Yesterday, we began our review of how the Court’s unanimity rate has changed over time with a review of the data for the civil docket. Today, we’re looking at the criminal docket. For the entire twenty-eight years, the Court has decided 1,540 cases and been unanimous in 67.86% – less than a point higher than the overall unanimity rate.
For the first four years of the period, the unanimity rate was over the average: 79,.71% in 1990, 75.86% in 1991, 82.61% in 1992 and 83.2% in 1993. For the three years following, it fell a bit below trend, to 61.54% in 1994 and 59.49% in 1996 before rising a bit in 1996 to 68.52%.
The unanimity rate was below trend for every year of the next seven years other (narrowly) than 1998. The unanimity rate was 60.32% in 1997, 69.44% in 1998, only 45.28% in 1999, only 26.74% in 2000, 58.62% in 2001, 54.29% in 2002 and 53.85% in 2003.
The unanimity rate remained high between 2004 and 2010: 74.19% in 2004, 81.36% in 2005, 72% in 2006, 71.43% in 2007, 84% in 2008, 76.92% in 2009 and 74.55% in 2010.
The unanimity rate in criminal cases stayed over the trend rate over the past seven years – 74% in 2011, 69.7% in 2012, 73.68% in 2013, 79.41% in 2014, 81.82% in 2015, 80% in 2016 and 72.53% in 2017.
Join us next Tuesday as we turn our attention to a new area.
Image courtesy of Flickr by William Ross (no changes).