Context and the Court

Abstract

The Rehnquist Court is a conservative court. A number of scholars, however, have found a surprisingly stable level of support for liberal outcomes in civil liberties cases despite important changes in membership that should have made the Court even more conservative. We offer an explanation for this stability based on changes in the Court's context as measured by the direction of lower court decisions reviewed by the Supreme Court. The relative liberalism of the Rehnquist Court is explained by its reversals of conservative lower court decisions, reversals that have constituted a larger proportion of the Court's decisions in recent years. These findings present a more complex and accurate picture of the conservatism of the Rehnquist Court.