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On the Unpredictability of the Supreme Court

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Lawrence Baum
Lawrence Baum*
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
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Extract

The United States Supreme Court today is an object of intense speculation. After two decades of anticipation by Court watchers, the Court may be ready to enter a new era in its history. Commentators debate what the new era will look like, if it does indeed develop. Will the Court reject altogether its mission of protecting individual liberties? If so, what new role will it adopt?

Because the Supreme Court is an important and intriguing institution, such speculation is understandable. But ultimately, even the most perceptive observers have a limited capacity to predict the Court's direction as a policy maker. These difficulties in prediction reflect a fundamental reality about the Court: its path is not the inevitable product of the political and social forces that shape its behavior. Rather, less systematic factors can influence the Court's path, making the Court's role as a policy maker largely upredictable.

Type
Research Article
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 25 , Issue 4 , December 1992 , pp. 683 - 688
Copyright
Copyright © The American Political Science Association 1992

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Carol Mock for her help in developing and presenting the ideas in this article. The article is a revision of a lecture sponsored by the Ohio State University Graduate School.

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