3.7 Judicial Drift Measured

1. What does the Martin-Quinn score attempt to measure? The score represents how left or right the justice is by taking their votes and placing them on a scale. The more positive the score, the more right the justice is, and vice versa.

2. What trend do you notice as justices serve on the Supreme Court for many years? Justices have become more and more liberal as time goes on, and Republican justices become liberal faster than Democratic nominees.  

3. How does the Greenhouse Effect theory try to explain this phenomenon? This is also known as the Liptak Effect, but it states that justices will try not to be to left wing or right wing, in order to appeal to the majority, who are moderates, but funny enough, this makes them more liberal overtime.

4. How does the Cocktail Party theory try to explain this? This theory states that justices are likely to lean liberal in attempt to fit in with other justices. But this is usually untrue since it depends on D.C. people being liberals.

5. How might the historical reputation of a justice effect their decision making? Historically conservative justices have a bad rep, so overtime they may lean more liberal.

6. Why have conservatives been disappointed so far by Chief Justice John Roberts? He ruled in favor of the Affordable Care Act, so conservatives question his stance,

7. Of all the theories for why this occurs, which do you think is most realistic?  Why?

I have to agree with the Greehouse Effect since it is the most plausible as media plays a big role in the public's view of politicians, so it is understandable they they'll try to appeal to them.

3.6 Introducing Neil Beans

1. Where is Neil Gorsuch currently working? He is currently a judge on the federal appeal courts; he is on the 10th circuit, his home state being Colorado.

2. Why are Democrats likely to attempt to fight this nomination? They are likely to fight this because in the past, Republicans stopped Merrick Garland from taking the seat, and Democrats will probably find many faults in his pro-life views and other points.

3. How are people predicting the way he might rule on abortion cases that reach the court? He has implied that he is pro-life, and he is in support of judicial restraint and originalism (much like Scalia, really).

4. How would you describe his views on religious freedom? He is conservative about religious freedom, but he supports religious expression in public places.

5. What opinions about the role of judges does the share with former justice Scalia? He loves judicial restraint, which means he'd rather not have judges be policymakers, and also he favors the death penalty. Gorsuch also favors Congress's role in regulating interstate commerce and federalism.

6. What percentage of all federal court cases end up being decided by a split SCOTUS? Only 0.014%

7. What does that tell you about the vast majority of federal court cases? It means that most work in appellate courts does not make its way to the public view/public controversy.

8. Why do people think that Gorsuch will have an important role in swaying "swing vote" Anthony Kennedy on so many issues? Gorsuch was a clerk for Justice Kennedy, so people hope that he can persuade Kennedy to side with his view points for a 5-4 majority. :(

3.5 Outdated Court Stuff

1. Describe the way most judicial branch nominations went down in Obama's first term. During Obama's administration, he had a democrat majority, so he filled empty spaces with Democratic judges; however, he faced a lot of Republican filibustering, so of course being moderate is the way to go.

2. How did Senate Democrats change the rules for nominations in Obama's second term? Because the republicans were getting stronger and stronger, the Democrats used majority vote to filibuster opposition during the nomination of judges.

3. How did Senate Republicans respond when they gained control of the Senate in 2014? Of course, Democrats retaliated by also outlawing fillibusters in confirmation hearings, so basically it backfired.

4. How many vacancies are there in the District Court level? In April 2016, there were 72 vacancies at the District level, and then in August, about ten percent of District seats were vacant. 

5. How will the Senate Republicans' gamble pay off significantly now that Trump is the president? Well, they did two things: they made sure that Obama could only fill the seats with moderates, and then they hld off judge selection until the day Trump came into office to ensure that the judges would have the same ideology. This means more power for Trump/the Republicans of course.

6. When is the hearing on Trump's travel ban Executive Order? The emergency hearing was on January 28th at 7:30 pm. in New York.

7. What type of court would this be since it's the first time hearing the case? District Court with original jurisdiction. 

8. Who are the plaintiffs? Hameed Khalid Darweesh and Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi, both who worked in the US military in Iraq, and they are sponsored by a few large names. 

9. How is the lawsuit going to try to turn this into a "class action"? (You definitely remember what a class action lawsuit is, right?) The lawsuit will ask that the government should treat all immigrants as a class, so the ruling can be applied to all immigrants whichever the outcome.