The Impact of Oral Argument Attendance

Abstract How does oral argument attendance impact public perceptions of the judiciary? Judicial independence is partly contingent on support, but conditions that generate institutional good will are not well understood. We examine how judicial outreach and court exposure inform attitudes. Leveraging a field-experiment randomizing in-person at arguments conducted by federal circuit appeals university campus, we find increases legitimacy extent to which decisions motivated law versus politics. The results have important implications for politics policy debates concerning reform initiatives involving riding, courtroom cameras, outreach.