Research

My research agenda focuses on explaining how external actors influence politics in judicial systems. Take a look at what I’ve been up to below!

Curriculum Vita

Book Manuscript:

The Gatekeeping Role of the Office of the Solicitor General at the Certiorari Stage”

One of the most important legal organizations in the United States is the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG). The OSG represents the federal government’s interests in federal litigation proceedings with the unique power to intervene and offer the government’s position on an issue even when the government is not a party to the case. In many ways, the OSG operates as would any other lawyer, its goal is to achieve the best outcome for its client. Due to its presidentially appointed status, the OSG finds itself tasked with maintaining both the short-term interests of the current presidential administration and the long-term interests of the United States government. Previous scholarship established the close advisory relationship between the Supreme Court and the OSG but this relationship is not infallible and shifts over time. My project further investigates this connection by evaluating the gatekeeping role the OSG plays at the certiorari stage before the Supreme Court—especially their negative agenda setting power.

By viewing the OSG as a legal mobilization actor, and one involved in the public policy process more generally, we can understand the OSG and the use of its power in new ways. I argue the OSG is not only a political gatekeeper, but a doctrinal gatekeeper. Using a novel dataset of briefs filed by the OSG at the certiorari stage (both granted and denied) coded for substantive policy content, I evaluate what types of cases the OSG supports and opposes over time (1988-2019.) Employing a text-as-data approach, I evaluate the legal strategies employed when the OSG is in a defensive vs. an offensive position.

Peer-Reviewed Articles:

Bird, Christine, Rachael Houston, and Marcy Shieh, 2024, “From Ads to Action: Exploring the Impact of Interest Group Supreme Court Confirmation Advertisements” (Forthcoming at Political Research Quarterly)

Abstract: Contemporary confirmation processes capture nationwide public attention, infiltrating the realms of social media and reality television. Interest groups capitalize on the opportunity to influence confirmations and invest millions in advertising expressing positions on nominees. We examines the impact of interest-group-produced advertisements on political behavior, specifically in the form of calls to action. Calls to action encompass donation behavior, contacting senators, and interacting with advertisements on social media. By analyzing real advertisements created to influence the public on the nominations of Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson’s, we discover these advertisements indeed influence individuals’ political behavior. Specifically, we find forced exposure, name recognition, partisan congruence, and positive tone are all positively associated with a respondent’s willingness to engage in interest groups’ calls to action. Moreover, negative tone advertisements decrease the likelihood of engagement. This article provides an in-depth analysis of the role confirmation advertisements play in shaping political behavior around nominations, political institutions, and individual political behavior in the digital age.

Bird, Christine and Brooke N. Shannon, 2024 “The Heat is On: Does Civil Litigation Affect Policing Practices?” (Political Research Quarterly).

Abstract: Each year, US municipalities pay millions to settle lawsuits filed against their police departments. While these cases can be extremely costly and politically embarrassing, it is unknown if their effects ripple outward, leading to systematic changes in police behavior. We investigate the relationship between civil litigation and policing activity at a systems level and take a step toward a more rigorous understanding of the effect of civil litigation as an accountability mechanism for law enforcement misconduct. To investigate, we assemble original data on every civil lawsuit filed against a police department in North Carolina between 2004 and 2011, which we pair with existing traffic stops data from 2002 to 2016. We hypothesize that as an agency faces an accumulation of lawsuits, the agency will scale back its discretionary enforcement activities. Empirical tests reveal a 16% drop in the number of monthly stops made by officers in the aftermath of new civil litigation against their department. However, reductions in discretionary police behavior appears to benefit white motorists while rates of stops of Black motorists remains relatively unchanged. Our findings highlight the role of litigation in police accountability as well as the seeming intractability of racial disparities in discretionary police behavior.   

Christine C. Bird and Zac A. McGee, 2023, “Going Nuclear: Federalist Society Affiliated Judicial Nominees’ Prospects and a New Era of Confirmation Politics” (American Politics Research)

Abstract: The intense politicization of judicial nominations over the past few decades come with increasing norm and precedent violations as well as significant delays. Pundits and scholars increasingly blame these detriments on the idea that Republicans seek to control the federal courts with help from, The Federalist Society (FedSoc). Most scholarship on FedSoc explores its influence in shaping constitutional law and the ideological leanings of judges once on the federal bench. Yet, basic questions about the group’s influence in Congress remain unanswered. Utilizing a novel dataset of FedSoc affiliates drawn from event listings (1982-2020), we analyze the role of FedSoc affiliation on the judicial nominations process. We find affiliation with FedSoc generally hinders a nominee’s chances of confirmation, leads to increased chances of a nomination returned to the president, and if the nomination is put to a recorded vote, decreases the coalition supporting the nominee on the record—except among Republican senators.

Christine C. Bird and Zac A. McGee, 2023 “Looking Forward: Interest Group Legal Strategy and Federalist Society Affiliation in the United States Circuit Courts of Appeal” (“Emergency Symposium on the State of the Supreme Court” Polity).

Abstract: In response to the blockbuster 2021 Supreme Court term and the entrenchment of the Court’s conservative supermajority, interest groups and elites engaged in legal advocacy are reevaluating their strategies. To best serve their constituents, progressive interests may consider strategically shifting their focus and resources away from the Supreme Court and toward intermediate federal courts and state supreme courts. We consider the reasons for a potential strategic shift and the influence of a particular conservative interest group– the Federalist Society– progressive litigants need to consider thoughtfully. In order to be successful advocates at the circuit court level, interest groups supporting either side of the ideological spectrum need a thorough understanding of the ideological and philosophical predispositions of individuals on the bench at each circuit and as well as knowledge about the chances of drawing a favorable panel of judges. We find that across circuits, the average probability of drawing a majority Federalist Society panel is around .10 and in the most conservative circuits almost .30. We present evidence left-of-center groups may want to focus their attention and resources to border circuits and identify circuits wherein conservatives are close to attaining their goal of majority membership among the judges

Book Chapters:

Julie Novkov and Christine C. Bird, 2022, “Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson on Delegated Enforcement of Abortion Restrictions” in Major Decisions and Developments of the U.S. Supreme Court 2022 ed. Morgan Marietta. Palgrave.

