Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T05:09:04.582Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Separating Partisanship from Party in Judicial Research: Reapportionment in the U.S. District Courts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 June 1995

Randall D. Lloyd
Randall D. Lloyd*
Affiliation:
University of Nevada
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Previous judicial decision-making studies have used party labels as surrogates for ideological orientation. In this study of state-level reapportionment cases before the U.S. district courts, I investigate the partisan reference-group identification of judges as a nonlegal influence on decisions. The partisan identification of judges is juxtaposed with the political orientations of the legislatures passing reapportionment plans. The results suggest that partisan effects are included in the pattern of decisions in cases related to the state-level district plans. While judges tend to vote against plans submitted to them from legislatures where one political party has numerical control of the reapportionment process, they vote against plans presented from legislatures of their own party at a much lower rate than in cases where the party opposite their own controls the district drawing process. The logit model correctly predicts 89.3% of the cases and produces a 60.3% reduction of error.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 89 , Issue 2 , June 1995 , pp. 413 - 420
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aldrich, John H., and Nelson, Forrest D.. 1984. Linear Probability, Logit, and Probit Models. University Paper series on Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences, no. 07–045. Beverly Hills: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baker v. Carr. 1962. 369 U.S. 186.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berelson, Bernard R., Lazarsfeld, Paul F., and McPhee, William N.. 1954. Voting. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Born, Richard. 1985. “Partisan Intentions and Election Day Realities in the Congressional Redistricting Process.” American Political Science Review 79:305–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown v. Thomson. 1983. 462 U.S. 835.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, Angus, Converse, Philip E., Miller, Warren E., and Stokes, Donald E.. 1960. The American Voter. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Carp, Robert A., and Rowland, C. K.. 1983. Policymaking and Politics in the Federal District Courts. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press.Google Scholar
Chapman v. Meier. 1974. 372 F.Supp. 371.Google Scholar
Chapman v. Meier. 1975. 420 U.S. 1.Google Scholar
Chavis v. Whitcomb. 1969. 305 F.Supp. 1364.Google Scholar
Gaffney v. Cummings. 1973. 412 U.S. 735.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
George, Tracey E., and Epstein, Lee. 1992. “On the Nature of Supreme Court Decision Making.” American Political Science Review 86:323–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldman, Sheldon. 1966. “Voting Behavior on the United States Courts of Appeals, 1961–1964.” American Political Science Review 60:374–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldman, Sheldon. 1975. “Voting Behavior on the United States Courts of Appeals Revisited.” American Political Science Review 69:491–506.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gray v. Sanders. 1963. 372 U.S. 368.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gryski, Gerard S., and Main, Eleanor C.. 1986. “Social Backgrounds as Predictors of Votes on State Courts of Last Resort: The Case of Sex Discrimination.” Western Political Quarterly 39:528–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gunderson v. Adams. 1970. 328 F.Supp. 584.Google Scholar
Lucas v. Colorado General Assembly. 1964. 377 U.S. 713.Google Scholar
Mahan v. Howell. 1973. 410 U.S. 315.Google Scholar
Montana v. U.S. Department of Commerce. 1991. 775 F.Supp. 1358.Google Scholar
Nagel, Stuart S. 1961. “Political Party Affiliation and Judges' Decisions.” American Political Science Review 55:843–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Niemi, Richard G., and Winsky, Laura R.. 1992. “The Persistence of Partisan Redistricting Effects in Congressional Elections in the 1970s and 1980s.” Journal of Politics 54:565–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O'Shields v. McNair. 1966. 254 F.Supp. 708.Google Scholar
Olson, Susan M. 1992. “Studying Federal District Courts through Published Cases: A Research Note.” Justice System Journal 15:782–800.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Redenius, Charles M. 1982. “Representation, Reapportionment, and the Supreme Court.” Political Studies 30:515–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Republican Party of Virginia v. Wilder. 1991. 774 F.Supp. 400.Google Scholar
Reynolds v. Sims. 1964. 377 U.S. 533.Google Scholar
Segal, Jeffery A. 1984. “Predicting Supreme Court Cases Probabilistically: The Search and Seizure Cases, 1962–1981.” American Political Science Review 78:891–900.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Segal, Jeffery A. 1985. “Measuring Change on the Supreme Court: Examining Alternative Models.” American Journal of Political Science 29:461–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Segal, Jeffery A., and Spaeth, Harold J.. 1993. The Supreme Court and the Attitudinal Model. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Songer, Donald R., and Davis, Sue. 1990. “The Impact of Party and Region on Voting Decisions in the United States Courts of Appeals, 1955–1986.” Western Political Quarterly 43:317–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Songer, Donald R., and Haire, Susan. 1992. “Integrating Alternative Approaches to the Study of Judicial Voting: Obscenity Cases in the U.S. Courts of Appeals.” American Journal of Political Science 36:963–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spaeth, Harold J. 1991. United States Supreme Court Database, 1953–1989 Terms. Ann Arbor: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research.Google Scholar
Swann v. Adams. 1967. 385 U.S. 440.Google Scholar
Tate, C. Neal. 1981. “Personal Attribute Models of the Voting Behavior of U.S. Supreme Court Justices: Liberalism in Civil Liberties and Economics Decisions, 1946–1978.” American Political Science Review 75:355–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tate, C. Neal, and Handberg, Roger. 1991. “Time Binding and Theory Building in Personal Attribute Models of Supreme Court Voting Behavior, 1916–88.” American Journal of Political Science 35:460–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Toombs v. Fortson. 1965. 241 F.Supp. 65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Westberry v. Sanders. 1964. 376 U.S. 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White v. Regester. 1973. 412 U.S. 755.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.