Mobilizing Public Will For Social Change

Examines the theory and strategies of "public will" campaigns and offers tangible criteria for their evaluation. It provides a rich inventory of strategies for use in mobilizing the public will through an integration of models of agenda building, social problem construction, issues management, social movements, media advocacy, and social capital. In addition, the paper provides cases and examples of public will campaigns directed at various social problems, along with criteria for evaluating these campaigns at various stages of a social problem's life cycle

Youth Smoking, Cigarette Prices, and Anti-Smoking Sentiment

In this paper, we develop a new direct measure of state anti-smoking sentiment and merge it with micro data on youth smoking in 1992 and 2000. The empirical results from the cross-sectional models show two consistent patterns: after controlling for differences in state anti-smoking sentiment, the price of cigarettes has a weak and statistically insignificant influence on smoking participation; and state anti-smoking sentiment appears to be a potentially important influence on youth smoking participation. The cross-sectional results are corroborated by results from discrete time hazard models of smoking initiation that include state fixed effects. However, there is evidence of price-responsiveness in the conditional cigarette demand by youth and young adult smokers.

Health Behav Policy Rev

ObjectivesWe examine influences on southeastern state legislators\ue2\u20ac\u2122 actions related to tobacco tax increases.MethodsIn 2014, we interviewed 26 former state legislators in southeastern states via phone.ResultsThemes regarding factors impeding increasing tobacco taxes included: tobacco's legacy in the South, protecting vulnerable populations from increased cigarette costs, concern about economic impact, opposing \ue2\u20ac\u153sin\ue2\u20ac? taxes, concern about impact on reelection, and perceptions that constituents oppose all taxes. The major theme in support of increasing tobacco taxes was health concern. Prior attempts at passing legislation resulted in political leveraging, deal-making, or compromising.ConclusionsLegislators\ue2\u20ac\u2122 misperceptions of constituent opposition and impact on economy, among other impediments to increased tobacco taxes, must be addressed.U48 DP001909/DP/NCCDPHP CDC HHS/United States2015-09-01T00:00:00Z26236755PMC451797

Liberal Justices\u27 Reliance on Legislative History

This Article presents a strong case against the conventional wisdom that legislative history is a politicized\u27 resource, invoked opportunistically by federal judges. The premise that judges regularly rely on legislative history to promote their preferred policy positions-if true-should find ample support in the majority opinions of liberal Supreme Court Justices construing liberal (pro-employee) labor and civil rights statutes. By analyzing all 320-plus majority opinions in workplace law authored by eight liberal Justices from 1969-2006, the authors establish that legislative history reliance is actually associated with a constraining set of results. When the eight liberal Justices use legislative history as part of their majority reasoning, they do so to justify a higher proportion of their pro-employer outcomes than their pro-employee decisions. The authors explain how liberal Justices use legislative history to illuminate the contours of complex statutory bargains that often favor conservative or pro-employer positions. After considering alternative explanations, the authors conclude that Justices Brennan, Marshall, Souter, Stevens, and others are willing to follow so frequently a legislative history trail leading away from their presumed ideological preferences mainly because they have invoked this interpretive resource in principled fashion. The Article also describes how, in the face of Justice Scalia\u27s fervent opposition to legislative history, liberal Justices since 1986 have opted not to rely on that resource in a series of pro-employer majorities that Scalia joins. One result of the liberals\u27 strategic restraint is that their use of legislative history in the remaining (mostly pro-employee) majority opinions appears more ideological than it was before Scalia joined the Court. Intriguingly, Justice Scalia\u27s strong resistance to legislative history when used by liberal Justices does not extend to majorities authored by his conservative colleagues. Scalia seems prepared to give these conservative colleagues more of a free ride: he is as likely to join their majorities, or vote for their results, when they rely on legislative history as when they do not

An Informational Approach to the Mass Imprisonment Problem

The United States is plagued by the problem of mass imprisonment, with its prison population having risen by 500% in the last three decades. Because the overwhelming majority of criminal cases are resolved through plea bargaining, there is room for prosecutors to reduce mass imprisonment by exercising their wide discretion. At present, prosecutors likely do not give much consideration to the overcrowding of America \u27s jails and prisons when making their plea bargain offers. However, if prosecutors were regularly advised of such overcrowding they might offer marginally lower sentences across the board. For instance, a prosecutor who typically offers a first-time drug offender a twenty-month sentence might instead agree to an eighteen-month plea bargain if she were aware that prisons were overcrowded and incarceration rates were on the rise. A rich body of social psychology literature supports the view that informing prosecutors about mass imprisonment might cause them to offer lower sentences. Legislatures have an incentive to enact such a proposal because a reduction in incarceration would reduce the already huge and escalating costs of criminal corrections. At the same time, because legislatures would simply be instructing that prosecutors be advised of the scale of imprisonment, and not specifically advocating lower sentences, there would be no danger of legislators appearing soft on crime

Liberal Justices\u27 Reliance on Legislative History

This Article presents a strong case against the conventional wisdom that legislative history is a politicized\u27 resource, invoked opportunistically by federal judges. The premise that judges regularly rely on legislative history to promote their preferred policy positions-if true-should find ample support in the majority opinions of liberal Supreme Court Justices construing liberal (pro-employee) labor and civil rights statutes. By analyzing all 320-plus majority opinions in workplace law authored by eight liberal Justices from 1969-2006, the authors establish that legislative history reliance is actually associated with a constraining set of results. When the eight liberal Justices use legislative history as part of their majority reasoning, they do so to justify a higher proportion of their pro-employer outcomes than their pro-employee decisions. The authors explain how liberal Justices use legislative history to illuminate the contours of complex statutory bargains that often favor conservative or pro-employer positions. After considering alternative explanations, the authors conclude that Justices Brennan, Marshall, Souter, Stevens, and others are willing to follow so frequently a legislative history trail leading away from their presumed ideological preferences mainly because they have invoked this interpretive resource in principled fashion. The Article also describes how, in the face of Justice Scalia\u27s fervent opposition to legislative history, liberal Justices since 1986 have opted not to rely on that resource in a series of pro-employer majorities that Scalia joins. One result of the liberals\u27 strategic restraint is that their use of legislative history in the remaining (mostly pro-employee) majority opinions appears more ideological than it was before Scalia joined the Court. Intriguingly, Justice Scalia\u27s strong resistance to legislative history when used by liberal Justices does not extend to majorities authored by his conservative colleagues. Scalia seems prepared to give these conservative colleagues more of a free ride: he is as likely to join their majorities, or vote for their results, when they rely on legislative history as when they do not