Strategic retirements: A political model of turnover on the United States Supreme Court

The president's ability to nominate justices to the United States Supreme Court is one of his most powerful tools for advancing his policy goals. To maximize the use of this tool it is important that he be able to determine how reasonable it is to expect a retirement from the Court during his presidency. Prior research is inconclusive as to whether Court retirements are politically motivated. In this study I develop and test a political model of Court retirements. The results from estimating the model using exponential Poisson regression show there to be an identifiable political element relating to the timing of retirements from the Court.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1990 Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, Atlanta, Georgia.     

Religion and the demand for membership in environmental citizen groups

I test the hypothesis that religious affiliation is an empirical measure of tastes and beliefs that affect the demand for membership in environmental citizen groups. The number of adherents to Judeo-Christian denominations per household has a significant, negative effect on state membership rates for nine groups advocating a preservationist approach to environmental policy, particularly in states with many Catholics, Baptists and Mormons. Religious affiliation has a marginally significant, positive effect on membership rates for two sportsmen groups advocating private stewardship. These results suggest that religious affiliation should also be a significant determinant of constituent preferences for environmental policies.     

A simple DNA extraction method for marijuana samples used in amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis

As a first step in developing a molecular method for the individualization of marijuana samples, we evaluated a plant DNA extraction kit. The QIAGEN plant DNeasy method uses a spin column format for recovery of DNA and is effective for obtaining high molecular weight DNA from leaf, flower (bud), and seed samples of marijuana. The average DNA yield was 125-500 ng per 100 milligrams of fresh plant tissue. The recovered DNA was of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) quality as measured by the ability to generate reproducible amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) profiles. AFLP is a technique used to create a DNA profile for plant varieties and is being applied to marijuana samples by the authors to link growers and distributors of clonal material. The QIAGEN plant DNeasy method was simple, efficient, and reproducible for processing small quantities of marijuana into DNA.     

Treating impulsivity, irritability, and aggression of antisocial personality disorder with quetiapine

There are few effective treatments of antisocial personality disorder (APD). Preliminary work suggests that the atypical antipsychotic quetiapine can decrease irritability, impulsivity, and aggressiveness. Data were collected from 4 patients with APD who were referred to a maximum-security inpatient psychiatric facility for pretrial evaluation and were treated with quetiapine. Quetiapine was effective in these patients as was indicated by a decrease in symptoms such as impulsivity, hostility, aggressiveness, irritability, and rage reactions. Typical dosage was 600 to 800 mg per day. Patients attributed their willingness to comply with quetiapine treatment to both the effectiveness of the drug and its favorable adverse-event profile. Quetiapine was successfully combined with mood stabilizers, particularly gabapentin, in patients with prominent affective instability. Quetiapine has demonstrated efficacy in aggression, impulsivity, and irritability and has proved to be an effective medication in these patients with APD. In addition, its favorable adverse-event profile makes patients willing to comply.     

Mandating insurance offers for low-wage workers: an evaluation of labor market effects

Employing a simultaneous model of part-time status, health insurance offers, and wages, we examine the impacts on employment and health insurance coverage of nondiscrimination rules in the tax code governing employer-sponsored health insurance. Using 1988 and 1993 Employee Benefits Supplements to the Current Population Surveys and variations in health insurance premiums and minimum wages, we find that health insurance coverage among low-wage primary earners is increased by at most 31 percent by the policy, at a cost of an estimated 0.8-5.4-percentage-point decrease in full-time employment for low-wage workers.     

Revisiting Respondent “Fatigue Bias” in the National Crime Victimization Survey

For more than three decades the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)—and its predecessor the National Crime Survey (NCS)—have been used to calculate estimates of nonfatal crime in the United States. Though the survey has contributed much to our understanding of criminal victimization, some aspects of the survey’s methodology continue to be analyzed (e.g., repeat victimizations, proxy interviews, and bounding). Surprisingly, one important aspect of NCVS methodology has escaped this scrutiny: respondent fatigue. A potential source of nonsampling error, fatigue bias is thought to manifest as respondents become “test wise” after repeated exposure to NCVS survey instruments. Using a special longitudinal NCVS data file, we revisit the presence and influence of respondent fatigue in the NCVS. Specifically, we test the theory that respondents exposed to longer interviews during their first interview are more likely to refuse to participate in the survey 6 months later. Contrary to expectations based on the literature, results show that prior reporting of victimization and exposure to a longer interview is not a significant predictor of a noninterview during the following time-in-sample once relevant individual characteristics are accounted for. Findings do demonstrate significant effects of survey mode and several respondent characteristics on subsequent survey non-participation.     

Internet offenders: traders, travelers, and combination trader-travelers

The Internet opens a vast array of communication, entertainment, and educational resources for children; however, it also opens a gateway to home and school for offenders who wish to exploit children. A convenience sample of 225 cases published in the news media was examined. The cases were classified using law enforcement terminology to describe Internet offenders as traders, travelers, or combination trader-travelers. The media is seen as a critical source of information for the public to be aware of how the Internet is being used to commit sexual exploitation and sex crimes against children.