Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Jurisprudence Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 9 of 9

Full-Text Articles in Jurisprudence

Are They All Textualists Now?, Austin Peters Mar 2024

Are They All Textualists Now?, Austin Peters

Northwestern University Law Review

Recent developments at the U.S. Supreme Court have rekindled debates over textualism. Missing from the conversation is a discussion of the courts that decide the vast majority of statutory interpretation cases in the United States—state courts. This Article uses supervised machine learning to conduct the first-ever empirical study of the statutory interpretation methods used by state supreme courts. In total, this study analyzes over 44,000 opinions from all fifty states from 1980 to 2019.

This Article establishes several key descriptive findings. First, since the 1980s, textualism has risen rapidly in state supreme court opinions. Second, this rise is primarily attributable …


The Pursuit Of Comprehensive Education Funding Reform Via Litigation, Lisa Scruggs Jan 2020

The Pursuit Of Comprehensive Education Funding Reform Via Litigation, Lisa Scruggs

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.


Panel Discussion: The Right To Education: With Liberty, Justice, And Education For All? Jan 2020

Panel Discussion: The Right To Education: With Liberty, Justice, And Education For All?

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.


A Class Action Lawsuit For The Right To A Minimum Education In Detroit, Carter G. Phillips Jan 2020

A Class Action Lawsuit For The Right To A Minimum Education In Detroit, Carter G. Phillips

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.


If An Interpreter Mistranslates In A Courtroom And There Is No Recording, Does Anyone Care?: The Case For Protecting Lep Defendants’ Constitutional Rights, Lisa Santaniello Nov 2018

If An Interpreter Mistranslates In A Courtroom And There Is No Recording, Does Anyone Care?: The Case For Protecting Lep Defendants’ Constitutional Rights, Lisa Santaniello

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.


The Scrivener’S Error, Ryan D. Doerfler Jun 2016

The Scrivener’S Error, Ryan D. Doerfler

Northwestern University Law Review

It is widely accepted that courts may correct legislative drafting mistakes, i.e., so-called scrivener’s errors, if and only if such mistakes are “absolutely clear.” The rationale is that if a court were to recognize a less clear error, it might be “rewriting” the statute rather than correcting a technical mistake.

This Article argues that the standard is much too strict. The current rationale ignores that courts can “rewrite,” i.e., misinterpret, a statute both by recognizing an error and by failing to do so. Accordingly, because the current doctrine is designed to protect against one type of mistake (false positives) but …


Realism About Judges, Richard A. Posner Jan 2015

Realism About Judges, Richard A. Posner

Northwestern University Law Review

No abstract provided.


Beyond Principal-Agent Theories: Law And The Judicial Hierarchy, Pauline T. Kim Jan 2015

Beyond Principal-Agent Theories: Law And The Judicial Hierarchy, Pauline T. Kim

Northwestern University Law Review

No abstract provided.


A Typology Of Judging Styles, Corey Rayburn Yung Jan 2015

A Typology Of Judging Styles, Corey Rayburn Yung

Northwestern University Law Review

This Article calls into question the fundamental premises of models of judicial decisionmaking utilized by legal and political science scholars. In the place of the predominant theories, I offer a new approach to understanding judicial behavior which recognizes judicial heterogeneity, multidimensional behavior, and interconnectedness among judges at different levels within the judiciary. The study utilizes a unique dataset of over 30,000 judicial votes from eleven courts of appeals in 2008, yielding statistically independent measures for judicial activism, ideology, independence, and partisanship. Based upon those four metrics, statistical cluster analysis is used to identify nine statistically distinct judging styles: Trailblazing, Consensus …