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Hiding Behind The Cloak Of Invisibility: The Supreme Court And Per Curiam Opinions, Ira P. Robbins
Hiding Behind The Cloak Of Invisibility: The Supreme Court And Per Curiam Opinions, Ira P. Robbins
Ira P. Robbins
Per curiam--literally translated from Latin to "by the court"-is defined by Black's Law Dictionary as "[a]n opinion handed down by an appellate court without identifying the individual judge who wrote the opinion." Accordingly the author of a per curiam opinion is meant to be institutional rather than individual, attributable to the court as an entity rather than to a single judge The United States Supreme Court issues a significant number of per curiam dispositions each Term. In the first six years of Chief Justice John Roberts’ tenure, almost nine percent of the Court full opinions were per curiams. The prevalence …
Justice By The Numbers: The Supreme Court And The Rule Of Four-Or Is It Five?, Ira P. Robbins
Justice By The Numbers: The Supreme Court And The Rule Of Four-Or Is It Five?, Ira P. Robbins
Ira P. Robbins
INTRODUCTION:
In the early hours of April 14, 2000, Robert Lee Tarver died in Alabama's electric chair, even though four Justices of the United States Supreme Court had voted to review the merits of his case. This situation is not unique. Each year, practitioners and pro se litigants alike petition the Supreme Court without fully knowing the rules pursuant to which the Court will decide their client's, or their own, fate. The reason is that the Supreme Court operates under two sets of rules-those that are published and those that are not. The former specify This Article is based on …