Race and Intersectionality of Interruptions at the U.S. Supreme Court

• In Event: Diversity in the Federal Courts

Abstract

Spirited back-and-forth between lawyers and justices is a time-honored tradition at the U.S. Supreme Court. Lawyers expect their presentations to be interrupted, but research suggests that interruptions and speaking time are not equally distributed. Women lawyers appearing before the Supreme Court are interrupted more often and allowed to speak for less time than their male colleagues (Patton and Smith 2017). Similarly, lawyers and fellow justices are more likely to interrupt women justices (Jacobi and Schweers 2017). Following Widner, Thurman and Buehring (n.d.), we argue that the role schemas that lead to biased patterns of interruptions and domination with respect to women are also likely to lead to increased interruptions and domination of attorneys and justices of color. We test this expectation using an original database of the race of members of the Supreme Court bar developed by Lane and Schoenherr (n.d.) and the transcripts of all oral arguments held from October Term (OT) 2009 – the first term in which the Court had two Justices of color – to OT 2018, the last full term that was not disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, when all attorneys’ identities were visibly salient due to their appearance in the Courtroom. Given that justices’ behavior at oral arguments (Black, Johnson and Wedeking 2012; Black, Schutte and Johnson 2013; Black, Sorenson and Johnson 2013) attorneys’ performance at oral arguments (Johnson, Wahlbeck and Spriggs 2006), and oral arguments generally have a significant impact on Supreme Court justices’ decision making (Johnson 2004), unequal treatment of gender and racial minority attorneys during this important 30 minute period has significant implications on policy created by the United States Supreme Court.

Authors

• Elizabeth Lane, North Carolina State University

• Kirsten Widner, University of Tennessee, Knoxville