Anticipation and Retaliation: The Impact of the Supreme Court on Congressional Decisionmaking

My dissertation project contributes to the separation of powers (SOP) literature. Empirically, I examine two aspects of SOP that have received little attention in existing research. First, I conduct an empirical analysis of the hypothesis that Congress alters its decisions to pass legislation in anticipation of negative treatment by the Supreme Court in two contexts. I hypothesize that the Supreme Court constrains Congress (a) at its first opportunity to pass legislation and (b) when Congress decides whether or not to pass legislation in response to a Supreme Court opinion that it dislikes. Second, I conduct an analysis of the instances in which Congress passes responsive legislation to assess empirically the presumption that Congress is able to countermand the constitutional directives of the Supreme Court and to identify the conditions under which Congress (or the Court) enjoys the last move in these interactions.  My dissertation will improve the state of knowledge on SOP interactions by extending the consideration of strategic behavior between Congress and the Court to the stages of Congress-Court interaction that have been neglected in extant work.

This research is supported in part by a Dissertation Improvement Grant from the Law and Social Science Program at the National Science Foundation. My dissertation committee is chaired by Micheal W. Giles.  Other committee members are Randall W. Strahan and Thomas G. Walker.