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The Applications Docket, Greg Goelzhauser

Georgia Law Review

The Supreme Court’s applications docket, often misleadingly called the “shadow docket” or “emergency docket,” is controversial, complex, and poorly understood. Using original data spanning nearly two decades, I unravel the docket’s empirical foundations. Applications practice changed fundamentally in recent years. Contrary to conventional wisdom, dispositions declined on average, but this conceals divergent trends: among applications involving stays and injunctions, capital dispositions decreased while noncapital dispositions increased. Moreover, noncapital applications now comprise a larger share of the docket than capital applications. This shift enhances docket salience because, as I show, most capital applications are denied simultaneous to denying plenary review, while …