Judge William Pryor Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi / ALM

Federal appellate Judge William Pryor Jr., a favorite among conservatives for a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, took to The New York Times op-ed pages to denounce a conservative law professor's controversial proposal urging Congress to quickly and greatly expand the federal courts.

Pryor, who sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, said in the opinion piece “there is nothing conservative—or otherwise meritorious—about this proposal,” authored by Steven Calabresi of Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law and one of his former students, Shams Hirji.

Calabresi's article, published this month under the headline “Proposed Judgeship Bill,” argued that the federal courts are “woefully understaffed” and that the courts are buckling from crushing caseloads. The proposal, styled in the form of a memorandum to Congress, also claimed the courts hear too few arguments and issue too many unpublished rulings.