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Supreme Court Decisions
About: Supreme Court Decisions is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 1804 publications have been published within this topic receiving 17066 citations.
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01 Jan 2016
TL;DR: This article studied the impact of the 1989 Webster abortion decision and Texas v. Johnson, the flag-burning edict released immediately prior to Webster using data from three Harris polls, one conducted just before the two decisions, and two conducted soon after.
Abstract: In this article, we revisit the question of whether, and in what manner, attitudes regarding specific Supreme Court decisions influence subsequent levels of confidence in the Court itself. Analysis centers on the impact of the 1989 Webster abortion decision and Texas v. Johnson, the flag-burning edict released immediately prior to Webster Using data from three Harris polls, one conducted just before the two decisions, and two conducted soon after, we design a quasi-experimental test in which data are analyzed using ordered logistic regression. Results demonstrate that agreement with the rulings did affect perceptions of the Court, and that the pattern of effects is indicative of a negativity bias; that is, disagreement with one or both decisions substantially reduced confidence in the Court, but agreement with both edicts brought only a marginal gain in confidence. Results also reveal that these effects did not decay in strength from the time of the first postdecision poll (conducted immediately after the decisions were released) to the time of the second postdecision poll (conducted six weeks later).
109 citations
TL;DR: The authors assess the impact of the Supreme Court's decision in Lamb's Chapel v. Center Moriches on the geographic constituency involved in the case, and find that high levels of information about the decision increases support for the decision among those for whom the decision is relatively less salient.
Abstract: We argue that the standard methodology for assessing the impact of Supreme Court decisions on public opinion, which relies on national surveys to measure public attitudes before and after relevant Court decisions, fails, among other grounds, to account for the fact that the overwhelming majority of Court decisions speak to particular constituencies only. We assess the impact of the Supreme Court's decision in Lamb's Chapel v. Center Moriches on the geographic constituencies involved in the case. We interviewed a random sample of residents in the town of Center Moriches and in the surrounding county of Suffolk, New York, before and after the decision. Consistent with the elaboration likelihood model of persuasion (Petty and Cacioppo 1986), we find that high levels of information about the decision increases support for the Court's decision among those for whom the decision is relatively less salient.
109 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the impact of the 1989 Webster abortion decision and Texas v. Johnson, the flag-burning edict released immediately prior to the decision, was investigated using three Harris polls, one conducted just before the two decisions and two conducted soon after.
Abstract: In this article, we revisit the question of whether, and in what manner, attitudes regarding specific Supreme Court decisions influence subsequent levels of confidence in the Court itself. Analysis centers on the impact of the 1989 Webster abortion decision and Texas v. Johnson, the flag-burning edict released immediately prior to Webster. Using data from three Harris polls, one conducted just before the two decisions, and two conducted soon after, we design a quasi-experimental test in which data are ana lyzed using ordered logistic regression. Results demonstrate that agree ment with the rulings did affect perceptions of the Court, and that the pattern of effects is indicative of a negativity bias; that is, disagreement with one or both decisions substantially reduced confidence in the Court, but agreement with both edicts brought only a marginal gain in confi dence. Results also reveal that these effects did not decay in strength from the time of the first postdecision poll (conducted immediately after...
108 citations
TL;DR: Mishler and Sheehan as discussed by the authors reported evidence of both direct and indirect impacts of public opinion on Supreme Court decisions, at both individual and aggregate level, and further statistical analysis to support the aggregate linkages.
Abstract: In their 1993 article in this Review, William Mishler and Reginald Sheehan reported evidence of both direct and indirect impacts of public opinion on Supreme Court decisions. Helmut Norpoth and Jeffrey Segal offer a methodological critique and in their own reanalysis of the data find, contrary to Mishler and Sheehan, no evidence for a direct path of influence from public opinion to Court decisions. Instead, they find an abrupt-permanent shift of judicial behavior consistent with an indirect model of influence whereby popularly elected presidents, through new appointments, affect the ideological complexion of the Court. In response, Mishler and Sheehan defend the direct public opinion linkage originally noted, at both individual and aggregate level; respond to the methodological critique; and offer further statistical analysis to support the aggregate linkages.
106 citations
TL;DR: The argument advanced here is that the politics of abortion can best be understood by examining the nature and scope of the conflict over abortion and the institutional context within which that conflict takes place.
Abstract: A conservative majority on the Supreme Court, recent Supreme Court decisions such as Webster v. Reproductive Health Services and Hodgson v. Minnesota that give states more leeway to set abortion standards, actions by state legislatures and governors to pass new, tougher state antiabortion laws, as well as efforts by the Reagan and Bush administrations to prevent workers at federally funded family planning clinics from discussing with clients the availability of abortion services point to a new political climate surrounding the abortion issue. These recent developments also increase the chances that Roe v. Wade will be overturned in the future. This essay defines the parameters of a "new" politics of abortion, offers a framework for understanding this post-Webster abortion politics, and suggests an agenda for future research. The argument advanced here is that the politics of abortion can best be understood by examining the nature and scope of the conflict over abortion and the institutional context within...
103 citations