Supreme Court Impact on Compliance and Outcomes: Miranda and New York Times in the United States Courts of Appeals

Abstract

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Do Standards of Review Matter? The Case of Federal Criminal Sentencing

“…Some studies have demonstrated that measures of higher court ideology are correlated with lower court decision making (for example , Songer 1987;Songer and Sheehan 1990). However, these results are consistent both with strategic behavior and with lower courts faithfully applying precedents issued by a superior court.…”

Overruled: An Event History Analysis of Lower Court Reaction to Supreme Court Alteration of Precedent

“…Douglas 1949;Songer and Sheehan 1990). This behavior may be fairly characterized as an avoidance of precedent.…”

“…Indeed, little evidence of outright defiance has been found in the Courts of Appeals (see, e.g., Songer 1987;Songer and Sheehan 1990). Lower court judges have several options available to them as they apply Supreme Court precedent.…”

“…First, we expect that the ideological views of appeals court 7 The Court substantially modified two Warren Court overruling decisions in later cases. Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391 (1963) judges affect their behavior (Goldman 1966(Goldman , 1975Richardson and Vines 1970;Songer and Davis 1989;Songer and Sarver 1997;Songer and Sheehan 1990;Stidham and Carp 1982;Tarr 1977). We employ party of the appointing president in computing a measure of the ideological consistency of appeals court panels with Supreme Court decisions.…”

“…They can cite their own opinions in lieu of the offending precedent (Manwaring 1972). They can distinguish their case from the one for which Supreme Court prescription is available (Baum 1978;Caminker 1994;Manwaring 1972;Songer and Sheehan 1990;Tarr 1977). They can dispose of the case on procedural grounds (Canon and Johnson 1999), they can criticize the Supreme Court while following it (Tarr 1977), or they can simply ignore the offending precedent's existence.…”