Topic
Majority opinion
About: Majority opinion is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 4107 publications have been published within this topic receiving 54845 citations. The topic is also known as: opinion of the court.
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03 Jan 2014TL;DR: The spiral of silence theory was first proposed by Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann in the early 1970s as discussed by the authors, and it has been studied in a variety of media, including newspapers, television, radio, and magazines.
Abstract: When Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann conceived of and developed her spiral of
silence theory in the 1960s and early 1970s, she formulated it in an era when
scholars perceived a return to all-powerful media-namely, that the media
were able to exert strong eff ects because audience members actively turned
to newspapers, television, radio, and magazines to help defi ne social reality.
Indeed, the spiral of silence emerged as a theory not only of public opinion, but
also of media eff ects. With their ubiquity, consonance, and cumulativeness, the
mass media of decades ago allowed individuals to gauge the climate of public
opinion and speak out or not, depending on whether they perceived themselves
to be in the minority or majority opinion. In this process of eff ects, the media
served what Noelle-Neumann (1993) termed an “articulation function,” providing audience members with arguments used to back up their opinions. After
all, “if the mass media fail to provide them, there will be no words” (p. 172).
10 citations
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors consider the recent referral by the UN Security Council of the situation in the western region of Sudan (Darfur) for investigation and prosecution to the International Criminal Court.
Abstract: The authors consider the recent referral by the UN Security Council of the situation in the western region of Sudan (Darfur) for investigation and prosecution to the International Criminal Court. The paper focuses on the context of this referral, especially since the referral signals a capitulation by the United States of America (which had the power to veto the referral) in the face of worldwide pressure for the United Nations to take action against perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan. In considering the referral, the authors point out that the International Criminal Court has been handed a hot potato. Because it is one of the first cases that the court will hear, the spotlight will be on the court's effectiveness as an instrument of international criminal justice. Sudan is not party to the court's statute, however, and accordingly owes the court no obligation to cooperate in the investigation and prosecution of Sudanese offenders.
10 citations
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01 Jan 2007
10 citations
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors trace the dynamics of borrowing and convergence in the arena of the exclusionary rule, illuminating the specific mix of historical contingency, adjudicatory pragmatism, and tactical considerations that drove the influence of constitutional tort doctrine on the inclusionary rule generally and in Herring more specifically.
Abstract: The Supreme Court’s 2009 decision in Herring v United States has prompted both criticism and puzzlement concerning the source, meaning, and implications of the new culpability-based framework that it announced for the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule This Article proposes that Herring may be better understood not solely by reference to the exclusionary rule precedents to which the majority opinion claims fidelity, but rather in the context of the important and largely unexamined influence that constitutional tort doctrine has had in shaping exclusionary rule jurisprudence That influence has been driven by the interrelated processes of borrowing and convergence – the former, a deliberate tactic employed when the Court in United States v Leon drew from qualified immunity jurisprudence to define the contours of the exclusionary rule’s good faith exception; the latter, a gradual and progressive effect of that initial borrowing, whereby first the good faith exception, and eventually other areas of exclusionary rule doctrine, have increasingly drawn from and grown aligned with constitutional tort doctrine The Article identifies and traces these dynamics of borrowing and convergence in the arena of the exclusionary rule, illuminating the specific mix of historical contingency, adjudicatory pragmatism, and, perhaps most interestingly, tactical considerations that drove the influence of constitutional tort doctrine on the exclusionary rule generally, and in Herring more specifically This examination affords greater understanding of the source, contours, and likely trajectory of the exclusionary rule framework that Herring enunciates Moreover, close examination of borrowing and convergence in this particular context provides a basis for mapping a more systematic understanding of why and how disparate strands of doctrine come to cross-fertilize – in the particular realm of criminal procedure, in the broader arena of constitutional remedies, and in the law more generally The story of these dynamics in the exclusionary rule context offers a largely cautionary tale of the risks that convergence poses to substantive legal standards as well as jurisprudential values such as transparency, particularly in constitutional remedial jurisprudence
10 citations
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TL;DR: The authors examined the voting behavior of justices of the Supreme Court of Canada during two important periods of institutional change: the end of appeals to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) and the adoption of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Abstract: This article examines the voting behavior of justices of the Supreme Court of Canada during two important periods of institutional change: the end of appeals to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) and the adoption of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I argue that these changes affected the justices' voting patterns in systematic ways. My assertion is that the end of appeals to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council removes a constraint on Supreme Court decision-making, which had led to strategic voting by the justices in the period during which the JCPC could examine and reverse the Supreme Court's decisions. For the Charter of Rights, I assert that its existence as a legal document served as a constraint for conservative justices on the Court in the period immediately following its passage. Drawing on the universe of decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada from 1945 to 2005 in criminal, tax, and tort cases, I use Baum's (1988, 1989) method of examining policy change on the Supreme ...
10 citations