Focusing on the behavioral aspects of disagreement within a panel and between the levels of the federal judicial hierarchy, the authors reveal the impact of individual attitudes or preferences on judicial decision-making, and hence on political divisions in the broader society.

Revealing analysis of how judges work as individuals and collectively to uphold judicial values in the face of contemporary challenges.

This book focuses on the decision-making processes in modern collegiate courts. Judges from some of the world s highest and most significant judicial bodies, both national and supranational, share their experiences and reflect on the challenges to which their joint judicial endeavour gives rise.

Judicial systems are under increasing pressure: from rising litigation costs and decreased accessibility, from escalating accountability and performance evaluation expectations, from shifting burdens of case management and alternative dispute resolution roles, and from emerging technologies. For courts to survive and flourish in a rapidly changing society, it is vital to have a clear understanding of their contemporary role – and a willingness to defend it. This book presents a clear vision of what it is that courts do, how they do it, and how we can make sure that they perform that role well. It argues that courts remain a critical, relevant and supremely well-adjusted institution in the 21st century. The approach of this book is to weave together a range of discourses on surrounding judicial issues into a systemic and coherent whole. It begins by articulating the dual roles at the core of the judicial function: third-party merit-based dispute resolution and social (normative) governance. By expanding upon these discrete yet inter-related aspects, it develops a language and conceptual framework to understand the judicial role more fully. The subsequent chapters demonstrate the explanatory power of this function, examining the judicial decision-making method, reframing principles of judicial independence and impartiality, and re-conceiving systems of accountability and responsibility. The book argues that this function-driven conception provides a useful re-imagining of some familiar issues as part of a coherent framework of foundational, yet interwoven, principles. This approach not only adds clarity to the analysis of those concepts and the concrete mechanisms by which they are manifest, but helps make the case of why courts remain such vital social institutions. Ultimately, the book is an entreaty not to take courts for granted, nor to readily abandon the benefits they bring to society. Instead, by understanding the importance and legitimacy of the judicial role, and its multifaceted social benefits, this books challenge us to refresh our courts in a manner that best advances this underlying function.

Examines the appellate court system of the United States, describing how cases are argued before the bench, how judges discuss these arguments in private, and how the judges' decisions affect American society

Throughout its existence the Federal District Court of Nebraska has echoed the dynamics of its time, reflecting the concerns, interests, and passions of the people who have made this state their home. Echo of Its Time explores the court’s development, from its inception in 1867 through 1933, tracing the careers of its first four judges: Elmer Dundy, William Munger, Thomas Munger (no relation), and Joseph Woodrough, whose rulings addressed an array of issues and controversies echoing macro-level developments within the state, nation, and world. Echo of Its Time both informs and entertains while using the court’s operations as a unique and accessible prism through which to explore broader themes in the history of the state and the nation. The book explores the inner workings of the court through Thomas Munger’s personal correspondence, as well as the court’s origins and growing influence under the direction of its legendary first judge, Elmer Dundy. Dundy handled many notable and controversial matters and made significant decisions in the field of Native American law, including Standing Bear v. Crook and Elk v. Wilkins. From the turn of the century through 1933 the court’s docket reflected the dramatic and rapid changes in state, regional, and national dynamics, including labor disputes and violence, political corruption and Progressive Era reform efforts, conflicts between cattle ranchers and homesteaders, wartime sedition and “slacker” prosecutions, criminal enterprises, and the endless battles between government agents and bootleggers during Prohibition.

Judges play a central role in the American legal system, but their behavior as decision-makers is not well understood, even among themselves. The system permits judges to be quite secretive (and most of them are), so indirect methods are required to make sense of their behavior. Here, a political scientist, an economist, and a judge work together to construct a unified theory of judicial decision-making. Using statistical methods to test hypotheses, they dispel the mystery of how judicial decisions in district courts, circuit courts, and the Supreme Court are made. The authors derive their hypotheses from a labor-market model, which allows them to consider judges as they would any other economic actors: as self-interested individuals motivated by both the pecuniary and non-pecuniary aspects of their work. In the authors' view, this model describes judicial behavior better than either the traditional “legalist” theory, which sees judges as automatons who mechanically apply the law to the facts, or the current dominant theory in political science, which exaggerates the ideological component in judicial behavior. Ideology does figure into decision-making at all levels of the federal judiciary, the authors find, but its influence is not uniform. It diminishes as one moves down the judicial hierarchy from the Supreme Court to the courts of appeals to the district courts. As The Behavior of Federal Judges demonstrates, the good news is that ideology does not extinguish the influence of other components in judicial decision-making. Federal judges are not just robots or politicians in robes.

This book studies the decisions of the United States circuit courts and their grounding in law and judicial ideology.

The U.S. Supreme Court is a public policy battleground in which organized interests attempt to etch their economic, legal, and political preferences into law through the filing of amicus curiae ("friend of the court") briefs. In Friends of the Supreme Court: Interest Groups and Judicial Decision Making, Paul M. Collins, Jr. explores how organized interests influence the justices' decision making, including how the justices vote and whether they choose to author concurrences and dissents. Collins presents theories of judicial choice derived from disciplines as diverse as law, marketing, political science, and social psychology. This theoretically rich and empirically rigorous treatment of decision-making on the nation's highest court, which represents the most comprehensive examination ever undertaken of the influence of U.S. Supreme Court amicus briefs, provides clear evidence that interest groups play a significant role in shaping the justices' choices.