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Understanding Judicial Hierarchy: Reversals and the Behavior of Intermediate Appellate Judges

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Kevin M. Scott
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Abstract

One of the central controversies in the judicial behavior literature is the extent to which judges' ability to act according to their ideological preferences is affected by their location in the judicial hierarchy. Judges on intermediate appellate courts have different decisionmaking environments than high court judges. As a result, the goals of lower appellate court judges may differ from those of their superiors: the quest for legal accuracy may compete with the desire to pursue policy preferences. Analysis of the reversal rate of the U.S. circuit courts of appeals offers insight into the extent to which these judges balance the pressures of their own policy preferences with the desire to achieve the legally accurate result in cases they decide.

Type
Articles of General Interest
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 40 , Issue 1 , March 2006 , pp. 163 - 192
Copyright
© 2006 Law and Society Association.

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Footnotes

This article was originally presented at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association. I would like to thank Christopher Banks, Larry Baum, Chris Bonneau, Rhonda Evans Case, Lori Hausegger, Micheal Giles, Steve Wasby, and Margaret Williams for their comments and advice. I would also like to thank Michael Bailey for his advice on data analysis.

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