POPULAR INFLUENCE ON SUPREME-COURT DECISIONS

In their 1993 article in this Review, William Mishler and Reginald She ehan reported evidence of both direct and indirect impacts of public o pinion on Supreme Court decisions. Helmut Norpoth and Jeffrey Segal of fer a methodological critique and in their own reanalysis of the data find, contrary to Mishler and Sheehan, no evidence for a direct path o f influence from public opinion to Court decisions. Instead, they find an abrupt-permanent shift of judicial behavior consistent with an ind irect model of influence whereby popularly elected presidents, through new appointments, affect the ideological complexion of the Court. In response, Mishler and Sheehan defend the direct public opinion linkage originally noted, at both individual and aggregate level; respond to the methodological critique; and offer further statistical analysis to support the aggregate linkages.