Constitutional Law

An interesting graph...

Over at the Volokh Conspiracy.

Basically, over the period studied of the Rehnquist Court, with the exception of Rehnquist himself, the Justices all cast about the same number of votes to strike down laws as unconstitutional. The total votes ranged from 57 ro 67.

But when they split between Federal and State laws, you see a rather dramatic difference. The liberal wing was much more likely to strike State laws, and the conservative wing to strike Federal ones. Thomas and Scalia voted more often to strike Federal than State laws, whereas Stevens voted 63 times to strike State laws and only 17 times to strike Federal ones.

Full post as published by Of Arms and the Law on February 25, 2008 (boomark / email).