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“A Matter Of Great Importance”: Interest Groups, The Senate Judiciary Committee, And Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings, Elizabeth A. Lane, Jessica A. Schoenherr

Arlen Specter Center Research Fellowship

As Senator Arlen Specter once explained, the Supreme Court confirmation process is a “matter of great importance” to the president, the nominee, senators, and the public at large. The public cares who sits on the Court, and interest groups play a key role in disseminating information about the nominee and his or her qualifications for the job. In this paper, we focus on one piece of interest groups’ involvement in Supreme Court confirmation hearings: their decision to send senators summarized information about the nominees via briefing books. We use a combination of archival research and text analysis to examine the …