Policy Legitimacy and the Supreme Court: The Sources and Contexts of Legitimation

Abstract

Conflicting evidence regarding the ability of the Supreme Court to confer policy legitimacy suggests that the process of legitimation is both subtle and multifaceted. Two aspects of this process are examined here First, the rela tionship between policy legitimacy and policy agreement is explored. Ex perimental tests demonstrate that policy legitimacy emerges from a direct process of symbolic legitimation, and through an indirect process of per suasive legitimation. Second, the mediated character of Supreme Court rul ings is examined as it relates to the Court's ability to enhance policy legitimacy. Experimental tests reveal that the Court's power of legitimation remains con sistent regardless of variance in the specific content of news coverage Col lectively, findings highlight the intricacy of policy legitimation while providing evidence that the institutional legitimacy maintained by the Supreme Court can produce significant shifts in policy evaluations.

Agenda Setting in the Supreme Court: The Collision of Policy and Jurisprudence

“…On the one hand, justices may wish to pursue their policy goals but find themselves constrained by legal considerations. Legal factors may lead justices to shed their policy goals in the broader aim of protecting the legitimacy of the law and the Court (Mondak 1994). On the other hand, if a justice's policy goals accord with what legal norms countenance, the law liberates justices to pursue their policy goals.…”

“…Furthermore, since the Court lacks the power to enforce its own decisions, justices must be loathe to trespass on legal norms that require adherence to certain patterns of behavior. Violating them could impugn the Court's legitimacy and provoke damaging repercussions (Epstein and Knight 1998;Lindquist and Klein 2006;Mondak 1994).…”

Explaining Processes of Institutional Opinion Leadership

“…On the other hand, experimental and quasi-experimental work on the Supreme Court's ability to move opinion has produced generally positive, if inconsistent, results. Conflicting findings have come from laboratory studies involving student samples (Baas and Thomas 1984;Hoekstra 1995;Mondak 1990Mondak , 1994, observational studies in naturally occurring contexts (Adamany 1973;Gibson, Caldeira, and Spence 2003;Marshall 1989), and quasi-experimental studies (Franklin and Kosaki 1989;Hoekstra and Segal 1996). Experimental studies suggest that under certain conditions, the Court is capable of moving opinion in the direction of its decisions (Clawson, Kegler, and Waltenburg 2001;Hoekstra 1995;Mondak 1990Mondak , 1992Mondak , 1994.…”

Actions speak louder than words : policy legitimation and the national security strategy

“…Public trust in the U.S. judiciary has not been as tarnished as it has for the executive and legislative branches (Zilis, 2015). The political capital of symbolic legitimacy thus relies upon institutional prestige and individual credibility (Mondak, 1994). Policy content is not necessarily relevant to symbolic legitimacy.…”

“…America's current crisis of symbolic legitimacy reinforces the importance of the second school of thought. Here, policy legitimation is based on substance and content (Mondak, 1994). In this dialogical construct, substantive legitimacy develops from the conversation between political actors and the public, wherein political actors justify their policy positions (Goddard & Krebs, 2015;Tjalve & Williams, 2015).…”