion in the table of cases to include, in order, its public-domain citation if one exists, its Wisconsin Reports volume and page, and its North Western Reporter volume and page. Preserve the parallel citation when available; do not merge two entries by deleting required reporter information.

SCR 80.02(3) distinguishes pinpoints: pre-2000 opinions generally use page numbers, while opinions issued on or after January 1, 2000 use paragraph numbers. The rule has a special treatment for older opinions later ordered published. These opinion pinpoints are not the numbers in your table's right-hand column. That column locates citations in your brief. The generator does not convert existing citations into the required style.

Keep brief, record and appendix numbers separate

Cover-first pagination is especially important in Wisconsin. Do not create a Roman-numbered front section followed by a new page 1 for the argument: Rule 809.19(8)(bm) requires sequential Arabic numbering beginning on the cover. Inserting a table therefore changes later numbers unless space was already reserved.

Record references identify material filed below. The official guide explains that the record index uses the circuit-court document number assigned when an item was filed, and that numbering gaps can occur. Appendix references identify pages in a separate appendix; subsection (2)(ae) requires that appendix to be filed separately from the brief. Its contents table must also identify circuit-court document numbers. A table entry for a statute points to the brief page containing the statute citation, not the appendix page containing evidence relevant to that statute. Keep these three systems separate during review.

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