Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-ndmmz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-02T09:03:15.234Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

New Measures of Judges’ Caseload for the Federal District Courts, 1964–2012

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 October 2022

Philip Habel  and
Kevin Scott
Philip Habel*
Affiliation:
University of Glasgow
Kevin Scott
Affiliation:
Administrative Office of the US Courts
*
Contact the author at philiphabel@gmail.com.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Over the past 30 years many observers of the federal courts have expressed concern over mounting dockets, arguing that the taxing workloads for federal judges could have a variety of negative consequences, including difficulties in judicial recruitment and retention. However, assessing the plausibility of those and similar claims requires the use of appropriate measures of judges’ workload. We introduce scholars and practitioners to new measures of caseload for the district courts available from 1964 through 2012. We detail the methodology for constructing our measures and then assess changes in caseload over time, both within and across courts. We argue that, in most cases, the preferred measure of caseload incorporates weighted filings and accounts for the service of senior status judges and vacancies. We conclude by pointing scholars toward additional research avenues that can be undertaken with our publicly available data.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Law and Courts , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , Spring 2014 , pp. 153 - 170
Copyright
© 2014 by the Law and Courts Organized Section of the American Political Science Association. All rights reserved.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Data referenced in this project are publicly available through Harvard University’s Dataverse Network and the University of South Carolina’s Judicial Research Initiative (JuRI) collection. A previous version of this article was presented at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, April 2012. The authors thank Laura Hatcher, Sheldon Goldman, and Christina Boyd for their comments on earlier versions. We thank Daniel Bennett, Dustin Heap, Lia Rohr, and Kyle Dvorak for research assistance. The views expressed here represent the opinions of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Administrative Office of the US Courts.

References

Baker, Thomas E. 2006. “Applied Freakonomics: Explaining the ‘Crisis of Volume.’” Journal of Appellate Practice and Process 8:101–14.Google Scholar
Barrow, Deborah J., and Zuk, Gary. 1990. “An Institutional Analysis of Turnover in the Lower Federal Courts, 1900–1987.” Journal of Politics 52:457–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Binder, , Sarah, , and Maltzman, Forrest. 2009. Advice and Dissent: The Struggle to Shape the Federal Judiciary. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.Google Scholar
Boylan, Richard T. 2004. “Do the Sentencing Guidelines Influence the Retirement Decisions of Federal Judges?” Journal of Legal Studies 33:231–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burbank, Stephen B., Jay Plager, S., and Ablavsky, Gregory. 2012. “Leaving the Bench, 1970–2009: The Choices Federal Judges Make, What Influences Those Choices, and Their Consequences.” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 161:1–102.Google Scholar
Gillespie, Robert W. 1974. “Measuring the Demand for Court Services: A Critique of the Federal District Courts Case Weights.” Journal of the American Statistical Association 69:38–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Government Accountability Office. 2003. The General Accuracy of the Case-Related Workload Measures Used to Assess the Need for Additional District Court and Courts of Appeals Judgeships. GAO Publication no. GAO-03-788R. Washington, DC: Government Accountability Office.Google Scholar
Hansford, Thomas G., Savchak, Elisha Carol, and Songer, Donald R.. 2010. “Politics, Careerism, and the Voluntary Departure of U.S. District Court Judges.” American Politics Research 38:986–1014.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lombard, , Patricia, , and Krafka, Carol. 2005. “2003–2004 District Court Case-Weighting Study.” http://www.fjc.gov/public/pdf.nsf/lookup/CaseWts0.pdf/$file/CaseWts0.pdf.Google Scholar
Newman, Jon O. 1989. “Restructuring Federal Jurisdiction: Proposals to Preserve the Federal Judicial System.” University of Chicago Law Review 56:761–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Scannlain, Diarmuid E. 2009. “Striking a Devil’s Bargain: The Federal Courts and Expanding Caseloads in the Twenty-First Century.” Lewis and Clark Law Review 13:473–83.Google Scholar
Posner, Richard A. 1985. The Federal Courts: Crisis and Reform. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Posner, Richard A. 2006. “Demand and Supply Trends in Federal and State Courts over the Last Half Century.” Journal of Appellate Practice and Process 8:133–40.Google Scholar
Spriggs, James F., and Wahlbeck, Paul J.. 1995. “Calling It Quits: Strategic Retirements on the Federal Court of Appeals, 1893–1991.” Political Research Quarterly 48:573–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vining, Richard L. 2009a. “Judicial Departures and the Introduction of Qualified Retirement, 1892–1953.” Justice System Journal 30:139–57.Google Scholar
Vining, Richard L. 2009b. “Politics, Pragmatism, and Departures from the U.S. Courts of Appeals, 1954–2004.” Social Science Quarterly 90:834–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wheeler, Russell. 2012. “Judicial Nominations and Confirmations after Three Years—Where Do Things Stand?” Governance Studies, Brookings Institution, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Yoon, Albert. 2003. “Love’s Labor’s Lost? Judicial Tenure among Federal Court Judges, 1945–2000.” California Law Review 41:1029–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yoon, Albert. 2005. “As You Like It: Senior Federal Judges and the Political Economy of Judicial Tenure.” Journal of Empirical Legal Studies 2:495–549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar