(images via supremecourt.gov) In the biggest cases this Supreme Court Term there was one common thread – the four Justices appointed by Democratic Presidents either voted together for the winning position or (likely) voted together to cause a 4-4 split (this was a potential strategy I discussed earlier). The numbers on the Court set up…
Category: justices
King of Dissents
In a time of transition in the Supreme Court, much attention is paid to the Court’s ideological pulse. Justices Thomas and Alito, two of the more conservative Justices on the Court are the top two dissenter so far this Term (see below). Justice Thomas in particular was noted for his lone dissent in the death…
Odd Couples (and Trios)
With eight Justices voting on the majority of cases this Term, who are known to often split their votes along ideological lines, there were and are bound to be several unique repercussions. The Justices had and have the option of evenly splitting their votes and leaving lower court opinions as they stand. They also can seek…
A Growing Fracture in the Death Penalty
Under Chief Justice Roberts, the Supreme Court has revisited the issue of capital punishment on numerous occasions. Just in terms of overall cases, the Court has ruled on 23 since the beginning of the 2005 Term (habeas cases where the Court granted cert and ruled on the merits simultaneously are excluded from this count). These…
Signs of a Gridlocked SCOTUS
Congress has historically low levels of public approval. Current Gallup Polls place Congress’ approval rating at around 18%. The Supreme Court’s approval rating tends to hover much higher – generally around the 50% level. One reason for this disparity is from sense that the Supreme Court does not engage in politics in the manner of other…
Lessons In Not Throwing Caution To the Wind
It seems a fitting tribute to include a post about the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) on the day the current Solicitor General, Donald Verrilli, steps down. The OSG is one of main gatekeepers to the Supreme Court’s review. Multiple times every Term the Justices request the OSG to express views on whether or…
Ideological or Individual Rifts: Justice Thomas at the Edge of the Court
There is and has been a clear ideological division between the more conservative and liberal Justices on the Court, especially in cases with high profile civil rights issues such as marriage equality. A not so often examined aspect of this fissure has to do with the cohesion of the individual voting blocs. For instance, Justice…
Interruptions and References
Supreme Court oral arguments are traditionally thought of as a time for the Justices to interact with and ask question of attorneys in a case. One of the lesser thought of aspects of oral arguments has to do with the interaction among the Justices. Over the years several studies and articles have looked at this…
Will Ghosts of Past Decisions Come Back to Haunt This Term?
Do Supreme Court Justices abide by the Court’s past precedents in cases where such precedents are not overruled? Political Scientists have long debated this question with differing accounts based on ideological theory, strategic theory, and post-behavioralism. Without getting lost in the weeds of this debate this post takes a look at the Justices’ votes in…
Peering Into Merrick Garland
If there’s one thing that can be said about the current Supreme Court vacancy, it is that it will not likely be filled anytime soon. Judge Garland has sat on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals since 1997 and has been the Chief Judge on the Circuit since 2013. With the benefit of time and the…
The State of the States Before the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court Justices never appeared less satisfied with responses during an oral argument this Term than they did with those in Birchfield v. North Dakota. Mark Joseph Stern described in an article for Slate, “Ever wondered what it felt like on the Titanic when that iceberg ripped the hull? The sensation, I suspect, was quite similar…
Has The Supreme Court Turned a Liberal Tide?
The pieces are in place. With Justice Scalia’s death the liberals on the Court (both ideologically speaking and by virtue of their appointments by Democratic Presidents) are matched evenly with the Court’s conservatives for the first time in almost half a century. The last time a majority of Justices appointed by democrats sat on the…
Empirical SCOTUS 