In What's Law Got to Do With It?, the nation's top legal scholars and political scientists examine to what extent the law actually shapes how judges behave and make decisions, and what it means for society at large. Although there is a growing consensus among legal scholars and political scientists, significant points of divergence remain. Contributors to this book explore ways to reach greater accord on the complexity and nuance of judicial decisionmaking and judicial elections, while acknowledging that agreement on what judges do is not likely to occur any time soon. As the first forum in which political scientists and legal scholars engage with one another on these hot button issues, this volume strives to establish a true interdisciplinary conversation. The inclusion of reactions from practicing judges puts into high relief the deep-seated and opposing beliefs about the roles of law and politics in judicial work.
Author(s): Charles Gardner Geyh
Edition: 1
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Year: 2011
Language: English
Pages: 369
Tags: judges, judicial, judicial behavior, law, decision-making
Figures and Tables ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction: So What Does Law Have to Do with It? 1
Charles Gardner Geyh
PART I: Setting the Stage: The Debate over What Law Has to Do with What Judges Do
1 What’s Law Got to Do with It: Thoughts from “The Realm of Political Science” 17
Jeffrey A. Segal
2 On the Study of Judicial Behaviors: Of Law, Politics, Science, and Humility 41
Stephen B. Burbank
PART II : Distinguishing Law from Other Influences on Judicial Decision-making
3 Law and Policy: More and Less than a Dichotomy 71
Lawrence Baum
4 Law Is Politics 92
Frank B. Cross
5 Path Dependence in Studies of Legal Decision-making 114
Eileen Braman and J. Mitchell Pickerill
6 Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places:
Some Suggestions for Modeling Legal Decision-making 143
Barry Friedman and Andrew D. Martin
7 Stare Decisis as Reciprocity Norm 173
Stefanie A. Lindquist
PART III : What Law Has to Do with What Judges Do and Its Implications for Judicial Selection
8 How Judicial Elections Are Like Other Elections and What That Means for the Rule of Law 197
Matthew J. Streb
9 On the Cataclysm of Judicial Elections and Other Popular Antidemocratic Myths 223
Melinda Gann Hall
10 Are Judicial Elections Democracy-Enhancing? 248
David Pozen
PART IV: What Law has to do with What Judges Do and Its Implications for Public Confidence in the Courts
11 Judging the Politics of Judging: Are Politicians in Robes Inevitably Illegitimate? 281
James L. Gibson
12 The Rule of Law Is Dead! Long Live the Rule of Law! 306
Keith J. Bybee
13 Three Views from the Bench 328
Frank Sullivan, Nancy Vaidik, and Sarah Evans Barker
About the Contributors 343
Index 345