Current Projects in Progress:

Bird, Christine, Jonathan King, and Zac McGee, “The Influence of Federalist Society Affiliation on Senator Voting in Judicial Nominations” (Under Review)

Abstract: Since its inception, the Federalist Society has been a key player in the conservative legal movement but its scope of influence on political processes and the U.S. judiciary has not been fully defined. We argue Federalist Society affiliation provides a low-cost, high-information cue to senators voting on nominees. Specifically, we investigate how Federalist Society affiliation shapes a senator’s voting behavior on judicial nominations. Using a novel dataset of 62,549 roll-call votes on U.S. district, circuit, and Supreme Court nominations from 1991-2020, we find that Federalist Society affiliation dramatically impacts the likelihood of receiving a senator’s vote. Even when accounting for the nominating president, partisan differences intensify with Democrats less likely to vote for Federalist Society affiliated nominees than Republicans at all levels of the judicial hierarchy. Interestingly, a senator’s own affiliation does not alter their voting pattern, indicating nominee affiliation is a crucial cue when senators vote on judicial nominees.

Bird, Christine, Rachael Houston, and Marcy Shieh, “Ad-Dressing the Bench: The Impact of Interest Group Ads on Partisan Perceptions of Supreme Court Confirmations” (Under Review)

Abstract: This study explores the influence of partisan identity on individuals’ reactions to interest group ads about U.S. Supreme Court nominees. Using a survey experiment, we expose authentic interest group ads, strategically crafted to sway public opinion on the nominations of Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court, to partisan respondents. With ads from both co-partisan and out-partisan groups, we investigate how exposure to interest group ads shape a partisan’s stance toward the nominee. Our analysis focuses on messages that align with or challenge existing partisan beliefs, aiming to further understand the interplay between the strength of partisan identity and attitudes about Supreme Court nominees. Additionally, we explore the differences in how Democrats and Republicans specifically respond to these advertisements.

Bird, Christine and Bethany Blackstone, “The Supreme Court’s Policy Agenda” (In Preparation for Submission)

Abstract: We consider the composition of the Supreme Court’s policy agenda between its 1955 and 2009 terms to evaluate how the Supreme Court has chosen to participate in American policymaking. We focus on three features of the Supreme Court’s agenda—issue attention, attention diversity, and agenda contentiousness. We find (1) that the Court’s agenda is heavily concentrated in a small number of topic areas, (2) that increased agenda control by the justices is associated with higher levels of agenda contentiousness, and (3) that in the post-1988 period, justices appear to moderate the contentiousness of the Court’s agenda when congressional and Court preferences diverge.

Bird, Christine, “Solicitor General Intervention and the Public’s Evaluation of Supreme Court Legitimacy” (Pretesting)

Abstract: I evaluate how the public evaluates Solicitor General interventions when presented with different frames of the role of the SG in appellate litigation before the Supreme Court? Employing a conjoint experiment, I investigate how the public evaluates the Supreme Court’s decisions differently when presented with information framing an SG intervention as a presidential intervention versus a legalistic advisory role to the Supreme Court? This project has interesting implications for scholarship evaluating the Supreme Court’s institutional legitimacy.

Research Lab Affiliation and Collaboration

I collaborate with two research groups. See more about our missions on our webpages!

The Edward A. Clark Center for Australia and New Zealand Studies

The Comparative Agendas Project

My Favorite Articles, Books, and More!

Here is a short, non-exhaustive list of some of my favorite pieces of work. In this business, I think its always appropriate to draw attention to work that inspired me, challenged me, or is just plain cool!

Traditional Academic Works

1. Marc Galanter (1974). “Why the Haves Come Out Ahead: Speculation on the Limits of Legal Change.” Law and Society Review. 9:1.
2. Charles Epp (1998). The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective. University of Chicago Press
3. Sean Farhang (2010). The Litigation State: Public Regulation and Private Lawsuits in the U.S. Princeton University Press.
4. HW Perry (1991). Deciding to Decide: Agenda Setting in the United States Supreme Court. Harvard University Press.
5. Frank Baumgartner and Beth Leech (1998). Basic Interests: The Importance of Interest Groups in Politics and Political Science. Princeton University Press.
6. Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones (1993). Agendas and Instability in American Politics. University of Chicago Press
7. Ryan Black and Ryan Owens (2009). “Agenda-Setting and the Supreme Court: The Collision of Policy and Jurisprudence.” Journal of Politics 71:1062-75.
8. Matthew K. Hall (2014). “The Semiconstrained Court: Public Opinion, The Separation of Powers, and the U.S. Supreme Court’s Fear of Nonimplementation.” American Journal of Political Science. 58:2, 352-366.

Blogs and Podcasts (Great Teaching Tools!!)

1. Empirical SCOTUS
2. SCOTUSblog
3. Amicus with Dahlia Lithwick
4. Strict Scrutiny
5. What Trump Can Teach Us About Con Law
6. The Policy Agenda (The Comparative Agenda Projects Podcast)
7. No Jargon by Scholars Strategy Network (very broad, great for intro)