[darryl]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

However, the US isn't a common law country. There are some aspects of US law which are common law, but many aspects are not. While it is derived from English law, it branched off in a very different direction.

Citing dissents happens a fair amount in the US, especially as attitudes towards the original decision shift. An example is that when the DC Circuit court upheld the appointment of Mueller, they cited Scalia's dissent in Morrison v Olsen et al. (usually referenced simply as Morrison), a rather famous and influential dissent.

Appellate law in the US is generally focused on the technical aspects which were specifically listed in the appeal as opposed to the rightness or wrongness of the trial judge's decision. So saying that a decision was upheld as a way to validate that the decision was correct is misleading. That's simply not the way it works in the US. Appellate courts decide if a specific point of law was correctly applied, not if the case was correctly decided.

Most of the time, when a judgement is overturned, it is returned to the trial court to reconsider keeping in mind the appellate court's clarification of how the law should be applied. No idea how common law countries do appeals.

The US is indeed a common law country, and the doctrine of precedent applies. For instance, Exeter University gives its list of common law countries and the requirements for those with a bachelors degree in law from that university to practice in those other countries here:

http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/l...nlawcountries/

The US appellate system and the treatment of dissents in the US is not materially different from most or perhaps even all common law countries. The doctrine of precedent retains its central role in the US. Minority judgements have their role, but they do not represent the law.

The DC circuit court decision you refer to is IN RE: GRAND JURY INVESTIGATION which can be downloaded as a pdf HERE. The only mention of Scalia is here, where Morrison is referred to with the usual syntax naming the majority judges and that Scalia dissented. This is simply the syntax adopted. The reference simply says that Scalia dissented. It does not give any details of the dissent. It does not even tell us whether his dissent related to the particular point. I'm too lazy to look it up, but Scalia may well have agreed on this aspect of the case, and his dissent was on some other point or points. But, if he did dissent on this point, which I expect may be the case, the Court followed the majority decision Here are some relevant extracts:

From first paragraph on Page 8:

There, this court recognized that an
independent counsel was an inferior officer because his office
was created pursuant to a regulation and “the Attorney General
may rescind this regulation at any time, thereby abolishing the
Office of Independent Counsel.” Id. at 56; see Morrison, 487
U.S. at 721 (Scalia, J., dissenting).

From final paragraph:

Because the Special Counsel is an inferior officer, and the
Deputy Attorney General became the head of the Department
by virtue of becoming the Acting Attorney General as a result
of a vacancy created by the disability of the Attorney General
through recusal on the matter, we hold that Miller’s challenge
to the appointment of the Special Counsel fails. Accordingly,
we affirm the order finding Miller in civil contempt.

A quite unremarkable application of the doctrine of precedent.