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Full-Text Articles in Judges
Diversity, Deliberations, And Judicial Opinion Writing., Susan B. Haire, Laura P. Moyer, Shawn Treier
Diversity, Deliberations, And Judicial Opinion Writing., Susan B. Haire, Laura P. Moyer, Shawn Treier
Faculty Scholarship
Underlying scholarly interest in diversity is the premise that a representative body contributes to robust decision-making processes. Using an innovative measure of opinion content, we examine this premise by analyzing deliberative outputs in the US courts of appeals (1997-2002). While the presence of a single female or minority did not affect the attention to issues in the majority opinion, panels composed of a majority of women or minorities produced opinions with significantly more points of law compared to panels with three Caucasian males.
Rethinking Critical Mass In The Federal Appellate Courts., Laura Moyer
Rethinking Critical Mass In The Federal Appellate Courts., Laura Moyer
Faculty Scholarship
This article draws from critical mass studies of gender in other political institutions to inform an application to the US Courts of Appeals. The results demonstrate the utility of considering court-level aspects of diversity. As mixed-sex panels become more common within a circuit, both male and female judges increasingly support plaintiffs in civil rights claims, though the magnitude of the effect is larger for women. The presence of a female chief judge is also positively associated with pro-plaintiff decisions by men and women in sex discrimination cases.
Judicial Attention As A Scarce Resource: A Preliminary Defense Of How Judges Allocate Time Across Cases In The Federal Courts Of Appeals, Marin K. Levy
Faculty Scholarship
Federal appellate judges no longer have the time to hear argument and draft opinions in all of their cases. The average annual filing per active judgeship now stands at 330 filed cases per year — more than four times what it was sixty years ago. In response, judges have adopted case management strategies that effectively involve spending significantly less time on certain classes of cases than on others. Various scholars have decried this state of affairs, suggesting that the courts have created a “bifurcated” system of justice with “separate and unequal tracks.” These reformers propose altering the relevant constraints of …