Law Commons^™

Creating A People-First Court Data Framework, Lauren Sudeall, Charlotte S. Alexander

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Most court data are maintained--and most empirical court research is conducted--from the institutional vantage point of the courts. Using the case as the common unit of measurement, data-driven court research typically focuses on metrics such as the size of court dockets, the speed of case processing, judicial decision-making within cases, and the frequency of case events occurring within or resulting from the court system.

This Article sets forth a methodological framework for reconceptualizing and restructuring court data as "people-first"-centered not on the perspective of courts as institutions but on the people who interact with the court system. We reorganize case-level …

Chief Judges: The Limits Of Attitudinal Theory And Possible Paradox Of Managerial Judging, Tracey E. George, Albert H. Yoon

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Chief judges wield power. Among other things, they control judicial assignments, circulate petitions to their colleagues, and manage internal requests and disputes. When exercising this power, do chiefs seek to serve as impartial court administrators or do they attempt to manufacture case outcomes that reflect their political beliefs? Because chiefs exercise their power almost entirely outside public view, no one knows. No one sees the chief judge change the composition of a panel before it is announced or delay consideration of a petition for en banc review or favor the requests of some colleagues while ignoring those of others. Chiefs …

Values As Variables In Judicial Decision-Making: Notes Toward A Theory, David I. Danelski

Vanderbilt Law Review

The concept of values is central to the explanation of judicial decision-making. Indeed, Clark L. Hull has gone so far as to say that any fairly detailed and sound dynamic theory of behavior must contain an empirical theory of values. Although students of judicial behavior have used values, or some equivalent concept, in their studies, there has been as yet no thorough, systematic exploration of values with a view toward using it as the central concept in building an empirical theory of judicial decision-making. This paper is a modest step in that direction. It is not, however, a presentation of …