front cover of The Behavior of Federal Judges
The Behavior of Federal Judges
A Theoretical and Empirical Study of Rational Choice
Lee Epstein, William M. Landes, and Richard A. Posner
Harvard University Press, 2012

Judges play a central role in the American legal system, but their behavior as decision-makers is not well understood, even among themselves. The system permits judges to be quite secretive (and most of them are), so indirect methods are required to make sense of their behavior. Here, a political scientist, an economist, and a judge work together to construct a unified theory of judicial decision-making. Using statistical methods to test hypotheses, they dispel the mystery of how judicial decisions in district courts, circuit courts, and the Supreme Court are made.

The authors derive their hypotheses from a labor-market model, which allows them to consider judges as they would any other economic actors: as self-interested individuals motivated by both the pecuniary and non-pecuniary aspects of their work. In the authors' view, this model describes judicial behavior better than either the traditional “legalist” theory, which sees judges as automatons who mechanically apply the law to the facts, or the current dominant theory in political science, which exaggerates the ideological component in judicial behavior. Ideology does figure into decision-making at all levels of the federal judiciary, the authors find, but its influence is not uniform. It diminishes as one moves down the judicial hierarchy from the Supreme Court to the courts of appeals to the district courts. As The Behavior of Federal Judges demonstrates, the good news is that ideology does not extinguish the influence of other components in judicial decision-making. Federal judges are not just robots or politicians in robes.

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front cover of Beyond Busing
Beyond Busing
Reflections on Urban Segregation, the Courts, and Equal Opportunity
Paul R. Dimond
University of Michigan Press, 2005

A compelling insider's account of the fight for educational desegregation, from one of its most dedicated and outspoken heroes. A new afterword explains the author's controversial belief that the moment for litigating educational equality has passed, clear-sightedly critiquing his own courtroom strategies and the courts' responses, before closing with an assessment of the economic and social changes that he feels have already moved us "beyond busing."

"An extraordinarily informative and thoughtful book describing the process of bringing Brown [v. Board of Education] North and the impact this process had upon national attitudes toward desegregation."
--Drew S. Days III, Yale Law Journal

"An original analysis of a tough subject. A must-read for all who care about opportunity for all our children."
--Donna E. Shalala, President, University of Miami

"Paul Dimond remains a passionate and caring voice for inner-city students, whether in his advocacy of school desegregation, school choice plans, or school finance reform. He illuminates these issues as one who participated in the major education cases and as a perceptive scholar."
--Mark Yudof, Chancellor, The University of Texas System

"A must-read for anyone who wants to understand America's continued failure to give inner-city children a quality education or to do something about it!"
--Sheryll Cashin, Author of The Failures of Integration: How Race and Class Are Undermining the American Dream

"Dimond is particularly good at relating his slice of legal history to the broader developments of the 1970s, and his occasional remarks about trial tactics are amusing and instructive. Dimond's
honesty about both his successes and failures makes his book required reading for civil rights lawyers."
--Lawrence T. Gresser, Michigan Law Review

"A fascinating first-hand account of 1970s northern school desegregation decisions."
--Neal E. Devins, American Bar Foundation Research Journal

"Dimond reminds the liberal reader of the promise that lies in the empowerment of ordinary families to choose their own schools."
--John E. Coons, Professor of Law, Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley

Paul R. Dimond is counsel to Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone, Michigan's largest law firm; chairman of McKinley, a national commercial real estate investment and management firm; and chairman or member of the board of trustees of numerous education, community, and civic organizations. He spent four years as President Clinton's Special Assistant for Economic Policy.
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front cover of The Bilingual Courtroom
The Bilingual Courtroom
Court Interpreters in the Judicial Process, Second Edition
Susan Berk-Seligson
University of Chicago Press, 2017
Susan Berk-Seligson’s groundbreaking book draws on more than one hundred hours of audio recordings of Spanish/English court proceedings in federal, state, and municipal courts—along with a number of psycholinguistic experiments involving mock juror reactions to interpreted testimony—to present a systematic study of court interpreters that raises some alarming, vitally important  concerns. Contrary to the assumption that interpreters do not affect the dynamics of court proceedings, Berk-Seligson shows that interpreters could potentially make the difference between a defendant being found guilty or not guilty of a crime.

This second edition of the The Bilingual Courtroom includes a fully updated review of both theoretical and policy-oriented research relevant to the use of interpreters in legal settings, particularly from the standpoint of linguistic pragmatics. It provides new insights into interpreting in quasi-judicial, informal, and specialized judicial settings, such as small claims court, jails, and prisons; updates trends in interpreter certification and credentialing, both in the United States and abroad; explores remote interpreting (for example, by telephone) and interpreter training programs; looks at political trials and tribunals to add to our awareness of international perspectives on court interpreting; and expands upon cross-cultural issues. Also featuring a new preface by Berk-Seligson, this second edition not only highlights the impact of the previous versions of The Bilingual Courtroom, but also draws attention to the continued need for critical study of interpreting in our ever diversifying society.
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