Public Policy Commons^™

Public Trust And Confidence In The Courts: What Public Opinion Surveys Mean To Judges, David B. Rottman, Alan Tomkins

Alan Tomkins Publications

In August 1998 a comprehensive national survey added to the growing mass of information on how the public perceives the state courts. The “Perceptions of the U.S. Justice System,” commissioned by the American Bar Association, relied on telephone interviews of 1,000 American adults selected at random. The respondents were asked for their opinions about “the justice system,” lawyers, judges, law enforcement and the courts. The findings from the ABA survey were optimistic relative to most of the previous surveys. Public confidence in the courts relative to other major institutions seemed higher, and experience with courts appeared to promote higher rather …

Final Report: Nebraska Child Support Collection And Disbursement System Implementation Project, Alan Tomkins, Nancy C. Shank

Alan Tomkins Publications

In June, 1999, the University of Nebraska Public Policy Center (PPC) was asked by the Executive Board of the Nebraska Legislature to undertake a study of child support issues. Specifically, the PPC was asked to recommend how Nebraska can preserve existing strengths and reduce or eliminate weakness in its child support customer service system as the state complies with a federal mandate and develops a centralized State Disbursement Unit (SDU) for the receipting and disbursement of child support payments.

In order to learn about the strengths and weaknesses of the present customer service system in Nebraska, as well as learn …

Introduction To International Perspectives On Therapeutic Jurisprudence, Alan Tomkins, David Carson

Alan Tomkins Publications

Therapeutic Jurisprudence (TJ), a concept first conceived by law professors David Wexler (University of Puerto Rico and University of Arizona) and Bruce Winick (University of Miami) only a little more than a decade ago, has emerged as the leading conceptual perspective in the mental health law field. Indeed, a LEXIS search reveals well over 150 articles on, or citing to, therapeutic jurisprudence in American law review publications in the past decade (terms used were “therapeutic w/5 jurisprudence w/25 Wexler or Winick”).

Although initially a notion that provided an alternative to the traditional “rights” approach to thinking about mental health law …

How The Public Views The State Courts (1999 National Survey)

University of Nebraska Public Policy Center: Publications

Table of Contents:
A REPORT ON THE NATIONAL SURVEY by Frank A. Bennack, Jr., President & Chief Executive Officer, The Hearst Corporation
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
INTRODUCTION
RESEARCH METHODS
FINDINGS
TRUST, CONFIDENCE AND APPROVAL
Public Trust and Confidence in America’s Institutions
The Manner in Which Courts Handle Cases
INVOLVEMENT, KNOWLEDGE, INFORMATION SOURCES, AND THE MEDIA
Personal Involvement
Self-Rated Court Knowledge
Sources of Information Regarding News and the Courts
Media Portrayal of Courts
COURT PERFORMANCE: THE PUBLIC’S EVALUATION
Court Access
Timeliness of Courts
Equality and Fairness of Courts
Perceptions of Equal Treatment
Court Independence and Responsiveness
CONCLUSION

Agricultural Property Taxation: A Comparative Analysis, Brandon G.Y. Raddatz, Bruce Johnson

University of Nebraska Public Policy Center: Publications

The purpose of this study was to update a terminated Economic Research Service-USDA information series comparing property taxes across states. The top 25 a gricultural producing states were studied along with Wyoming since it shares a border with the focused state, Nebraska.

State departments of revenue personnel from each of the states were surveyed and tax information compiled which provided the means to update the comparative tax analysis to 1998 for 19 of the 26 states. The remaining sta tes lacked sufficient data to complete this update.

How The Public Views The State Courts A 1999 National Survey, Frank A. Bennack Jr.

University of Nebraska Public Policy Center: Publications

The survey covered four broad areas: access to the courts, timeliness of court decisions, fairness of judicial decision-making, independence and responsiveness of the courts to the public and to changing conditions in society.

The questions came at the issues from many angles, but when all the figures were totaled and all the comments considered, the courts came out just okay on average.

This conclusion is a mix of high, medium and low marks across different categories. Sometimes there was broad consensus and other times views differed widely by race, ethnic group, income and other factors.