The connection between federalism and protection of civil liberties is discussed by many researchers as the controversial point. In their article “State Courts, the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Protection of Civil Liberties”, Howard, Graves, and Flowers focus on the role of federalism for the further protection of the people’s civil liberties with references to the potential division of duties and responsibilities between the regional and central governments in order to contribute to emphasizing civil liberties and rights (Howard, Graves, & Flowers, 2006).
It is important to note that the authors discuss this question while concentrating on the role of ideology in the process of state courts and the U.S. Supreme Court’s cooperation. Thus, the intended audience of the article is the representatives of the regional and central governments and the representatives of the U.S. legislative sphere as well as the persons interested in the question.
Howard, Graves, and Flowers claim that state courts are too conservative to realize the specific shift to the ideals of new federalism which can be effective to promote the protection of civil liberties in the country. To support this vision, the authors have conducted the event count analysis depending on the study of the specific state search-and-seizure cases. The cases for discussion were chosen from the period of 1981-1993.
While examining the cases, Howard, Graves, and Flowers paid much attention to the ideological component with references to the state courts and the U.S. Supreme Court’s relations. The idea of the expanded and accentuated federalism was discussed with references to the examined cases, and three spatial models based on the degree of intrusiveness were developed to investigate the potential for the further division of responsibilities among the courts.
These spatial models were stated as regimes according to which the authors formulated their hypotheses (Howard, Graves, & Flowers, 2006). The findings of the case analysis supported the hypotheses that regional courts could contribute to the intensified protection of civil liberties, conservative state courts could be discussed as a kind of prevention for the policies, and the ideological component could influence the idea of newly developed federalism significantly.
However, it is also significant to focus on the article’s strengths and weaknesses to conclude its credibility and importance for the further discussion of the topic.
The article is characterized by such strengths as the discussion of possibilities for the federalism reforms in relation to the conservative positions of state courts, the focus on the ideological component which was not previously discussed in investigations on the topic, and on the attempts to determine and analyze the courts which can be discussed as more liberal for protecting civil liberties in the country.
The authors also used the effective zero-inflated negative binomial regression model to analyze the results of the cases examined to refer to the adequate data on the question. Furthermore, the chosen methods are effective to respond to all the proposed hypotheses.
Nevertheless, it is possible to determine such weaknesses in the article as the usage often directional and working hypotheses because this number of hypotheses can lead to generalizing the research’s results because of the impossibility to focus on all the hypotheses separately. Furthermore, it can be useful to improve the structure of the article, focusing more on the methods than on the literature review.
The article is effective to discuss the problem of federalism’s effects on protecting civil liberties in the context of the U.S. legislative system because of providing the findings and results supported with the proper research and evidence. It is useful to refer to the authors’ approach to discuss the concepts of federalism, liberalism, conservatism, and ideology in their connection to the idea of new judicial federalism.
Reference
Howard, R. M., Graves, S. E., & Flowers, J. (2006). State courts, the U.S. Supreme Court, and the protection of civil liberties. Law & Society Review, 40(4), 845-870.