Tracking Public Mood in the Supreme Court: Cross-Time Analyses of Criminal Procedure and Civil Rights Cases

Abstract

Representational models of judicial decision making posit that the Supreme Court is a permeable institution, subject to external pressures-namely elite and mass opinion. Court rulings, therefore, should be demonstrably congruent with the views of the majoritarian electoral/political alliance. Building upon an innovative study by Mishler and Sheehan (1993), the relationship between public and elite attitudes and Supreme Court rulings are examined in two important issue areas: criminal procedure and race- related civil rights. The results indicate that permeability of the Court varies to some degree according to issue area. While public opinion (in the pre- Reagan years) has a direct affect on Supreme Court liberalism in both issue areas, the direct impact of elite opinion is evidenced only in the area of criminal procedure, not in the area of race-related civil rights. The relation ship between public opinion and Court liberalism during the Reagan years, however, is negative as the gap between liberalism in the public "mood" and in Court decisions has widened. These nuances in the relationship between the Supreme Court and the broader sociopolitical environment indicate that the Court does follow changes in the dominant political alliance more readily in some issue areas than it does in others.