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Daily Archives: January 2, 2017

Paper – Do Law Clerks Influence Voting on the Supreme Court?

Bonica, Adam and Chilton, Adam S. and Goldin, Jacob and Rozema, Kyle and Sen, Maya, Do Law Clerks Influence Voting on the Supreme Court? (December 16, 2016). Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2815545

“We study the influence of law clerk ideology on Supreme Court voting. To do so, we exploit the timing of hiring to link variation in clerk ideology to variation in voting, and we measure ideology by matching clerks to their political donations. We document a positive and statistically significant effect of clerk ideology on judicial voting. Our results suggest that a justice would cast approximately 4% more conservative votes in a term when employing his or her most conservative clerks, as compared to a term in which the justice employs his or her most liberal clerks. We find larger effects in cases that are higher profile, cases that are legally significant, and cases in which the justices are more evenly divided. We interpret our results as providing suggestive evidence that clerk influence operates through persuasion rather than delegation of decision-making responsibility.”

House Republicans diminish role and power of Office of Congressional Ethics – updated

Less than a day after my post and The Hill reports – House GOP scraps plan to gut ethics watchdog after emergency meeting – “House Republicans abruptly withdrew a proposal to weaken an independent ethics watchdog on Tuesday, in a rocky start to the new Congress.” New York Times – “House Republicans, defying their top… Continue Reading

CRS – An Introduction to Judicial Review of Federal Agency Action

Via FAS – An Introduction to Judicial Review of Federal Agency Action, Jared P. Cole, Legislative Attorney. December 7, 2016. “The U.S. Constitution vests the judicial power in the Supreme Court and any inferior courts established by Congress, limiting the power of federal courts to the context of “cases” or “controversies.” Pursuant to constitutional and… Continue Reading

Gallup’s Top World Findings of 2016

Julie Ray – “In 2016, Gallup published global reports and articles on what people in more than 140 countries are thinking and feeling. Through its World Poll, Gallup systematically tracks and reports on well-being, leadership approval ratings, confidence in national institutions, employment rates and other important issues affecting people’s daily lives. The following list includes… Continue Reading

Book Review – Caught: The Prison State and the Lockdown of American Politics

Jochnowitz, Leona Deborah and Ford, Julia A., Book Review – Caught: The Prison State and the Lockdown of American Politics (December 27, 2016). Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2890524 “The 71st and 72nd 2015 and 2016 annual meetings of the American Society of Criminology (ASC) in Washington, D.C. and New Orleans focused on themes of… Continue Reading

Paper – Social Rights and the Function of Employing Entities

McGaughey, Ewan, Social Rights and the Function of Employing Entities (October 28, 2016). Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, Forthcoming; King’s College London Law School Research Paper No. 2017-03. Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2860685 “In The Concept of the Employer (2015) Jeremias Prassl develops an elegant model to find who bears labour and employment law… Continue Reading

Pew – Online Shopping and E-Commerce

New technologies are impacting a wide range of Americans’ commercial behaviors, from the way they evaluate products and services to the way they pay for the things they buy: “Americans are incorporating a wide range of digital tools and platforms into their purchasing decisions and buying habits, according to a Pew Research Center survey of… Continue Reading

New on LLRX – Prison Affected People: Punished to the Margins of Life

Via LLRX.com – Prison Affected People: Punished to the Margins of Life “Ken Strutin’s expansive scholarship, acumen, commitment to and comprehensive knowledge of criminal law and justice is fully articulated and shared in his new guide. He robustly argues and supports his reasoning that retribution is at odds with medical reality for conviction alone and… Continue Reading