Justice Speaks, but Who’s Listening? Mass Public Awareness of US Supreme Court Cases

@article{Hitt2019JusticeSB,
  title={Justice Speaks, but Who’s Listening? Mass Public Awareness of US Supreme Court Cases},
  author={Matthew P. Hitt and Kyle L. Saunders and Kevin Michael Scott},
  journal={Journal of Law and Courts},
  year={2019},
  volume={7},
  pages={29 - 52}
}
We seek to measure the impact of decisions issued by the US Supreme Court on public awareness of its cases. We use a quasi-experimental design with the Court decisions as the stimulus of hypothesized public awareness change. We find that public awareness of cases varies according to individual differences: more educated, knowledgeable, and informationally motivated citizens are more likely to report awareness. Further, decision announcements increase awareness more generally, especially in… 
View on U Chicago Press
5 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
1
Background Citations
3

5 Citations

Explaining Media Coverage of Constitutional Court Decisions in Germany: The Role of Case Characteristics
ABSTRACT Research on the media coverage of decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court has revealed that the newsworthiness of a court decision – as determined by specific case characteristics – influences…
Judicial public relations: Determinants of press release publication by constitutional courts
It remains unclear what institutional characteristics determine the publication of press releases by constitutional courts. Research has revealed that courts use press releases to disseminate…
Promoted Media Coverage of Court Decisions: Media Gatekeeping of Court Press Releases and the Role of News Values
ABSTRACT The present study focuses on the effect of court press releases on media gatekeeping, a field that has remained largely uninvestigated to date. Using original data on the German Federal…
Home Style Opinion: How Local Newspapers Can Slow Polarization
Local newspapers can hold back the rising tide of political division in America by turning away from the partisan battles in Washington and focusing their opinion page on local issues. When a local…
Transparency and strategic promotion: How court press releases facilitate judicial agenda-building in Germany

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 58 REFERENCES
The Supreme Court and Local Public Opinion
Most research suggests that the mass public knows very little about the Supreme Court and, consequently, that decisions do not affect attitudes toward the Court. I argue that where there is…
The Limits of Legitimacy: Dissenting Opinions, Media Coverage, and Public Responses to Supreme Court Decisions
When the U.S. Supreme Court announces a decision, reporters simplify and dramatize the complex legal issues by highlighting dissenting opinions and thus emphasizing conflict among the justices…
The Supreme Court, the Media, and Public Opinion: Comparing Experimental and Observational Methods
Can Supreme Court rulings change Americans’ policy views? Prior experimental and observational studies come to conflicting conclusions because of methodological limitations. We argue that existing…
Sensationalism and Sobriety Differential Media Exposure and Attitudes Toward American Courts
While a great deal of research has focused on under- standing the foundations of public support for American courts, scant attention has been paid to the role of the media for such attitudes. Given…
U.S. Supreme Court Opinions and Their Audiences
This book is the first study specifically to investigate the extent to which U.S. Supreme Court justices alter the clarity of their opinions based on expected reactions from their audiences. The…
Media Coverage and Public Approval of the U.S. Supreme Court
When citizens believe the U.S. Supreme Court makes decisions in an insincere or politicized manner, their specific support for the institution can decline. The Court’s relative aversion to publicity…
Republican Schoolmaster: The U.S. Supreme Court, Public Opinion, and Abortion
TLDR
It is shown that the Court's decision did affect public attitudes but not as previous work would predict, and a theory resting on interpersonal influences to explain these results is developed, arguing that the social interpretation of events drives the differing outcomes.
One Voice Among Many: The Supreme Court's Influence on Attentiveness to Issues in the United States, 1947-92
Theory: As with other United States political institutions, the Supreme Court confers and withdraws benefits, both material and symbolic, and can under some circumstances rearrange the ecology of…
Measuring the Political Salience of Supreme Court Cases
While Supreme Court cases are generally salient or important, some are many degrees more important than others. A wide range of theoretical and empirical work throughout the study of judicial…
Elite Influence on Public Opinion in an Informed Electorate
An enduring concern about democracies is that citizens conform too readily to the policy views of elites in their own parties, even to the point of ignoring other information about the policies in…
...
...