Thomas, Ginsburg, Breyer & Alito - Smith & Pigott (Part 4 of Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output [with Charts!])

For this post, we're focusing on the judicial output of the next most senior Justices and New York Judges. Specifically, the next 4 senior Justices and next 2 senior Judges. (Because the Supreme Court has 9 members compared to the Court of Appeals' 7, we're looking at 2 additional Supreme Court Justices in this post.)

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

As is clear from Chart 1, each of the 2 New York Court of Appeals Judges authored far more majority opinions--i.e., opinions written for their Court that decided the case--than did any of the Supreme Court Justices. This is the same kind of sharp contrast that we saw with the other Judges and Justices whose judicial outputs we compared in the previous posts in this series.

In those first 3 posts, we looked at last year's opinion output of the 3 most senior members of each court. That is, Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia and Kennedy of the nation's high court; Chief Judge Lippman and Judges Graffeo and Read of New York's. (See Part 3.)

Thus far, the pattern emerging is that the New York Judges collectively wrote significantly more judicial opinions than did the Justices. This is most dramatically true regarding majority opinions. It is also generally true regarding total opinions--i.e., the sum of majorities, separate concurrences, and dissents.

The only exception seen thus far is the total number of opinions authored by Scalia. He wrote more in toto than did New York's Judge Read. Scalia actually wrote only 1/2 as many majority opinions as Read--and even less than that compared to Lippman and Graffeo. But he wrote considerably more concurrences and dissents than did Read. That raised his total somewhat above hers. Other than that, the pattern was uniform.

In this post, we're looking at the judicial output of Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Samuel Alito--the next 4 most senior Justices. And from the New York court, Robert Smith and Eugene Pigott--the next 2 most senior Judges.

What about their total opinions?

CHART 2

Again, the number of total opinions represents the sum of majority + concurring + dissenting opinions. (And as we've specified previously in this series, we're looking at the immediately preceding year at the Supreme Court and the New York Court of Appeals, from summer break 2012 to summer break 2013.)

Roberts, Scalia & Kennedy - Lippman, Graffeo & Read (Part 3 of Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output [with Charts!])

In the last 2 posts, we compared the judicial opinion outputs of Chief Justice Roberts and New York's Chief Judge Lippman, and then of Justices Scalia & Kennedy and Judges Graffeo & Read. Now let's combine those in a few charts just to make it easy to see where we are thus far in this series.
[In the next post we'll get to some additional Justices and Judges.]

First, let's look at total opinions--i.e., the sum of majority + concurring + dissenting opinions authored by each Justice and Judge. And specifically, for this series, we're looking at the immediately preceding year at the Supreme Court and the New York Court of Appeals, from summer break 2012 to summer break 2013.

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

As is clear from Chart 1, and has been clear from the charts in the previous posts, the total judicial output of the New York Judges is significantly greater than that of the Supreme Court Justices. Justice Scalia's output is an exception to the general pattern. The total number of opinions he authored is considerably greater than that of his two colleagues included here, and greater than that of New York's Judge Read.

Let's look inside these figures. Let's start with the number of majority opinions within these totals.

CHART 2

Again, the output of the Court of Appeals Judges is much greater than that of the Justices. Indeed, each of the three New York Judges considered thus far authored at least twice as many majority opinions--i.e., controlling opinions for the Court as a whole--than did any of the three Justices. Judge Graffeo, for the starkest example, wrote nearly 3 times as many majority opinions as did Chief Justice Roberts or Justices Scalia or Kennedy.

Scalia & Kennedy - Graffeo & Read (Part 2 of Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output [with Charts!])

In the last post, we compared the judicial output of Chief Justice Roberts with that of New York's Chief Judge Lippman. We saw that Lippman authored nearly twice as many judicial opinions as Roberts did last year (Aug. 2012 thru July 2013). That included more than twice as many majority opinions, and more than twice as many dissents as well.

Let's now take a look at the judicial output of the next two most senior members of each court. On the U.S. Supreme Court, that would be Justices Antonin Scala and Anthony Kennedy. On the New York Court of Appeals, that would be Judges Victoria Graffeo and Susan Read.

Let's first look at the total opinions written by each of them last year.

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

The picture is a bit less straightforward than it was when we juxtaposed Roberts' and Lippman's records. The total number of judicial opinions by New York Judges Graffeo and Read, combined, is significantly higher than that of the Justices Scalia and Kennedy combined--48 as compared to 39.

But while New York's Judge Graffeo authored the most opinions of the four, Justice Scalia came next. He wrote more total opinions than did Judge Read, as well as more than his colleague Justice Kennedy. The latter wrote the fewest of all. He authored significantly fewer opinions than did either Scalia or Read, and only half as many as Graffeo.

Let's look inside these total opinion numbers. What about looking just at opinions written for the majority. [Actually, opinions written for the Court, including the unanimous ones.]

CHART 2

As the chart shows, when considering only those opinions that garnered the support of the majority of the Court--from a bare majority to unanimous--the picture is clearer. The two New York Court of Appeals Judges each authored many more majority opinions than either of the two Justices. Judge Graffeo wrote nearly three times as many majorities as did Scalia or Kennedy. Judge Read wrote twice as many as they did.

Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output (Part 1: Roberts & Lippman [with Charts!])

(The new school year is now in full swing. [Happy to be back.] But the Saratoga meet came to an end last week. [Mild depression.]

Reviewing the meet for the Saratoga Highlights will be therapeutic [Coming later this year.] And, of course, there's always lots to study and write about courts and judges and public law that will keep me occupied and out of trouble--filling the time I'd otherwise be at the track.)

The first focus of the new academic year for New York Court Watcher will be the previous year at the Supreme Court and at New York's highest court, the Court of Appeals. And we'll start off with who's producing what. More specifically, for the first few posts, who's producing how much.

Let's begin at the center seat of the 2 high courts: Chief Justice John Roberts and Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman. Again, we're looking at last year--i.e., the year that began with last year's summer break and ended with this year's (August 2012 thru July 2013).

How many judicial opinions did Roberts and Lippman each write during that time? Take a look.

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

Yes, New York's Chief Judge Lippman authored nearly twice as many total judicial opinions as did Chief Justice Roberts during the same period of time. (We'll get to graphic breakdowns of majority, dissenting, & concurring opinions below.)

And yes, I know there's the but, but, but, and the yet, yet, yet, and the what ifs, and the did you considers, etc. If anything, however, it seems that most considerations make the contrast even more--not less--significant.

Take just one for now: their administrative responsibilities. Both Roberts and Lippman are the not only the chief judges of the courts on which they sit, but they are also the chief executives, respectively, of the federal and New York judicial branches. And--dealing with what's significant--the New York judicial branch overseen by Lippman is far larger, has far more courts and judges and staff, and handles far more cases than the federal judiciary overseen by Roberts.

(We'll deal more fully with that and other specifics later in this series.)

Notwithstanding a much greater administrative workload, New York's Chief Judge still manages twice the judicial productivity.

Let's now confine ourselves to majority opinions--actually, opinions written for the court, majority or unanimous.

CHART 2

Here, the contrast is even greater. Lippman wrote more than twice as many ruling opinions for his court than Roberts did for his.