The Influence of Personalized Knowledge at the Supreme Court: How (Some) Former Law Clerks Have the Inside Track

2020 ◽  
pp. 106591292094813
Author(s):  
Ryan C. Black ◽  
Ryan J. Owens
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Significant Influence ◽  
High Court ◽  
Empirical Question ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
To Come ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Law Clerks

When arguing at the U.S. Supreme Court, former High Court law clerks enjoy significant influence over their former justices. Our analysis of forty years of judicial votes reveals that an attorney who formerly clerked for a justice is 16 percent more likely to capture that justice’s vote than an otherwise identical attorney who never clerked. What is more, an attorney who formerly clerked for a justice is 14 to 16 percent more likely to capture that justice’s vote than an otherwise identical attorney who previously clerked for a different justice. Former clerk influence is substantial, targeted, and appears to come from clerks’ personalized information about their justices. These results answer an important empirical question about the role of attorneys while raising normative concerns over fairness in litigation.

Equity and certainty in contract law

Acta Juridica ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 141-176
Author(s):  
F Brand
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Contract Law ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
High Court ◽  
Contractual Relationships ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Court Of Appeal ◽  
Do So

The role of abstract values such as equity and fairness in our law of contract has been the subject of controversy for a number of years. In 2002 the Supreme Court of Appeal took the position that these values do not constitute self-standing grounds for interfering with contractual relationships. Despite this being consistently maintained by the SCA in a number of cases, some High Court judges deviated from this position on the basis that they were permitted to do so by some minority judgments and obiter dicta in the Constitutional Court. The uncertainty thus created has fortunately now been removed by the judgment of the Constitutional Court in Beadica v The Trustees for the Time being of the Oregon Trust.

Justice and Empathy

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Burt
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Individual Liberty ◽  
Economic Equality ◽  
Civil Rights Act ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
American Society ◽  
The U.S

The Supreme Court long considered its highest mission to be the protection of individual liberty from intrusion by government, but the court shifted its focus to social and economic equality. This book explores this shift and its implications, especially for the legal protection of the vulnerable. Crucial to the author's perspective is an unconventional view of the role of judges—not simply to decide disputes, but to promote a respectful dialogue leading to a genuine understanding between parties. The U.S. Constitution, through its interpretation by the U.S. Supreme Court, deals with the protection of vulnerable people in American society. It focuses on the judge not as the sole determiner of equality or protection but as a leader who, through careful observation and guidance, promotes an interactive process among the parties in order to settle the matter in an empathic, mutually respectful way. The book points out that judges are not the only actors through whom democratic values founded on empathic mutual respect and accountability can be promoted. At the center of this study is the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

scholarly journals Settlements in the Supreme Court of Israel

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 41-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Kretzmer
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
High Court ◽  
Palestinian Territories ◽  
National Courts ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Government

One of the unique features of Israel's legal, military, and political control over the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) has been the review by the Supreme Court of Israel of the actions and decisions of the authorities in those territories. Sitting as a High Court of Justice that has the competence to review the actions of all persons exercising public functions under law, the Court has entertained thousands of petitions relating to the legality of such varied actions as house demolitions, deportations, land requisition, entry permits, and establishment of settlements. There can be little doubt that the very existence of judicial review has had a restraining effect on the authorities. While the Court has not ruled against the government that often, and has provided legitimization for acts of dubious legality, such as punitive house demolitions and deportations, it has handed down some important rulings on questions of principle. Furthermore, in the shadow of the Court, many petitions have been settled without a court ruling, allowing for a full or partial remedy for the Palestinian petitioner.

High Court Recruitment of Female Clerks: A Comparative Analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court and the Supreme Court of Canada

2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 355-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin B. Kaheny ◽  
John J. Szmer ◽  
Michael A. Hansen ◽  
Katherine Felix Scheurer
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
High Court ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The U.S

Conclusion

2022 ◽  
pp. 296-317
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
National Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Same Sex Couples ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Political Selection ◽  
The Right ◽  
The U.S

This chapter summarizes the role of the U.S. Supreme Court as a national policy-making institution. As the final arbiter of law in the United States, the nine unelected justices of the Supreme Court contend their attitudes and decisions are tied to the political selection of justices. Extending the right to marry to same-sex couples through judicial means ignited a backlash in which religious groups and individuals turned to legislative solutions to contest the court's decision and its obligation to recognize marriage equality. Today, the same types of claims that once justified anti-LGBTQ laws are being used to advocate for religious and moral exemptions from laws designed to protect the dignity of LGBTQ people. With this turn back to religion, the cycle of subordination has come full circle. Future decision making from the court to extend the rights of LGBTQ citizens is directly tied to the changing composition of its members.

scholarly journals The Role of Administrative Court in Settlement Administrative Dispute of General Election.

