The Conscientious Justice
How Supreme Court Justices' Personalities Influence the Law, the High Court, and the Constitution

Reveals how Supreme Court justices' personalities, particularly conscientiousness, influence the Law, the High Court, and the Constitution.

Ryan C. Black (Author), Ryan J. Owens (Author), Justin Wedeking (Author), Patrick C. Wohlfarth (Author)

9781316618004, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 16 September 2021

370 pages, 75 b/w illus. 30 tables
22.9 x 15.1 x 1.9 cm, 0.54 kg

'This pathbreaking book should be read by anyone interested in the workings of the Supreme Court and its justices.' M. W. Bowers, Choice

United States Supreme Court justices make decisions that have a profound impact on American society. Empirical legal scholars have portrayed justices as either single-minded or strategic seekers of policy, and there is little room in these theories for things like law, reputation, or personality. This book offers a fresh perspective that will jar Supreme Court scholarship out of complacency. It argues that justices' personalities influence their behavior, which in turn influences legal development and the United States Constitution. This impressive group of authors exhaustively examine every part of the Court's decision-making process, and focus on the trait of conscientiousness and how it influences justices over nine different empirical contexts, from agenda setting to writing the Court's opinions. The Conscientious Justice is an important and comprehensive account of judging that restructures existing approaches to analyzing the High Court.

1. Introduction
2. A theory about justices and conscientiousness
3. Measuring justices' conscientiousness
4. Conscientiousness and Supreme Court agenda setting
5. Conscientiousness and legal persuasion
6. Conscientiousness and the United States Solicitor General
7. Conscientiousness and majority opinion assignments
8. Conscientiousness and opinion bargaining
9. Conscientiousness and Supreme Court Opinion Content
10. Conscientiousness and the treatment of precedent
11. Conscientiousness and public opinion
12. Conscientiousness and recusal
13. Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Law [L], Politics & government [JP]