Supreme Court of Georgia

Format

Type

Century Schoolbook 13 pt, 1.2× spacing

Margins

1-inch margins

Opening brief

10,000 words or 30 pages

Reply brief

7,000 words or 20 pages

What counts

Pages apply only to typed/handwritten filings. Excludes cover page, TOC, table of citations, appendices, certificate of service, signature block, word-count statement. Death penalty: 20,000/10,000 words.

Rules

Rules of the Supreme Court of the State of Georgia — Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 16, 17; Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 20

Parts of the brief, in order

1. TABLE OF CONTENTS — If applicable · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(a)
2. TABLE OF CITED AUTHORITIES — If applicable · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(a)
3. INTRODUCTION — Optional · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(b)
4. JURISDICTIONAL STATEMENT — Required · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(c)
5. ENUMERATION OF ERRORS — Required · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(d)
6. STATEMENT OF THE CASE — Required · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(e)
7. SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT — If applicable · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(f)
8. ARGUMENT — Required · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 19(1)(g)
9. Word-count statement (above signature) — Required · Ga. Sup. Ct. R. 20
10. Signature block — Required
11. CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE — Required

Argument headings: Argument generally follows order of enumeration of errors; point headings encouraged. Unsupported enumerations deemed abandoned (Rule 22(1)). In certiorari cases, list the Court's questions instead of enumerations.

Standard of review: Concise statement of applicable standard(s) of review within the argument (Rule 19(1)(g)).

Record citations: (V1-77) = volume and PDF page of electronic record (Rule 22(2))

Appendix

Optional. Pages are numbered like A12.

Appendices are excluded from word count (Rule 20); no detailed appendix rule verified.

Certificates

• Compliance: Exact text immediately above signature: 'This submission does not exceed the word-count limit imposed by Rule 20.'
• Service: Certificate of service required
• Certificate of Interested Persons with initial filing (Rule 26.1): all parties, all attorneys below, all witnesses

Good to know

• Serif proportional font; no monospaced; sans-serif allowed for headings. Minimum = 13-pt Century Schoolbook equivalent (11-pt footnotes); examples: Century family, Baskerville, Book Antiqua, Calisto, Bookman Old Style, Palatino (Rule 16).
• Text left-aligned or justified WITH hyphenation (Rule 16(3)).
• Line spacing between 1.2x and double (Rule 16(4)).
• Minimum mandatory parts: jurisdictional statement (incl. why Supreme Court rather than Court of Appeals), enumeration of errors, statement of the case, argument.
• Minors' names -> initials; no home addresses (Rule 17(5)).
• Official rules PDF (eff. July 2, 2026) blocked by robots.txt; verified via courtrules.net mirror.

Filing: Electronic filing; searchable PDF, letter size; no hyperlinks to external sites/other documents (internal links OK) (Rule 17).