[EL] (no subject)

[David Adamany]

Rick:  With respect to the anonymous comment you report from a reader of your blog about the four liberal justices joining Justice Scalia in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council, which begins as follows: "Liberals don’t care about stare decisis, conservatives do."  Has your correspondent published work showing this to be true, or does he/she refer to other published work to this effect?   In addition to teaching election law in our law school, I also teach a course on the Supreme Court in our Political Science Department--a course about the Court as an institution deeply engaged in our political process.  The perspective I suggest to students is in the modern period, at least since the end of World War II and to some degree before that time, stare decisis has not had much force in guiding the Court's policy making, whether by liberal or conservative justices.   I rely principally on the "behavioral" studies of Supreme Court voting that appear in the social science literature and in some law review articles.   If there is evidence that respect for stare decisis divides along ideological lines, I'd like to revised what I teach.   Any evidence to the contrary of that assertion offered  by your correspondent?





David Adamany

Laura Carnell Professor of Law

and Political Science, and
Chancellor
1810 Liacouras Walk, Ste 330
Temple University
Philadelphia, PA 19122
(215) 204-9278

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