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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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65 citations
Book•
01 Aug 1983
TL;DR: The history of water in the American West has an unusually rich platter of themes from which to select: ecology, economics, environment, the distribution of a life-sustaining commodity, government fairness, or the equality of citizens or social groups as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Historians of water in the American West have an unusually rich platter of themes from which to select: ecology, economics, environment, the distribution of a life-sustaining commodity, government fairness, or the equality of citizens or social groups If they are of the school that seeks a theoretical model that saves the effort of researching evidence, they may make the scarceness of water the historiological frame for the tale and interpret Western history by the dictates of water deterministic environmentalism It is surprising, therefore, that some historians of Western water lore have succmbed to none of these lures, looking instead at the history of water from the perspective of the topic that more than any other historians of the American West have ignored: law Scholars of Western water law also have a choice of historical themes One possible approach asks what legal rules add to our knowledge of water in Western American history Michael CMeyer poses that question in one of the books under review The word "rights" in the title of our other book, Forging New Rights, implies that its author does also, but if law attracted him he apparently did not know where to find it The second approach, more challenging intellectually but beyond the interest of Western historians, is to enquire what the history of water can tell us about law: for example, the autonomy of law There is a dispute among American legal historians that may never be resolved about the laws autonomy One school of thought maintains that all law is politics, that nothing is autonomous, that every decision and judgment of the law is a product of the lawmaker's political, social, and economic bias and interests Stated in its most indefensible extreme (by a constitutional historian, not a lawyer), this school argues that "[t]here is nothing inevitable about the process The operation of a legal system is largely a story of rendered choices The system is not some vast, impersonal deus ex machina; instead it operates through discretionary judgments reflecting political and personal needs of power holders"' According to the opposite or "autonomous" perspective, neutral principles determine the process of legal decisionmaking Law is neither politics nor economics Law is opened to politics on one end but closed on the other by doctrine and professional methodology There are certain core values controlling judicial decisions,
65 citations
TL;DR: While theoretical justifications predict that a judge's gender and race may influence judicial decisions, empirical support for these arguments has been mixed as discussed by the authors, however, recent increases in judicial diversity have been mixed.
Abstract: While theoretical justifications predict that a judge's gender and race may influence judicial decisions, empirical support for these arguments has been mixed. However, recent increases in judicial...
65 citations
Book•
30 Apr 2012TL;DR: The Office of the Solicitor General as discussed by the authors is the finest law firm in the country and has a history of influence and agenda-setting on the US Supreme Court and Congress.
Abstract: 1. The Solicitor General and the Supreme Court 2. The Office of the Solicitor General: the finest law firm in the country 3. Explanations for Solicitor General success 4. Solicitor General influence and agenda setting 5. Solicitor General influence and merits outcomes 6. Solicitor General influence and briefs 7. Solicitor General influence and legal doctrine 8. Conclusion 9. Appendices.
64 citations
Book•
08 Jul 1996TL;DR: Griffin this article surveys the theoretical issues raised by judicial practice in the United States over the past three centuries, particularly since the Warren Court and locates both theory and practices that have inspired dispute among jurists and scholars in historical context.
Abstract: Despite the outpouring of works on constitutional theory in the past several decades, no general introduction to the field has been available. Stephen Griffin provides here an original contribution to American constitutional theory in the form of a short, lucid introduction to the subject for scholars and an informed lay audience. He surveys in an unpolemical way the theoretical issues raised by judicial practice in the United States over the past three centuries, particularly since the Warren Court, and locates both theory and practices that have inspired dispute among jurists and scholars in historical context. At the same time he advances an argument about the distinctive nature of our American constitutionalism, regarding it as an instance of the interpenetration of law and politics.American Constitutionalism is unique in considering the perspectives of both law and political science in relation to constitutional theory. Constitutional theories produced by legal scholars do not usually discuss state-centered theories of American politics, the importance of institutions, behaviorist research on judicial decision making, or questions of constitutional reform, but this book takes into account the political science literature on these and other topics. The work also devotes substantial attention to judicial review and its relationship to American democracy and theories of constitutional interpretation.
64 citations