Strategizing Strategic Behavior in Legal Interpretation

This Essay is part of a larger work that proposes a theory of the political effects of the American social practice of organizing lawmaking through distinct adjudicative and legislative institutions. The main question addressed is the role of political ideology, in the simple sense of "liberalism" and "conservatism," in the part of judicial activity that is best described as lawmaking. I argue that ideological projects of this familiar kind pervasively influence judicial lawmaking, but that ideologically oriented legal work is different from ideologically oriented legislative work. I address the grand question of the meaning and effects of adjudication in society through the development of these differences.