2018 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
pp. 03006
Author(s):  
Ayu Putriyanti
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
General Election ◽  
Legal Certainty ◽  
Conceptual Approach ◽  
High Court ◽  
The Supreme Court

The Administrative Court has competence to settlement the administrative disputes. In the regulations of general election stated that election offence administrative disputes, election dispute process, adminsistrative disputes of election should be proceeded in Administrative Court, High Court of Administrative Court and Supreme Court. The existing regulations of Administrative Court do not regulates the procedural process to proceed general election administrative disputes, and the competence of Adminisitrative Court are limited. This becomes a legal gap in law enforcement and legal certainty. The issue is how the competence of administrative court to setllement the administrative dispute of general election based on the regulations.The method is juridical normative by statute approach, conceptual approach. Statute approach and conceptual approach by compared the relevant regulations.The result shows that the Administrative Court has competence to settlement the administrative dispute of general election. To give law certainty and law enforcement, the Supreme Court had legitimized some regulations to proceed the disputes settlement. The novelty is there should be a new regulation of Administrative Court consider the development and modernization.

scholarly journals The 2020 U.S. Supreme Court and Political Identity

Politeja ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (5 (68)) ◽  
pp. 217-238
Author(s):  
Paweł Laidler
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
To Come ◽  
The U.S

This article aims to determine current political identity of the U.S. Supreme Court by analyzing the process of appointment of its recent Justices and their ideology. The Author claims that ideology and politics play decisive role on Court’s jurisprudence, but that it was Anthony Kennedy’s retirement in 2018 which defined the direction of Court’s adjudication for years to come. The analysis shows important role of the President and Senate in the process of indirect interpretation of the Constitution by the appointment of Justices representing certain ideology.

LEGAL MORALISM AND THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

Legal Theory ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 91-111
Author(s):  
Richard Galvin
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Legal Moralism ◽  
High Profile ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Legal Moralist ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Or Applications

My aim in this paper is to examine the role of legal moralism in the reasoning that underlies some high profile cases decided by the Supreme Court. In so doing, I provide a sketch of a version of legal moralism that arguably addresses the most serious concerns of some of its critics. My thesis is roughly that the decisions in Bowers and Barnes are ultimately indefensible and the decisions in Loving and Lawrence are indeed correct. But despite appearances to the contrary, legal moralism is not the culprit in Bowers and Barnes, because what might appear to be instances of legal-moralist arguments in the prevailing opinions in those cases are either variants of other types of argument or applications of untenable versions of legal moralism. Further, the arguments employed by the Court in the prevailing opinions in Loving and Lawrence are at least consistent with the most plausible version of legal moralism and would have entailed that Bowers and Barnes be decided differently. Indeed, Justice Stevens's dissent in Bowers contains important parallels with the most plausible versions of legal moralism, and Justice Scalia's dissent in Lawrence relies on an implausible version of legal moralism.

A Note on Mandela v Executors, Estate Nelson Mandela 2018 (4) SA 86 (SCA) and the Conundrum around the Customary Marriage between Nelson and Winnie Mandela

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sipho Stephen Nkosi
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Eastern Cape ◽  
High Court ◽  
Nelson Mandela ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Court Of Appeal

The note is about the appeal lodged by the late Mrs Winnie Madikizela-Mandela to the SCA against the decision of the Eastern Cape High Court, Mthatha, dismissing her application for review in 2014. In that application, she sought to have reviewed the decision of the Minister of Land Affairs, to transfer the now extended and renovated Qunu property to Mr Mandela and to register it in his name. Because her application was out of time, she also applied for condonation of her delay in making the application. The court a quo dismissed both applications with costs, holding that there had been an undue delay on her part. Mrs Mandela then approached the Supreme Court of Appeal, for special leave to appeal the decision of the court a quo. Two questions fell for decision by the SCA: whether there was an unreasonable and undue delay on Mrs Mandela’s part in instituting review proceedings; and whether the order for costs was appropriate in the circumstances of the case. The SCA held that there was indeed an unreasonable delay (of seventeen years). Shongwe AP (with Swain, Mathopo JJA, Mokgothloa and Rodgers AJJA concurring) held that the fact that there had been an undue delay does not necessarily mean that an order for costs should, of necessity, particularly where, as in this case, the other litigant is the state. It is the writer’s view that two other ancillary points needed to be raised by counsel and pronounced on by the Court: (a) the lawfulness and regularity of the transfer of the Qunu property to Mr Mandela; and (b) Mrs Mandela’s status as a customary-law widow—in relation to Mr Mandela.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document