A little-noticed brief in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court this fall may launch a new genre of friend-of-the-court filings: written by a law firm on behalf of no client—not even law professors—and in support of neither side.

Or it might flop, its author Thomas Goldstein of Goldstein Russell readily acknowledges. “I’ve never heard of it being done before—the court is used to lawyers having clients,” he said in an interview. “But that has never deterred me from doing something before.”