The Crime Conundrum by Lawrence M. Friedman George Fisher

Author:Lawrence M. Friedman, George Fisher [Lawrence M. Friedman, George Fisher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780367291082
Google: lLqQzQEACAAJ
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group
Published: 2020-06-30T03:47:47+00:00

Public Opinion about the Courts

We have been speaking in the abstract about the public's views of the trial courts. Yet there is a substantial body of public opinion research that relates to some of the issues that we raise in this essay. How does the citizenry view the courts? Are courts considered to be legitimate and effective institutions for dispute resolution and the punishment of lawbreakers? Is there any evidence that the contemporary public views the courts with increased suspicion?

In reviewing the results of public opinion polls about experiences with and attitudes toward the courts, one is immediately struck by the fact that most citizens lack direct experience with the courts. Furthermore, most citizens know very little about how courts operate. If courts are to function effectively as messengers of general deterrence, the public must have a reasonably good understanding of what happens in the courts. Yet in two major national surveys of knowledge about and attitudes toward the courts,12 people showed only modest knowledge. Nevertheless, they expressed serious concerns about the functioning of the courts. A disturbing finding was that those with the most knowledge tended to be more critical of the courts.

In terms of general support for the courts, national public opinion data collected as part of the General Social Survey over the last several decades show moderate levels of confidence in the courts.13 Support for the U.S. Supreme Court is fairly high; it is ranked above most governmental institutions. Support for other courts and the legal system in general is lower but still substantial. An analysis of responses to General Social Survey questions about confidence in courts and the legal system shows that, overall, twenty-six percent of the public has a great deal of or complete confidence in courts and the legal system; forty-seven percent has some confidence; and twenty-seven percent has very little or no confidence.

The public's major reason for dismay over the courts is the perception that they fail to identify and punish the guilty.14 Citizens seem to expect that the courts will function as crime control institutions, and many seem to resent the way in which due process guarantees interfere with crime control. The explanation for this current view of the courts may rest, not so much on the supposed deficiencies of the courts, but rather on the punitive attitudes of the citizenry.

The general public appears to have grown much more punitive toward criminal defendants. Support for the death penalty is a good proxy for punitiveness, since it is strongly and significantly related to general views about criminal punishment. A forty-year study of attitudes toward the death penalty that tracked support for capital punishment from the 1950s through the 1990s showed that endorsement of the death penalty rose dramatically over that period.15 It declined during the 1950s, hit a low of forty-seven percent in 1966, and then increased during the 1970s and 1980s. Since 1982, approximately seventy to seventy-five percent of the general population has supported the death penalty. Historically, African Americans as a

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