Judicial Independence and Minority Interests
Conference on Empirical Studies and Judges, Harvard Law School, November 10, 2006
37 Pages Posted: 12 Sep 2007
Abstract
Special education litigation has grown rapidly during the 1980s and 1990s following the passage in 1975 of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and judges have become more involved in determining whether or not students with disabilities are receiving a free and appropriate public education. We argue that students with disabilities are a minority interest and promoting their interests can make state judges unpopular for two reasons: first, IDEA imposes substantial costs on state and local budgets; second IDEA mainstreams children with disabilities into regular classrooms. We then provide evidence at the state and school district level that those states that either did not elect judges or eliminated judicial elections have more aggressively promoted the interests of students with disabilities. The most compelling explanation for this finding is that judges who do not stand for election are more likely to promote minority interests.
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