Public Views of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Aftermath of the Kavanaugh Confirmation

Christopher N. Krewson and Jean R. Schroedel

Social Science Quarterly, 2020, vol. 101, issue 4, 1430-1441

Abstract: Objective We analyze public views of the Supreme Court following the confirmation hearings of Brett M. Kavanaugh. Methods We distributed an online survey days after the Senate confirmed Kavanaugh's appointment. Results Supreme Court legitimacy was weak following the hearings and perceptions of legitimacy varied based on partisanship, gender, and race. However, legitimacy was not strongly related to support for Kavanaugh. Furthermore, respondents consistently ranked political characteristics as the least important attributes of a nominee. Still, those satisfied with the Senate confirmation process ranked political attributes as more important. Conclusion Our findings portend some challenges for the Court in the wake of the Kavanaugh confirmation. At the same time, Supreme Court legitimacy was only weakly tied to Kavanaugh, and legal qualities and moral character were more important to the public than a nominee's political attributes.

Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/ssqu.12820

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:socsci:v:101:y:2020:i:4:p:1430-1441

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0038-4941

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science Quarterly is currently edited by Robert L. Lineberry

More articles in Social Science Quarterly from Southwestern Social Science Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().