New StatPack Available

A new StatPack analyzing the opinions released through the April sitting is available for download here. This includes:

• Opinion Authors by Sitting
• Circuit Scorecard
• Decisions by Final Vote
• Frequency in the Majority
• Justice Agreement
• Justice Agreement for Non-unanimous Cases

The chart of Questions Presented has been updated to include the most recent opinions, available here.

Some notable points:

*Only one case is outstanding from the November sitting–Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts (07-591). Three cases are outstanding from December–Haywood v. Drown (07-10374); Ashcroft, Former ATT’Y Gen. v. Iqbal (07-1015); and AT&T Corp. v. Hulteen (07-543). Three cases are also outstanding from January–Coeur Alaska (07-984/07-990); Montejo v. Louisiana (07-1529); and Boyle v. U.S. (07-1309).

*Justice Anthony M. Kennedy has only authored two opinions thus far–Bartlett v. Strickland (07-689) and Negusie v. Mukasey (07-499)–but has most frequently joined the opinion of the Court. He’s dissented in just three cases–Arizona v. Gant (07-542); Ministry of Defense and Support for the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran v. Elahi (07-615); and the per curiam summary ruling in Spears v. United States (08-5721).

*Justice John Paul Stevens is winning the contrarian award so far. He’s been in the majority least frequently–32 out of 48 opinions, or 66.7%–and has the highest rate of disagreement with other justices. He’s disagreed completely with Justice Antonin Scalia and Justice Clarence Thomas in 48% of cases and with Chief Justice John G. Roberts and Justice Samuel A. Alito in 46%. In comparison, at this point in OT07, Justice Stevens had disagreed with the conservative justices in 21%-36% of cases. Justice David H.  Souter is close behind–he’s been in the majority in only one more case than Justice Stevens and has similarly high rates of disagreement with the conservative justices.