Judicial Selection and Judicial Choice
Year: 2009
Type: article
Abstract: : The divisiveness of the lower federal court confirmation process has been the focus of extensive scholarly and popular commentary. The engine driving the controversy is the notion that who sits on the federal bench makes a difference for subsequent policy outcomes. However, little attention has been paid to whether the concerns of actors involved in the process have been borne out in the behavior of nominees who were controversial at the time of their nomination to the bench (but ultimately were successful in securing confirmation). Using data from 1977-2002 on nominations to the U.S. Courts of Appeals and the voting behavior of court of appeals jurists for the same period, here we empirically investigate whether judges who were considered more controversial during their confirmation process are more ideologically-driven in their voting behavior than other (less controversial) judges. Note: This manuscript reflects the views of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. We offer our thanks to David C. Clark, Paul M. Collins, Jr., Harold J. Spaeth, Margaret Williams and the members of the Comparative-American Workshop at Binghamton University for their thoughts on this
Authors: Kevin M. Scott, Wendy L. Martinek
Language: English
Subfield: Law
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1505873845