Although thousands of petitions seeking review by the Supreme Court are filed each year, the justices only accept about 150 or fewer for plenary review, with perhaps a few hundred more disposed of summarily. Because of this low acceptance rate scholars have long thought that the justices must use some strategy or process to reduce their workload to manageable levels. Although the examination of agenda setting on the Supreme Court is of continuing interest to judicial scholars, previous studies have usually focused only on cert petitions, specific issues, particular terms, or sampling for their data collection. A more comprehensive examination of the cases filed before the Supreme Court will provide a clearer picture of how the justices set their agenda.
Drawing from an ongoing database project this study examines all cases filed before the Burger Court (1969 to 1985 Terms). The specific question addressed in this paper is whether the presence of government parties in a case affects the chances for acceptance by the Supreme Court. The results, which prove to be rather robust, show that they do. In various combinations, federal or state/local government entities, as appellant or appellee, in criminal or noncriminal cases, are associated with a statistically significant difference in the acceptance rate by the Court.