Supreme court

About: Supreme court is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 41858 publications have been published within this topic receiving 306787 citations. The topic is also known as: court of last resort & highest court of appeal.

Police Interrogation in the 1990s: An Empirical Study of the Effects of Miranda

Abstract: Miranda v. Arizona is the Supreme Court’s most famous criminal law decision, spelling out the requirements for police interrogation of criminal suspects. Despite its fame, we have little empirical knowledge about how the decision has affected police interrogation in the years that followed. What percentage of suspects waives Miranda rights? How many confess? How important are confessions to the outcome of prosecutions? No one knows the answer. This Article provides answers to those questions. After a review of existing literature in Part I, Part II sets forth the methodology of the empirical study. Part III reports the specific findings, including assessments of custodial interrogations, noncustodial interrogations, police compliance with Miranda rules, and ultimate outcomes of criminal cases. Part IV assesses the importance of these findings with respect to the wisdom of Miranda. The Article concludes that the Miranda decision, despite the promises of the Court and its defenders, has yet to be empirically justified as the proper balance between the competing interests of criminal suspects and society at large.

Substantive and Procedural Aspects of Supreme Court Decisions as Determinants of Institutional Approval

Abstract: Public evaluations of the Supreme Court are influenced by response to the Court's rulings, but the specific elements of decisions that affect such institutional appraisals require identification. In particular, previous investigators have been unable to determine if support of the Supreme Court moves in response to the substantive aspects of decisions, public concern with democratic procedure, or attention to both substance and procedure. This article presents the results of an experiment designed to distinguish the possible influences of substantive and procedural concerns. Findings reveal that the substantive aspects of Court rulings exert significant influence on evaluations of the Supreme Court, affecting institutional support, confidence in the Court's justices, and specific support of each of the three decisions that were studied. In contrast, concern with the democratic implications of activist rulings failed to alter any dimension of Court approval.

The Separation of Powers and Supreme Court Agenda Setting

Abstract: This study employs the first systematic, empirical analysis that relies on archival data to examine whether the separation of powers influences justices' agenda votes. It spatially models how justices set the Court's agenda under a sincere approach as well as an SOP approach and compares the competing expectations derived therefrom. The results suggest that legislative and executive preferences fail to influence justices' votes. Across every model tested, the data show justices uninfluenced by the separation of powers. These results provide a strong rejoinder to SOP models, since the Court's agenda stage is the most likely stage of the decision making process to show signs of an SOP effect.

The politics of race and juvenile justice: The "due process revolution" and the conservative reaction

Abstract: Through the prism of race, this article analyzes the social structural and political context of juvenile justice law reforms over the past half century. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the Supreme Court imposed national legal and equality norms on recalcitrant southern states that still adhered to a segregated Jim Crow legal regime, and these norms provided the impetus for the Supreme Court's juvenile court “due process” decisions in the 1960s. The article then analyzes sociological, criminological, racial factors, media coverage, and political dynamics of the 1970s and 1980s that contributed to the “get tough” legislative reformulation of juvenile justice policies in the 1990s. During this period, conservative Republican politicians pursued a “southern strategy,” used crime as a code word for race for electoral advantage, and advocated “get tough” policies, which led to punitive changes in juvenile justice laws and practices and have had a disproportionate impact on racial minorities.

Leadership and Consensus on the U.S. Supreme Court

Abstract: For more than a century the members of the U.S. Supreme Court refrained from disagreeing with their brethren through written opinions. The Court exhibited a norm, or behavioral expectation, that limited the formal expression of conflict. Danelski's (1960) classic work on Court leadership suggests that high levels of consensus were due in large part to effective task and social leadership on the part of the chief justice. While Danelski and others have held Chief Justice Stone responsible for the transformation of the consensus norm in the twentieth century, the results of this analysis suggest that the leadership style of Chief Justice Hughes is critical to understanding the shift. Chief Justice Hughes precipitated a shift in the behavioral expectations among the justices, but the change was consolidated under the leadership of Chief Justice Stone. Other variables are explored to validate the prominent role of leadership in the decline of consensus.