Today, we begin our analysis of a new subject – tracking the California Supreme Court’s experience with amicus curiae briefs. The Court more closely tracks the experience of the United States Supreme Court than of other state Supreme Courts (including the Illinois Supreme Court, as reported in our Illinois Supreme Court Review) in its
Yesterday, we demonstrated that majority opinions have been getting somewhat longer on average in criminal cases at the California Supreme Court since 2007. Today, we turn our attention to the Court’s majority opinions in automatic death penalty appeals. These two inquiries are not entirely independent; yesterday we were working with overall criminal docket data, including
For the past two weeks, we’ve been tracking trends in the length of majority opinions at the California Supreme Court. Today, we turn our attention to the Court’s criminal opinions during the years 2008 to 2015.
In the title, we ask whether majority opinions are getting longer in criminal cases. The answer is yes. As
Last week, we began our analysis of the length of the Court’s majority opinions, addressing civil and criminal cases between 2000 and 2007. Yesterday, we reviewed the Court’s majority opinions in death penalty appeals for the same period. Today, we turn our attention to majority opinions in civil cases between 2008 and 2015.
Overall, there
Last week, we began addressing trends in the length of the Court’s majority opinions, reviewing civil and criminal majority opinions between 2000 and 2007. Today, we turn our attention to the Court’s majority opinions in automatic death penalty appeals, with the data divided between non-unanimous and unanimous opinions.
As we show in Table 114 below,
Yesterday, we began our review of the length of the California Supreme Court’s majority opinions, addressing the Court’s civil opinions between 2000 and 2007. Today, we turn our attention to the Court’s majority opinions in criminal cases during the same period.
We report the data in Table 113 below. Two things are evident: first, majority
Last week, we completed our examination of reversal rates and average votes to affirm, District by District of the Court of Appeal. This week, we turn our attention to another issue: the length of the Court’s opinions. For context, the average majority opinion from the Illinois Supreme Court, the other court we closely follow, averages
For the past week, we’ve been refining our analysis of the reversal rates of each District and Division of the Court of Appeal by tracking the average votes to affirm of each District and Division before the Supreme Court. Today, we address the average votes to affirm in criminal cases between 2008 and 2015. As
Last week, we began another phase of our analysis of the standing of the Courts of Appeal in the California Supreme Court’s decision making, calculating three-year floating average votes to affirm each District of the Court of Appeal in civil and criminal cases. Today, we begin the second half of that analysis with the civil
Yesterday, we turned our attention to the average votes to affirm in civil cases the Districts of the Court of Appeal in civil cases at the California Supreme Court between 2000 and 2007. Today, we address the average votes to affirm on the criminal side of the docket during those same years.
Not surprisingly, most