CONSENSUAL NORMS AND THE FRESHMAN EFFECT ON THE UNITED-STATES-SUPREME-COURT

Objective. Under the leadership of Chief Justices Taft and Hughes, Sup reme Court justices were socialized in the ''no dissent unless necessa ry'' tradition. As a result, few separate opinions were written betwee n 1921 and 1940. Since 1941, however, there has been a decline of cons ensual norms in the Supreme Court. This decline has been accompanied b y diminished opportunities for socialization into the work of the Cour t. The purpose of this research is to determine if these factors are s ignificantly related to the behavior of freshman justices. Methods. Th is research analyzes the proportion of separate opinions written by fr eshman justices for the period 1921-92. Specifically, the proportions of separate opinions written by freshman and senior justices are compa red for the time periods of 1921-40 and 1941-92. Results. While no dif ferences were found to exist between the proportion of separate opinio ns written by freshman and senior justices of the earlier time period, a systematic difference was found between freshman and senior separat e opinion writing in the later time period. Conclusions. This finding is consistent with the existence of the freshman effect. The most plau sible and apparent reason for this disparity is the difficulty that fr eshmen have adjusting to the Court's workload.