Doctoral Dissertation Research: Placing Federal District Courts in the Judicial Hierarchy

作为初审法院，联邦地区法院是联邦司法系统中诉讼当事人的第一个，而且在许多情况下是唯一的司法机构。然而，我们对这些重要法院的业务的了解相当有限。作为其三篇论文的总和，本论文项目旨在弥补这一缺陷，并发掘出前所未有的证据，证明联邦地区法院在司法体系中的作用和地位。特别是，本研究统计模型(1)上诉法院对地方法院结果的直接影响；（二）败诉的当事人？从地区法院向上诉法院提出上诉的决定，以及基于该上诉的上诉结果；(3)联邦地区法院对案件的初步处理，特别关注主持案件的法官的性别和案件和解的可能性。为这个项目收集的数据有望成为有史以来在这个主题上最全面的数据之一。通过收集和编码多年来，30个地区法院和众多问题领域的数千个案件摘要、意见和其他法院文件，这些文件加起来约占联邦地区法院民事摘要的40%，本研究改进了以前的研究，这些研究通常只依赖于发表或报道的意见、少数地区法院和有限的问题领域。这些数据与法官和诉讼当事人的具体信息相结合，为法律的发展、当事人的策略、法官的管理作用以及中级上诉法院的影响提供了前所未有的见解。

As trial courts, federal district courts are the first, and in many cases the only, face of justice for litigants in the federal judicial system. And yet, our knowledge of the business of these important courts is quite limited.Viewed as the sum of its three essays, this dissertation project seeks to remedy this deficit and unearth an unprecedented degree of evidence on the role and place of federal district courts in the judicial hierarchy. In particular, this research statistically models (1) the direct impact that courts of appeals have on district court outcomes; (2) the losing litigant?s decision to appeal from district courts to courts of appeals and the resulting appellate outcome based on that appeal; and (3) the initial disposition of cases in federal district courts, with a specific focus on the sex of the judge presiding over the case and the likelihood of case settlement.The data collected for this project promise to be some of the most comprehensive ever amassed on the subject. By collecting and coding thousands of case dockets, opinions, and other court documents across multiple years, thirty district courts, and numerous issues areas that together account for about forty percent of federal district court civil dockets, this research improves on previous studies that generally rely on only published or reported opinions, a small number of district courts, and a limited set of issue areas. These data are combined with judge and litigant specific information, providing unprecedented insights into the development of law, the strategies of parties, the managerial role of judges, and the influence of intermediate appellate courts.