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Consensus and Cooperation on State Supreme Courts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2021

Meghan E. Leonard  and
Joseph V. Ross
Meghan E. Leonard*
Affiliation:
Illinois State University, Normal, IL, USA
Joseph V. Ross
Affiliation:
Florida Gulf Coast University, Ft. Myers, FL, USA
*
Meghan E. Leonard, Department of Politics and Government, Illinois State University, P.O. Box 4600, Normal, IL 61790-4600, USA. Email: mleonar@ilstu.edu
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Abstract

The opinion-writing process is a vital yet understudied aspect of judicial decision making on state supreme courts. We argue that this process is influenced by the political context and particularly by institutional rules that serve to reactivate and reinforce divisions among justices, leading to less cooperation on the court. We test our theory with original data comprising all education cases decided from 1995 to 2005 in all 50 states and find evidence to support our theory. Specifically, we find that elections lead to fewer unanimous decisions and more separate written opinions, indicating that judicial elections may have a more pervasive effect on the daily work of these courts than previously thought.

Keywords

judicial behaviorjudicial politicsjudicial electionsjudicial selectionpublic law
Type
Research Article
Information
State Politics & Policy Quarterly , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , March 2014 , pp. 3 - 28
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2014

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