This article looks at
the farewell speeches and other contributions of members of the WTO Appellate
Body through the lens of the accusations levelled against the Appellate Body by
the US, which invoked these accusations as reasons for blocking all
appointments to the Appellate Body and thereby, in effect, ending the Appellate
Body’s existence. It finds that the US was correct insofar as it claimed that Appellate
Body members did perceive the Appellate Body not only as a mere settler of
specific disputes – the role the US believed the Appellate Body should limit
itself to – but as a courtlike institution with the task of developing a
coherent and consistent body of jurisprudence. However, Appellate Body members
rejected almost uniformly allegations of judicial activism and judicial
overreach. Moreover, many Appellate Body members warned of the dangers of the
imbalance between a very active WTO judicial branch and a mostly dysfunctional
WTO legislative branch and called for overcoming the legislative deadlock.