Ideology and Specific Support for the Supreme Court

• Published date: 01 December 2021
• Author: Alison Higgins Merrill,Soren Jordan,Joseph Daniel Ura,Kathryn Haglin
• DOI: 10.1177/1065912920950482
• Date: 01 December 2021
• Subject Matter: Articles

2021, Vol. 74(4) 955 –969

https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912920950482

Political Research Quarterly

© 2020 University of Utah

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DOI: 10.1177/1065912920950482

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Article

Introduction

Americans’ evaluations of the Supreme Court’s job per-

formance have declined over the last decade (Merrill,

Conway, and Ura 2017; Sinozich 2017). While diffuse

support for the Court remains high and stable (Gibson

and Caldeira 2009; Gibson and Nelson 2014), numerous

surveys show that Americans express much less approval

of and confidence in the Supreme Court than they did in

the early 2000s (e.g. Jones 2016; Merrill, Conway, and

Ura 2017; Pew Research Center 2015; Sinozich 2017).1,2

What explains the erosion of approval of and confidence

in the Supreme Court?

The literature on specific support for the Supreme

Court provides some guidance for answering this ques-

tion, identifying two principal factors associated with

attitudes about the Court’s job performance (Ansolabehere

and White 2020; Durr, Martin, and Wolbrecht 1997;

Malhotra and Jessee 2014; Sinozich 2017; see also

Caldeira 1986, 1987, 1991; Mondak and Grosskopf

1998). The first is dispositions toward the federal govern-

ment as a whole, especially attitudes toward Congress

(Durr, Martin, and Wolbrecht 1997; Sinozich 2017).

Americans’ evaluations of the Supreme Court rise and

fall with their judgments about the rest of the federal gov-

ernment. The second is the degree of ideological diver-

gence between Supreme Court decision-making and

public mood (Durr, Martin, and Wolbrecht 1997). As the

ideological tenor of aggregate Supreme Court decision-

making diverges from the public’s medially preferred

level of policy liberalism, total support for the Supreme

Court declines.

Research on Americans’ ideological commitments,

though, suggests that the second prong of this account

may be incomplete, as Americans’ political values oper-

ate asymmetrically among ideological groups (Lupton,

Smallpage, and Enders 2020). On the one hand, American

political conservatism is tied to a relatively concentrated

value space centered on a commitment to “individual-

ism,” which often manifests as support for personal lib-

erty and laissez-faire economic principles (Feldman and

Zaller 1992; Franklin and Jackson 1983; Goren 2001;

McClosky and Zaller 1984), as well as a corresponding

commitment to moral absolutism (Gibson and Hare

2016). On the other hand, American political liberalism is

associated with a more diverse value space occupied by a

coalition of social groups featuring a commitment to

“egalitarianism” (Feldman and Zaller 1992; Franklin and

Jackson 1983; Goren 2001; Lupton, Smallpage, and

Enders 2020) and a corresponding belief in moral relativ-

ism (Gibson and Hare 2016). These differences in ideo-

logical value structures and related moral commitments

are reinforced by the nation’s leading political parties

(Grossman and Hopkins 2016; see also Converse,

Clausen, and Miller 1965; Goggin and Theodoridis

950482PRQXXX10.1177/1065912920950482Political Research QuarterlyHaglin et al.

research-article2020

1University of Minnesota-Duluth, USA

2Auburn University, AL, USA

3Susquehanna University, Selinsgrove, PA, USA

4Texas A&M University, College Station, USA

Corresponding Author:

Joseph Daniel Ura, Department of Political Science, Texas A&M

University, 4348 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-4348, USA.

Email: jura@tamu.edu

Ideology and Specific Support for the

Supreme Court

Kathryn Haglin1, Soren Jordan2, Alison Higgins Merrill3,

and Joseph Daniel Ura4

Abstract

We develop and assess an account of ideological asymmetries in public support for the Supreme Court. We find that

specific support for the Supreme Court is more strongly negatively related to perceptions that the Court is overly

liberal than perceptions that the Court is overly conservative. Our findings provide a more complete theoretical

account of dynamics in specific support for the Supreme Court and indicate a mechanism behind the recent decline in

the Supreme Court’s public standing.

Keywords

approval, ideology, public opinion, specific support, Supreme Court