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Wisconsin Court of Appeals

Intermediate appellate court of Wisconsin

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 10, 2026
Entity authorityQ8027145 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals is an intermediate appellate court that reviews contested decisions of the Wisconsin circuit courts. The Court of Appeals was created in August 1978 to alleviate the Wisconsin Supreme Court's rising number of appellate cases. Published Court of Appeals opinions are considered binding precedent until overruled by the Supreme Court; unpublished opinions are not. The Court hears most appeals in three-judge panels, but appeals of circuit court decisions in misdemeanor, small claims, and municipal ordinance cases are decided by a single judge.

Composition

The Court of Appeals comprises 16 judges elected to six-year terms in four geographic districts. Districts I and II have four judges each, three judges are chambered in District III, and five in District IV. The court is administered by a chief judge, appointed by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, who is assisted by a deputy chief judge and a presiding judge in each district. Vacancies on the court are filled by gubernatorial appointment; following the appointment of a judge, a new election for that seat is scheduled in the next Spring election in which no other Appeals Court seat in that Appeals Court District is up for election, unless that election occurs less than five months from the date of the appointment.

Districts

District I is chambered in Milwaukee and contains only Milwaukee County.

District II is chambered in Waukesha and contains Calumet, Fond du Lac, Green Lake, Kenosha, Manitowoc, Ozaukee, Racine, Sheboygan, Walworth, Washington, Waukesha, and Winnebago counties.

District III is chambered in Wausau and contains Ashland, Barron, Bayfield, Brown, Buffalo, Burnett, Chippewa, Door, Douglas, Dunn, Eau Claire, Florence, Forest, Iron, Kewaunee, Langlade, Lincoln, Marathon, Marinette, Menominee, Oconto, Oneida, Outagamie, Pepin, Pierce, Polk, Price, Rusk, Sawyer, Shawano, St.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Wisconsin Court of Appeals” as intermediate appellate court of Wisconsin. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1978—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Wisconsin, Court and Appeals can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as intermediate appellate court of Wisconsin. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 10, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q8027145. VIAF identifies the subject as 138501606. The Library of Congress control number is n89630836. None of the 3 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1978.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  2. Expand the search: follow Wisconsin Court of Appeals primary sources, Wisconsin Court of Appeals archive and Wisconsin research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Wisconsin Court of Appeals” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.