Amicus briefs filed before the Supreme Court are most commonly used as a tool for interest groups use to convey their positions (for a look at interest groups’ use of amicus briefs see this article by Professor Paul Collins). This is not the sole use of such briefs though. Non-party individuals and groups that have an…
Quick Note: Supreme Court Stay Applications 2015/2016
The Supreme Court regularly receives applications to stay court orders or mandates pending possible upcoming decisions such as those on certiorari. Many of these requests are received from inmates on death row looking to stay executions. Several instances involve multiple applications based around the same underlying cases. Due to the interest in the stay recently granted in…
Forced Judicial Restraint
When, soon after his nomination to the Supreme Court, Judge Garland was praised for his judicial restraint, this praise was not envisioned for the type of impact Judge Garland’s nomination has made on the Court so far. Similarly, no one calling for judicial restraint or decrying the Court’s judicial activism prior to 2016 expected change to come in…
Cert Filing Leaders
Chambers and Partners regularly releases highly regarded law firm rankings and comparisons. One of these guides compares top appellate firms. The firms detailed in Chambers’ list are top players in the Supreme Court and employ many of the attorneys with the most extensive Supreme Court expertise. While these firms are recognized for their work in…
The Three Shifts of Chief Justice John Roberts
Chief Justice John Roberts’ resume is not remarkably unique for a Supreme Court Justice. That is not to say that it is not impressive. There is scant evidence of an imperfection from his Harvard undergrad and law school education, appellate and Supreme Court clerkships, work in the Solicitor General’s Office, big firm law practice, and…
Bringing in the Big Guns
In a cautious and almost trepidatious manner the Supreme Court has slowly filled in part of its docket for the 2016 Term. The correlation between this slow-moving approach to cert and the empty seat on the Court is unmistakable. There are currently eight cases scheduled for argument in October. The Court already granted cert in…
Still A Conservative Court
It’s a new day for the Supreme Court. We are in uncharted territory with this current Supreme Court vacancy with no end in sight. In some respect this has led to a liberal shift in the Court’s general demeanor – especially since this is the first time in decades that conservative Justices have not held a majority…
Justice Ginsburg: Political and Efficient All Wrapped Up in One
Once on the Supreme Court the Justices have a few essential obligations. Add to this life-tenure and lots of free time while the Court is in recess and the job sounds pretty enviable. The Justices still must hear oral arguments, meet and vote to decide cases, and grant new cases for the Court to hear…
Research Corner: 7/15/2016
Three new works on the study of judicial behavior: Alma Cohen, Alon Klement & Zvika Neeman, Judicial Decision Making: A Dynamic Reputation Approach, J. Legal Stud. (2015) Examines “how judicial elections affect the incentives and decisions of judges” Lee Epstein, Some Thoughts on the Study of Judicial Behavior, 57 Wm. & Mary L. Rev….
Inferences From Amicus Briefs and How Justice Kennedy Continues to Rule Supreme
This post analyzes the amicus filings from this past Term in three ways. First it looks at counts of cert stage amicus filings and compares them to merits stage filings. This difference show whether the interest in a case prior to the Court granting cert paralleled the interest in the case’s outcome on the merits. …
Quick Note: Roberts Court Majority Opinion Assignment
Who decides which Justice authors a given majority opinion? There is, of course, the necessity that this Justice is part of the majority coalition. Beyond that though there are two main rules. The first is that the Chief Justice assigns the opinion if the Chief is a member of the majority. If the Chief is…
SCOTUS Briefs: Opinions’ Basic Building Blocks
A Supreme Court opinion is a mixture of law, fact, and interpretation. By the time cases reach the Supreme Court, they amass a detailed record from the lower court(s) (except for the very few instances of original actions) and a large number of appellate filings. The case with the most amicus briefs on the merits…
Empirical SCOTUS 