Strategic Behavior and Foreign Policy Litigation in the Federal District Courts.

Does the hierarchical relationship between the district courts and the courts of appeals influence decision-making at the trial level? Stated another way, are district court judges constrained by the appeals courts, according to the tenets of principal agency theory? Do these judges anticipate responses by appellate panels and condition their decisions based on these expectations? Using an original dataset of foreign policy cases from 1946-2000 and incorporating a strategic choice statistical framework to analyze a formal model, I discover that the District Courts are not constrained by the anticipated responses of the Appeals Courts. Whether one examines District Courts in isolation from other tribunals or within a hierarchical structure, conclusions regarding ideological voting remain consistent: Democratic judges are more likely to rule in favor of civil liberties than their Republican colleagues. Thus, the hierarchical structure of the federal judiciary does not appear to be a significant constraint to the District Courts as it seemingly is for the Courts of Appeals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]