Congressional Committees and the Federal Courts: A Neo-Institutional Perspective

1992 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 949 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark C. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Federal Courts ◽  
Institutional Perspective ◽  
Congressional Committees

Courts, Agencies, and Congressional Committees: A Neo-Institutional Perspective

1993 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 471-489 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark C. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Federal Agency ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
The Other ◽  
Court Decisions ◽  
Institutional Perspective ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Congressional Committees ◽  
Judiciary Committee ◽  
Oriented Energy ◽  
Do So

Based on over 75 personal interviews with members of Congress and their staffs, this article examines how three House authorization committees differ in their reactions to federal court decisions versus their reactions to federal agency decisions. In general, Congress holds the courts in higher esteem than it does the agencies. The courts are generally seen as less political than the agencies, and committee reactions to court decisions are seen as much more unusual than reactions to agency decisions. The attitudes of the three committees toward decisions of the other institutions vary in ways consonant with their institutional roles, the committees' political cultures, and the primary goals of the committee members. The domination of lawyer members on the policy oriented Judiciary Committee results in that committee being the most deferential to the courts. The constituency focused Interior Committee is oriented to local interests and members' reelection goals, and it responds to the courts or to agencies only when constituency pressures force it to do so. The power oriented Energy and Commerce Committee treats the courts and the agencies just like any other political actors.

The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights under the 2010 Constitutional Dispensation

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-226
Author(s):  
Bonolo Ramadi Dinokopila ◽  
Rhoda Igweta Murangiri
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
National Commission ◽  
Bill Of Rights ◽  
Institutional Perspective ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
National Human ◽  
The Status ◽  
Protection Of Human Rights

This article examines the transformation of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR) and discusses the implications of such transformation on the promotion and protection of human rights in Kenya. The article is an exposition of the powers of the Commission and their importance to the realisation of the Bill of Rights under the 2010 Kenyan Constitution. This is done from a normative and institutional perspective with particular emphasis on the extent to which the UN Principles Relating to the Status of National Institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights (the Paris Principles, 1993) have been complied with. The article highlights the role of national human rights commissions in transformative and/or transitional justice in post-conflict Kenya. It also explores the possible complementary relationship(s) between the KNCHR and other Article 59 Commissions for the better enforcement of the bill of rights.

Appeals by the Prosecution

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nancy J. King ◽  
Michael Heise
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Work ◽  
The United States ◽  
National Sample ◽  
Federal Courts ◽  
Court Of Appeals ◽  
High Courts ◽  
Extensive Information ◽  
State High Courts ◽  
State Prosecutors ◽  
Rate Of Success

Scholarly and public debates about criminal appeals have largely taken place in an empirical vacuum. This study builds on our prior empirical work exploring defense-initiated criminal appeals and focuses on criminal appeals by state and federal prosecutors. Exploiting data drawn from a recently released national sample of appeals by state prosecutors decided in 2010, as well as data from all appeals by federal prosecutors to the United States Court of Appeals terminated in the years 2011 through 2016, we provide a detailed snapshot of non-capital, direct appeals by prosecutors, including extensive information on crime type, claims raised, type of defense representation, oral argument and opinion type, as well judicial selection, merits review, and relief. Findings include a rate of success for state prosecutor appeals about four times greater than that for defense appeals (roughly 40% of appeals filed compared to 10%). The likelihood of success for state prosecutor-appellants appeared unrelated to the type of crime, claim, or defense counsel, whether review was mandatory or discretionary, or whether the appellate bench was selected by election rather than appointment. State high courts, unlike intermediate courts, did not decide these appeals under conditions of drastic asymmetry. Of discretionary criminal appeals reviewed on the merits by state high courts, 41% were prosecutor appeals. In federal courts, prosecutors voluntarily dismissed more than half the appeals they filed, but were significantly less likely to withdraw appeals from judgments of acquittal and new trial orders after the verdict than to withdraw appeals challenging other orders. Among appeals decided on the merits, federal prosecutors were significantly more likely to lose when facing a federal defender as an adversary compared to a CJA panel attorney.

The Certainty of the Legal Status of Court Secretary and Court Clerk in Federal Courts

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 26-34
Author(s):  
E. V. Gerasenko ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Russian Federation ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
System Analysis ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Federal Courts ◽  
Scientific Methods ◽  
Level Of Education ◽  
Additional Qualification ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Russian Federation

Employees of the federal courts' apparatus, in accordance with the current regulations, are public civil servants. In practice and in existing scientific research there is an approach to determining the legal status of this category of public servants through their duties, without specifying the specific requirements for candidates for the position to be filled. The purpose of this study is to define additional qualification requirements to be imposed on the applicant for the position of State Civil Service «Court Secretary» in court, in addition to those contained in the Federal Law «On State Civil Service of the Russian Federation» and orders of the Judicial Department of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation. The tasks of this work are to study the theoretical foundations of the concept of «status of a State civil servant », to compare federal legislation, decrees of the President of the Russian Federation, decisions and other acts of ministries and departments in the field of the State civil service in the apparatus of federal courts; Justification for the need to include in the status of a public servant serving in the court apparatus additional requirements for the level of education. The methodological basis of the present study was the general scientific methods such as analogy, derivation, system analysis, as well as the private scientific methods: formal-logical, technical-legal and comparativelegal in their various combinations. The study concluded that it was necessary to distinguish the status of federal court staff according to the level of education required to replace a public civil service post, in particular the «Registrar of the Court».

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