Judicial Influence: A Citation Analysis of Federal Courts of Appeals Judges

TLDR

The study estimates the influence of federal appellate judges by analyzing citations to their opinions and examines factors that explain variations in that influence. Judges are ranked by total and average citation influence, adjusted for tenure and other variables, while factors such as law school quality, demographics, prior experience, and circuit case mix are examined, and circuit-level influence is also assessed via citations to opinions within each circuit.

Abstract

This article uses citations to the published opinions of judges on the federal courts of appeals who had 6 or more years tenure at the end of 1995 to estimate empirically the influence of individual judges. We rank judges on the basis of both total influence (citations adjusted for judicial tenure and other variables) and average influence (citations per published opinion). We also analyze the effects of factors that may be relevant to explaining differences in the influence of individual judges. These factors include both characteristics of the judges (for example, quality of law school, law school performance, sex, race, prior experience, political affiliation) and characteristics of the circuit in which they sit (such as the mix of cases in the circuit). In an appendix, we use citations to the published opinions in each circuit rather than to individual judges to measure the influence of circuits rather than individual judges.