MS · rules
Miss. R. App. P. 20
CERTIFIED QUESTIONS FROM FEDERAL COURTS
(a) When Certified. When it shall appear to the Supreme Court of the United States
or to any United States Court of Appeals that there may be involved in any proceeding before
it questions or propositions of law of this state which are determinative of all or part of that
cause and there are no clear controlling precedents in the decisions of the Mississippi
Supreme Court, the federal court may certify such questions or propositions of law of this
state to the Mississippi Supreme Court for rendition of a written opinion concerning such
questions or propositions of Mississippi law. The Supreme Court may, in its discretion,
decline to answer the questions certified to it.
(b) Method of Invoking Rule. The provision of this rule may be invoked by the
federal court upon its own motion or the suggestion or motion of any interested party when
approved by the federal court.
(c) Contents of Certificate. The certificate shall contain the style of the case, a
statement of facts showing the nature of the cause and the circumstances out of which the
questions or propositions of law arise, and the question of law to be answered.
(d) Preparation of Certificate. The certificate shall be certified to the Supreme Court
by the clerk of the federal court and under its official seal. The Supreme Court may, in its
discretion, require the original or copies of all or any portion of the record before the federal
court to be filed with said certificate where, in its opinion, such record may be necessary in
the determination of the certified question.
(e) Costs. The costs of the proceedings shall be equally divided between the parties
unless otherwise ordered by the Supreme Court.
(f) Briefs and Argument. The appellant or petitioner in the federal court shall submit
the initial brief on the question certified. All briefs, arguments, and other proceedings shall
be conducted according to these Rules. For the purposes of Rule 28, additional briefing will
be upon directive of the Supreme Court.
History
[Adopted governing matters filed on or after January 1, 1995; amended effective June 27, 2002.] Comment: Rule 20 continues the practice of accepting certified questions from federal courts. Acceptance of a question so certified is discretionary with the Court. The Court reserves the right to rephrase certified questions, Government Employees Ins. Co. v. Brown, 446 So. 2d 1002, 1006 (Miss. 1984), and has said it will restrict its review under this rule "to the performance when properly requested of the function of declaring in general terms the controlling rules" of state law, and not the application of law to fact. Boardman v. United Services Auto Ass'n, 470 So. 2d 1024, 1031 (Miss. 1985). The practice of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in certifying questions is discussed in In Re McClintock, 558 F. 2d 732, 733 nn. 2-5 (5th Cir. 1977), and J. Brown, Certification-Federalism in Action, 7 Cumb. L. Rev. 455 (1977) (tracing development of certification doctrine).
Provenance
- Source
- courts.ms.gov
- Retrieved
- 2026-09-25
- Edition
- 2026-09-25
- Content hash
b17902ca7714b5c150facb86e4094ef054cc12dbd728d8e17ef1dd18f832021a
The link goes to the issuing authority’s own document — the one we read to produce this record. Where a source publishes whole titles rather than sections, your browser may need a moment to jump to the provision.
Unofficial copy of government-published law, reproduced from official sources with full provenance. Not an official publication; verify against official sources before relying on it in a filing. Records in the 'guidance' corpus, and only that corpus, are sub-regulatory (interpretive guidelines, survey procedures) and are not binding law. Validity bounds follow each jurisdiction's declared temporalBasis.