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The Supreme Court has decided more than 50 appeals relevant to its Miranda ruling since 1966. Though not completely so, the bulk of these decisions has been to restrict the situations and behaviors for which law enforcement officials are required to give the warnings or are require to honor the response of the suspect. This chap6ter describes four cases that restricted rights in several ways, including permitting police to alter the wording of Miranda rights and permitting them to continue questioning when the defendant makes an ambiguous response regarding the desired presence of an attorney.

This chapter discusses the Supreme Court's decision-making process. Topics covered include case selection, the frequency of granting certiorari, the rule of four, the interval between granting certiorari and the oral arguments, the judicial conference, the draft opinion, the majority opinion, and announcement of the decision.

This chapter considers the cumulative cost of implementing the entire Appellate Triage regime. It argues that the courts have transformed themselves in the teeth of their enabling statute from courts of mandatory jurisdiction to certiorari courts. That is a change of major proportion. Despite the statutory guarantee, average litigants are denied a meaningful mandatory appeal heard by the judges, and instead must petition the staff to have their cases included in the select few that receive the traditional appellate treatment and the attention of the judges. The chapter also notes that the impact of the expediting devices is not class neutral; it falls disproportionately on the poor and middle class, whose appeals are deemed less momentous than the “big” cases brought by or against the government or major private economic actors.

Criminal proceedings almost always arise between the individual and the state, but when lawyers talk of public law they have civil and not criminal proceedings in mind. Public law proceedings have a particular importance, since they provide much the most important legal means of ensuring that public and governmental power is lawfully and fairly exercised. There are several different remedies which a claimant may seek in a public law action, several of which have old-fashioned Latin names: certiorari, mandamus, prohibition. If the claimant complains that he has been unlawfully detained, he may invoke a long-standing procedure to obtain a court decision, whether he has been unlawfully detained or not (habeas corpus). Or he may simply ask the court to decide what the law is, where that is in dispute.

Badrinath informs the reader that English law took two great steps towards protecting the individual from the unlawful use, both of legislative and governmental power. The first in the Anisminic case in 1969, and the second in the Tameside case in 1977. He says further that the Supreme Court of India, as constituted at present, has, by its recent several judgements and directions to governmental and civic agencies, deepened the foundations of the rule of law in a way that was never before done in India or elsewhere. The judges have achieved this by extending the power of mandamus over areas which hitherto were beyond judicial control.

This chapter provides an initial exploration of the crucial query: If the Supreme Court’s role is to solve difficult and vexing legal questions, why does it grant certiorari in cases that are ultimately decided unanimously? An examination of the pool memos from cases decided during the 1989 Term focuses on subjective case characteristics discussed routinely by the authors that provide information about the case’s certworthiness. In analyzing these memos to understand why the Supreme Court accepts cases for which it ultimately issues a unanimous opinion, some interesting findings emerge. From this investigation of the 1989 Term cert pool memos, the authors conclude that unanimous cases are those in which the justices believe it is important to clarify the law and issue a final, national ruling on a legal question of great importance.

This chapter shows through examples that during the colonial and early national periods unlawful confinement could be redressed not only through habeas corpus (e.g., constable Charles Banfild, contemnor Benjamin Whittemore, alleged slave Peter Johnson, impoverished service member George Daze) but also through other common law writs, including certiorari (e.g., contemnor Peter Pearse), supersedeas (e.g. impoverished service member Andrew Downer), prohibition, trespass, and personal replevin (de homine replegiando) (e.g. alleged slave Phebe Nung in action against owners Vincent Tarr and Lois Tarr)—or even by filing a petition without naming a specific writ (e.g., the free black woman Zipporah in “the case of the headless baby” and Elizabeth Bird on behalf of her son, apprentice John Bird).

This chapter is concerned with the history of mechanisms for reviewing judicial and administrative decisions. It begins with the writ of error, which was confined to errors on the face of the record of a court of record and therefore not an appeal as now understood. But informal methods were developed for reserving points to be discussed by all the judges of England, usually in the Exchequer Chamber or Serjeants’ Inn. Appeals in a wider sense began in Chancery and were not brought into the common-law system till 1875. The ‘prerogative writs’ of prohibition, habeas corpus, certiorari, and mandamus, enabled the King’s Bench to review inferior jurisdictions and also the exercise of power by officials and ministers. It is explained how this grew into the present system of administrative law. There is also a brief account of the rise of tribunals, and how their decisions came to be reviewable.

This chapter in Business and the Roberts Court documents the emergence of a highly specialized, elite Supreme Court bar that disproportionately represents business interests. The Court grants the petitions filed by the expert members of the bar at a significantly higher rate and they also prevail on the merits more frequently. This chapter documents the extent of the modern bar’s domination of the Court’s docket, arguments, and rulings and considers the extent to which business interests that serve as the bar’s primary clients are enjoying heightened success before the Court as a result.

This chapter addresses the methodological and procedural aspects of capital litigation. Through a historical and chronological review of legal precedent and procedural changes to capital litigation, it addresses the legacy of change and highlights the era when, due to the Supreme Court decisions in Furman v. Georgia (1972) and Gregg v. Georgia (1976), a moratorium on the death penalty was issued and the constitutionality of capital punishment was under direct judicial scrutiny nationwide. Additional attention is paid to post-Gregg decisions that have transformed capital procedure, limited or expanded its scope, or changed the legal, social, or clinical criteria upon which capital decisions can be based. The chapter concludes with a discussion on the human rights issues brought up by capital punishment in the United States, as well as implications for social workers and other helping professions working within the capital context.