The Supreme Court Confirmation Process and Its Implications

In recent history, there has been a trend of increasing partisan polarization throughout most of the American political system. Some of the impacts of this polarization are obvious; however, there is reason to believe that we miss some of the indirect effects of polarization. Accompanying the trend of increased polarization has been an increase in the contentiousness of the Supreme Court confirmation process. I believe that these two trends are related. Furthermore, I argue that these trends have an impact on judicial behavior. This is an issue worth exploring, since the Supreme Court is the most isolated branch of the federal government. The Constitution structured the Supreme Court to ensure that it was as isolated as possible from short-term political pressures and interests. This study attempts to show how it may be possible that those goals are no longer being fully achieved. My first hypothesis in this study is that increases in partisan polarization are a direct cause of the increase in the level of contention during the confirmation process. I then hypothesize that the more contention a justice faces during his or her confirmation process, the more ideologically extreme that justice will then vote on the bench. This means that a nominee appointed by a Republican president will tend to vote even more conservatively than was anticipated following a contentious confirmation process, and vice versa for Democratic appointees. In order to test these hypotheses, I developed a data set for every Supreme Court nominee dating back to President Franklin D. Roosevelt¿s appointments (1937). With this data set, I ran a series of regression models to analyze these relationships. Statistically speaking, the results support my first hypothesis in a fairly robust manner. My regression results for my second hypothesis indicate that the trend I am looking for is present for Republican nominees. For Democratic nominees, the impacts are less robust. Nonetheless, as the results will show, contention during the confirmation process does seem to have some impact on judicial behavior. Following my quantitative analysis, I analyze a series of case studies. These case studies serve to provide tangible examples of these statistical trends as well as to explore what else may be going on during the confirmation process and subsequent judicial decision-making. I use Justices Stevens, Rehnquist, and Alito as the subjects for these case studies. These cases will show that the trends described above do seem to be identifiable at the level of an individual case. These studies further help to indicate other potential impacts on judicial behavior. For example, following Justice Rehnquist¿s move from Associate to Chief Justice, we see a marked change in his behavior. Overall, this study serves as a means of analyzing some of the more indirect impacts of partisan polarization in modern politics. Further, the study offers a means of exploring some of the possible constraints (both conscious and subconscious) that Supreme Court justices may feel while they decide how to cast a vote in a particular case. Given the wide-reaching implications of Supreme Court decisions, it is important to try to grasp a full view of how these decisions are made

Effects of Aqueous Extracts of Coptis Chinensis Franch and Prunus Mume on Intestinal Bacteria in Vitro

通过滤纸片法初步测定了黄连和乌梅水提液的抗菌性能,用比浊法进一步考察了它们对5种肠道菌体外生长的影响。结果表明,0.001 g/mL黄连和乌梅水提液均能够有效抑制产气荚膜梭菌和金黄色葡萄球菌的生长,轻微促进干酪乳杆菌的生长,但对嗜酸乳杆菌的生长只有微弱的抑制作用。0.01 g/mL黄连水提液对大肠杆菌的生长影响不大。而0.001 g/mL乌梅水提液可促进大肠杆菌的生长,但当质量浓度升高至0.005 g/mL时,则对大肠杆菌的生长表现出抑制作用。因此,黄连、乌梅水提液可能是潜在的益生元,是功能性食品配料、绿色饲料添加剂的候选者。The effects of aqueous extracts from C.chinensis Franch root(Coptis root)-derived and P.mume fruit-derived materials on the growth of intestinal bacteria were examined firstly by using impregnated paper disk method,and further by using spectrophotometric method.Both Coptis root and P.mume extracts exhibited potent inhibition against Clostridium perfringens and Staphylococcus aureus at mass concentration as low as 0.001 g/mL,whereas only weak inhibitory activity was detected against Lactobacillus acidophilus.Moreover,growth of Lactobacillus casei was slightly promoted by both extracts at the same mass concentration.No inhibition against Escherichia coli was observed from treatment with Coptis root extracts even at 0.01 g/mL.On the contrary,P.mume extracts showed slight stimulation effects on the growth of E.coli at 0.001 g/mL,but exhibited significant growth inhibition at 0.005 g/mL.These results indicated that Coptis extracts and P.mume extracts may be potential prebiotics,and could be alternatives for functional food additives and green feed additives

全球数字广播系统音频编码器的软件实现

全球范围的数字广播系统DRM(Digital Radio Mondiale),是一种针对30MHz以下频段的数字声音广播系统。和传统广播系统相比,DRM数字广播系统在声音质量上是模拟调幅广播无法比拟的。这其中的关键之一在于DRM系统引入了新的信源编解码技术——MPEG-4标准的AAC(Advanced Audio Coding,先进音频编码)。在分析符合DRM标准的AAC音频编码器原理基础上,提出了一种改进的离散余弦变换算法,并在PC上实现了基于该算法的AAC音频编码器。实验表明,该软件编码器能够满足D

Effect of Tetrachloroethylene on Sphalerite Leaching

The effects of tetrachloroethylene (C2Cl4) on sphalerite leaching in FeCl3-HCl were investigated in view of simultaneous mass transfer and reaction, and the leaching models with and without organic solvent C2Cl4 were derived. The leaching experiments and the SEM results show that C2Cl4 is an effective organic solvent for sphalerite leaching in FeCl3-HCl system to be accelerated and for the sulfur to be separated. Adding C2Cl4 in the FeCl3-HCl medium will turn the kinetic model controlled by sulfur layer diffusion with process activation energy of 67.9 kJ/mol into mixed diffusion with the energy reduced to 55.1 kJ/mol when 20 ml of C2Cl4 was added

H_2SO_4-HNO_3体系中锌精矿浸出与四氯乙烯萃硫的耦合

研究锌精矿在H2 SO4 HNO3体系中浸出与四氯乙烯萃取硫磺的耦合过程。考察了浸出时间、四氯乙烯的加入对锌浸出的影响。结果表明 ,在 85℃ ,氧气压力 0 1MPa ,H2 SO4 浓度 1 8mol/L ,HNO3浓度 0 2mol/L条件下 ,加入 2 0mL四氯乙烯萃取硫磺时 ,锌浸出率在 3h内达到 99 7% ,与常规浸出相比 ,浸出时间缩短了 5 0 % ,耦合效果明显

H2SO4-HNO3体系中锌精矿浸出与四氯乙烯萃硫的耦合

研究锌精矿在H2SO4-HNO3体系中浸出与四氯乙烯萃取硫磺的耦合过程。考察了浸出时间、四氯乙烯的加入对锌浸出的影响。结果表明，在85℃，氧气压力0．1MPa，H2SO4浓度1．8mol／L，HNO3浓度0．2mol／L条件下，加入20mL四氯乙烯萃取硫磺时，锌浸出率在3h内达到99．7％，与常规浸出相比，浸出时间缩短了50％，耦合效果明显