Attacking judges

Negative campaigning, with its name-calling, personal attacks and hard-hitting tactics, has become a regular part of American elections, and races for judgeships are not spared. This book studies how television advertising, especially ads with sharp attacks, affects state supreme court elections. Melinda Gann Hall asks whether these bitter contests cause lasting harm to representative democracy.

Hall centers her analysis on two questions: how much support justices seeking reelection receive, and how likely voters in each state are to turn out at the polls. Through these measures she tests the widely held view that partisan campaign politics damages judges, voters and state court systems.

Rather than relying on assumptions, the book draws on empirical evidence to show how attack advertising shapes public engagement with judicial races and how effective it is across different kinds of state elections. Its conclusions challenge many of the fears reformers have expressed about negative campaigning in state high court elections. The work also highlights the importance of institutions in American politics and the value of empirical political science in informing major public debates.