The Briefing Room
General Category => National/Breaking News => SCOTUS News => Topic started by: Elderberry on June 29, 2019, 03:03:05 am
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SCOTUSblog by Adam Feldman 6/28/2019
The Supreme Court term is now complete, resolving cases that had generated months of speculation. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote majority opinions in two of the most anticipated decisions of the term, Department of Commerce v. New York and Rucho v. Common Cause, bringing his total majority-opinion authorship count to seven. Other justices wrote six to eight majority opinions each. The justice who wrote the most total opinions this term was Justice Clarence Thomas with 28, including eight majority opinions, 14 concurrences and six dissents.
With Justice Brett Kavanaugh joining the Supreme Court in October, much of the discussion this term has centered on how the new justice would fit in on the court and mesh with the other sitting justices. If finding agreement was his goal, Kavanaugh seems to have done an effective job. Kavanaugh had the highest frequency in the majority of the justices, at 91 percent. Roberts was second highest at 85 percent. Kavanaugh and Roberts also shared the highest agreement level for any justice pairing this term, at 94 percent. The second-highest agreement level was between Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor, who agreed in 93 percent of their votes.
While Kavanaugh shared high agreement levels with several of the other more conservative justices on the Supreme Court, his agreement levels with some of the more liberal justices were on the high side as well. Kavanaugh’s votes aligned with Justice Samuel Alito’s 91 percent of the time and his agreement level with Thomas was at 80 percent. Below this, Kavanaugh agreed equally often with Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Neil Gorsuch, at 70 percent apiece. Kavanaugh’s agreement level with Gorsuch was on the very low end of the scale when we look at agreement levels between two justices appointed by the same president in their first full term together over the last half century.
More: https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/06/final-stat-pack-for-october-term-2018/#more-287709 (https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/06/final-stat-pack-for-october-term-2018/#more-287709)