I am an assistant professor in the Department of Politics at Princeton University. My main research area is judicial politics, but I have broad interests in the study of American politics. My current research analyzes the dynamics of collegial decision making on three-judge panels of the U.S. Courts of Appeals, with a particular focus on how the judicial hierarchy interacts with collegiality to influence individual judicial voting. I am also working on a series of papers that examine the role race and gender play on three-judge panels of the Courts of Appeals I have also written several papers examining the relationship between public opinion and the Supreme Court, with a focus on senatorial voting in Supreme Court nominations.
contact info
Princeton University
Department of Politics
39 Corwin Hall
Princeton, NJ 08544
609-258-8951
Curriculum Vitae
Publications
- Racial Diversity and Judicial Influence on Appellate Courts, American Journal of Political Science, 2013, 57(1):167-83.
- The Supreme Court and Percolation in the Lower Courts: An Optimal Stopping Model, Journal of Politics, 2013, 75(1): 150-68, with Tom Clark.
- Voting for Justices: Change and Continuity in Confirmation Voting 1937-2010, Journal of Politics, 2013, 72(2):283-99, with Charles Cameron and Jee-Kwang Park.
- Hierarchical and Collegial Politics on the U.S. Courts of Appeals, Journal of Politics, 2011, 73(2):345-61. Winner of the Law & Courts Section's 2009 CQ Award for Best Graduate Student Paper.
- Panel Composition and Voting on the United States Courts of Appeals, Political Research Quarterly, 2011, 64(2):377-91.
- Public Opinion and Senate Confirmation of Supreme Court Nominees, Journal of Politics, 2010, 72(3): 767-84, with Jeffrey Lax and Justin Phillips.
- The Statistical Analysis of Judicial Decisions and Legal Rules with Classification Trees, 2010, Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 7(2): 202-30.
- Case Selection and the Study of Judicial Politics, Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 2008, 5(3): 407-446, with Jeffrey Lax.
- Panel Composition and Judicial Compliance on the U.S. Courts of Appeals, Journal of Law, Economics & Organization, 2007, 23(2): 421-41.
- Using Graphs Instead of Tables in Political Science, Perspectives on Politics, 2007. 5(4): 755-71, with Eduardo Leoni.
- Predicting and Dissecting the Seats-Votes Curve in the 2006 U.S. House Election, PS: Political Science and Politics, 2008, 41(1):139-145, with Andrew Gelman and Jamie Chandler.
- The Playing Field Shifts: Predicting the Seats-Votes Curve in the 2008 U.S. House Election, PS: Political Science and Politics, 2008, 41(4):729-32, with Andrew Gelman and Jamie Chandler.
Working Papers
- My SSRN webpage
- Whistleblowing and Compliance in the Judicial Hierarchy, with Deborah Beim and Alex Hirsch. Winner of the Law & Courts Section's 2013 Best Conference Paper Award.
- When are Whistleblowers Effective? The Dual Influence of Dissent in the Judicial Hierarchy, with Deborah Beim.
- Opinion Assignment and Control of the Law on the U.S. Courts of Appeals, with Sean Farhang and Greg Wawro.
- Elite Cues and Public Support for the Supreme Courts, with Tom Clark.
- Distorting the Electoral Connection? Partisan Representation in Supreme Court Confirmation Politics, under revise and resubmit, at the Quarterly Journal of Political Science.with Jeffrey Lax, Michael Malecki, and Justin Phillips.
- Estimating State Public Opinion with Multi-level Regression and Poststratification using R, with Jeffrey Lax and Justin Phillips
Teaching
- UNDERGRADUATE
- GRADUATE