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Judicial opinion

About: Judicial opinion is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5300 publications have been published within this topic receiving 64803 citations.


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Book
15 Apr 1993
TL;DR: Solan as discussed by the authors found that judges often describe their use of language poorly because there is no clear relationship between the principles of linguistics and the jurisprudential goals that the judge wishes to promote.
Abstract: Since many legal disputes are battles over the meaning of a statute, contract, testimony, or the Constitution, judges must interpret language in order to decide why one proposed meaning overrides another. And in making their decisions about meaning appear authoritative and fair, judges often write about the nature of linguistic interpretation. In the first book to examine the linguistic analysis of law, Lawrence M. Solan shows that judges sometimes inaccurately portray the way we use language, creating inconsistencies in their decisions and threatening the fairness of the judicial system. Solan uses a wealth of examples to illustrate the way linguistics enters the process of judicial decision making: a death penalty case that the Supreme Court decided by analyzing the use of adjectives in a jury instruction; criminal cases whose outcomes depend on the Supreme Court's analysis of the relationship between adverbs and prepositional phrases; and cases focused on the meaning of certain words in the Constitution. Solan finds that judges often describe our use of language poorly because there is no clear relationship between the principles of linguistics and the jurisprudential goals that the judge wishes to promote. A major contribution to the growing interdisciplinary scholarship on law and its social and cultural context, Solan's lucid, engaging book is equally accessible to linguists, lawyers, philosophers, anthropologists, literary theorists, and political scientists.

116 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors synthesize elements derived from contextual and attitudinal perspectives by appending them to a model of judicial decision-making, which is an initial step toward the development of an integrated model of decision making.
Abstract: This article is an initial step toward the development of an integrated model of judicial decision making. The study synthesizes elements derived from contextual and attitudinal perspectives by app...

115 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors explored the two causal pathways suggested to link public opinion directly to the behavior of justices and the implications of the nature and strength of these linkages for current debates concerning Supreme Court tenure.
Abstract: There is wide scholarly agreement that the frequent replacement of justices has kept the Supreme Court generally attuned to public opinion. Recent research indicates that, in addition to this indirect effect, Supreme Court justices respond directly to changes in public opinion. We explore the two causal pathways suggested to link public opinion directly to the behavior of justices and the implications of the nature and strength of these linkages for current debates concerning Supreme Court tenure. The recent increase in the stability of Court membership has raised questions about the continued efficacy of the replacement mechanism and renewed debates over mechanisms to limit judicial tenure. Our analysis provides little evidence that justices respond strategically to public opinion but provides partial support for the idea that justices' preferences shift in response to the same social forces that shape the opinions of the general public. Our analysis offers preliminary evidence that—even in the absence o...

115 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
Nita A. Farahany1
TL;DR: Judicial opinions issued between 2005–12 that discussed the use of neuroscience or behavioral genetics by criminal defendants were identified, coded and analysed.
Abstract: The goal of this study was to examine the growing use of neurological and behavioral genetic evidence by criminal defendants in US criminal law. Judicial opinions issued between 2005-12 that discussed the use of neuroscience or behavioral genetics by criminal defendants were identified, coded and analysed. Criminal defendants are increasingly introducing such evidence to challenge defendants' competency, the effectiveness of defense counsel at trial, and to mitigate punishment.

113 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a model of judicial decision-making based on a judge's concern for reputation and the interdependence of judges' decisions through precedent is developed, and the audience of judges plays a crucial role in the analysis.
Abstract: This paper develops a model of judicial decision-making based on a judge's concern for reputation and the interdependence of judges' decisions through precedent. The audience of judges plays a crucial role in the analysis. In general, we show that reputation can both restrain judicial discretion, but also inspire it if future judges are expected to be persuaded by a decision and follow it, thereby enhancing the authoring judge's reputation.

113 citations


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Performance
Metrics
No. of papers in the topic in previous years
YearPapers
202314
202242
202196
2020160
2019174
2018176