Princeton University

Specialization: Judicial politics; separation of powers; rational-choice institutionalism

Tom Clark's research focuses on the interaction of political institutions. In particular, he is interested in the dynamics of judicial power and the interaction of the judiciary with other institutions, at the national and local levels. His pre-dissertation research focused on the exercise of judicial power vis-a-vis the executive. In his dissertation, Tom builds a theory of institutional hostility. The dissertation develops a new theoretical model of judicial independence which demonstrates the highly strategic environment in which Congress and the Court interact and uses new evidence to test his theoretical predictions.

M.A., Princeton University; B.A., Rutgers College

Thesis Title: The Politics of Judicial Independence

Committee: Charles Cameron; Keith Whittington; Brandice Canes-Wrone

Abstract: Building on evidence from interviews with Supreme Court justices, members of Congress, former law clerks, and legislative staffers, the dissertation develops a formal model of legislative-congressional relations. The model generates hypotheses about the relationship between congressional hostility towards the Court and judicial decision-making. The theory posits that, rather than responding to congressional preferences directly, a Court constrained by Congress should be responsive only when it perceives congressional hostility. To assess the theoretical predictions, I assemble an original dataset including all Court-curbing proposals introduced in Congress between 1877 and 2006. Empirical analyses demonstrate that Court-curbing is strongly related to public support for the Court and that judicial decision-making is constrained by congressional preferences when Congress exhibits signs of hostility toward the Court. These statistical results are then combined with evidence from archival research to provide a reinterpretation of several historical examples of Court-Congress conflict. The evidence largely provides strong support for the claim that congressional hostility is a primary determinant of Supreme Court deference to congressional preferences.

---

Link to: Personal Web site