- The Oxford Handbooks of American Politics
- The Oxford Handbook of U.S. Judicial Behavior
- Dedication
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- List of Abbreviations
- List of Contributors
- Appointing Federal Judges
- Appointing Supreme Court Justices
- Judicial Elections: Judges and their “New-Style” Constituencies
- Federal Judicial Tenure
- Law Clerks
- Gatekeeping and Filtering in Trial Courts
- Access to Intermediate Appellate Courts
- Agenda-Setting on the U.S. Supreme Court
- Courtroom Proceedings in U.S. Federal Courts
- Opinion Writing
- Vertical <i>Stare Decisis</i>
- Law in Judicial Decision-Making
- The Strategic Analysis of Judicial Behavior and the Separation of Powers
- Judicial Review
- The Role of Personal Attributes and Social Backgrounds on Judging
- Ideology and Partisanship
- The Economic Analysis of Judicial Behavior
- Judges and their Audiences
- Interest Groups and the Judiciary
- The Relationship between Courts and Legislatures
- Courts and Executives
- Covering the Courts
- The Supreme Court and Public Opinion
- Judicial Impact
- Cognition in the Courts: Analyzing the Use of Experiments to Study Legal Decision-Making
- New Measurement Technologies: A Review and Application to Nuremberg and Justice Jackson
- The Use of Observational Data to Study Law and the Judiciary
- Index
Abstract and Keywords
Most judges in the United States retain their judgeships through periodic popular elections. In recent years, these judicial elections have become more salient, with high-profile television advertising becoming commonplace. This chapter discusses the effects of judicial elections, particularly in an age of salient campaigning, on the choices judges make. It reviews existing findings about the influences other institutions of state government, interest groups, and the public have on judges, before discussing the effects of high-profile judicial elections on the information available to voters and the institutional legitimacy of the judiciary. Throughout, the chapter discusses the normative controversies inherent in the use of judicial elections as well as potentially fruitful avenues for future inquiry.
Keywords: judicial elections, judicial selection, state courts, legitimacy, judicial decision-making, courts and public opinion
James L. Gibson is the Sidney W. Souers Professor of Government at Washington University in St. Louis.
Michael J. Nelson is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the Pennsylvania State University.
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- The Oxford Handbooks of American Politics
- The Oxford Handbook of U.S. Judicial Behavior
- Dedication
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- List of Abbreviations
- List of Contributors
- Appointing Federal Judges
- Appointing Supreme Court Justices
- Judicial Elections: Judges and their “New-Style” Constituencies
- Federal Judicial Tenure
- Law Clerks
- Gatekeeping and Filtering in Trial Courts
- Access to Intermediate Appellate Courts
- Agenda-Setting on the U.S. Supreme Court
- Courtroom Proceedings in U.S. Federal Courts
- Opinion Writing
- Vertical <i>Stare Decisis</i>
- Law in Judicial Decision-Making
- The Strategic Analysis of Judicial Behavior and the Separation of Powers
- Judicial Review
- The Role of Personal Attributes and Social Backgrounds on Judging
- Ideology and Partisanship
- The Economic Analysis of Judicial Behavior
- Judges and their Audiences
- Interest Groups and the Judiciary
- The Relationship between Courts and Legislatures
- Courts and Executives
- Covering the Courts
- The Supreme Court and Public Opinion
- Judicial Impact
- Cognition in the Courts: Analyzing the Use of Experiments to Study Legal Decision-Making
- New Measurement Technologies: A Review and Application to Nuremberg and Justice Jackson
- The Use of Observational Data to Study Law and the Judiciary
- Index
