SGER: Money, Politics, and the Legitimacy of State Supreme Courts: The Impact of Recusals and Disqualifications

由于州高等法院法官的政治化选举，这些法院的合法性变得越来越脆弱。在最近的许多事态发展中，最具威胁性的是利益冲突(真实和明显的)，当那些在法院提起诉讼的人正是在竞选期间向法官捐款的个人和机构时，就会出现这种冲突。许多人认为，这种贡献从根本上破坏了选举产生的法院的合法性。在任何情况下，这种冲突都比不上西弗吉尼亚州最高上诉法院做出的卡伯顿诉梅西一案更严重，美国最高法院已经批准了移审令。此案涉及推翻下级法院对梅西的5000万美元判决的关键投票，该判决是由一名法官做出的，这名法官在前一次司法选举中从梅西一方获得了大量竞选捐款。在此背景下，我们在这个项目中的目标包括：(1)确定西弗吉尼亚州最高上诉法院拥有多大的合法性；(2)评估这种合法性是否受到竞选捐款争议的影响；(3)调查捐款问题是否只玷污了牵涉的司法，或者是否产生了更普遍的制度后果；(4)确定上诉是否恢复了违规的司法；(5)测试关于竞选捐款的特定属性的假设，这些假设影响了人们对司法公正的看法，从而影响了法院的合法性；(6)在法院预期理论的背景下进行所有这些分析，该理论承认一些公民已经开始期望司法机构以合理的意识形态方式行事；以及(7)调查美国最高法院的干预是否通过“合法性授予”程序影响了人们对西弗吉尼亚州最高上诉法院的看法。这个项目是基于对西弗吉尼亚州居民的两波小组调查。

The legitimacy of state high courts has become increasingly fragile as a result of politicized elections for the judges sitting on these courts. One of the most threatening of the many recent developments is conflicts of interest (real and apparent) that arise when those litigating before a court are the very same individuals and institutions contributing money to the judges during their election campaigns. Many believe that such contributions fundamentally undermine the legitimacy of elected courts. In no instance is this conflict more severe than in the case of Caperton v Massey, a decision from the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeal, to which the U.S. Supreme Court has granted certiorari. This case involves a crucial vote to overturn a $50,000,000 lower court judgment against Massey by a justice who received large campaign contributions from the Massey side during the preceding judicial election. Using this context, our goals in this project include: (1) determining how much legitimacy the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeal enjoys; (2) assessing whether that legitimacy is affected by the campaign contribution controversy; (3) investigating whether the contribution issue taints only the implicated justice or whether more general institutional consequences arise; (4) determining whether recusals rehabilitate an offending justice; (5) testing hypotheses about the specific attributes of campaign contributions that influence perceptions of judicial impartiality, and hence of the legitimacy of courts; (6) conducting all of this analysis within the context of an expectancy theory of courts that recognizes that some citizens have come to expect that the judiciary should act in a reasonably ideological fashion; and (7) investigating whether the intervention of the U.S. Supreme Court affects perceptions of the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeal via "legitimacy conferring" processes. This project is based upon a two-wave panel survey of the residents of West Virginia.