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A Positive Political Model of Supreme Court Economic Decisions
Author(s) -
Caporale Tony,
Wintert Harold
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
southern economic journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.762
H-Index - 58
eISSN - 2325-8012
pISSN - 0038-4038
DOI - 10.1002/j.2325-8012.2002.tb00447.x
Subject(s) - supreme court , politics , institution , law , inflation (cosmology) , majority opinion , supreme court decisions , political science , economics , physics , theoretical physics
We develop a positive political model of the U.S. Supreme Court. Looking at the Court's economic cases for the period 1953‐1993, we find a significant larger fraction of conservative decisions under Republican presidents and more conservative leadership of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. Conservative decisions are also found to be positively correlated with the fraction of the Court appointed by Republican presidents and the rate of price inflation. We argue that our findings cast serious doubt on the common view of the Supreme Court as a completely independent, apolitical institution.