The Supreme Court. Thirteenth Edition by Lawrence Baum

The Supreme Court. Thirteenth Edition by Lawrence Baum

Author:Lawrence Baum
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-09-20T14:31:18.029920+00:00


Justices’ Values

There is considerable room for disagreement about the impact of the law on decision making in the Supreme Court, but it is clear that legal considerations do not fully explain the Court’s decisions. The positions of individual justices and of the Court as a whole have other bases as well.

Of those other bases for choice, the one that appears to have the greatest impact is the justices’ own values. And of those values, justices’ policy preferences are the most powerful, because justices typically hold strong views about most of the policy issues that are bound up in cases. The impact of policy preferences on decisions is widely recognized. That recognition is reflected in the attention that participants in the selection of justices give to the policy views of potential and actual nominees to the Court. It is also reflected in commentaries on the Court, which regularly emphasize the justices’ policy preferences as a basis for their votes and opinions.

Justices might act consciously to reach decisions that accord with their policy preferences. But even if justices try only to interpret the law properly, they will tend to move toward the interpretation that is most consistent with their preferences. One of Justice Felix Frankfurter’s law clerks described that process well in talking about Frankfurter:



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