Variations on the Themes of Regime Theory

• In Event: The U.S. Supreme Court in Contemporary Democratic Politics

Abstract

The Supreme Court's exploration of constitutional disqualification highlights how regime theory, like the court, is a they, not an it. The central teaching of regime theory is that courts are a member of the dominant national coalition and is unlikely to deviate from that coalition for long. The dominant national coalition, however, has many strands. This paper explores how different political activists representing different strands of the dominant national coalition asked the court to make different rulings on the Trump disqualification and how the opinions in the case reflected those strands of the dominant national coalition. These different perspectives highlight how courts matter, even when they are not counter-majoritarian.

Author

• Mark A. Graber, University of Maryland Carey School of Law