“Factbound and Splitless” Profiled on SCOTUSBlog

From SCOTUSBlog:

Matthew L.M. Fletcher (Michigan State University College of Law) has posted “Factbound and Splitless: Certiorari and Indian Law” on SSRN, see here.  This article engages in an empirical study of 162 certiorari petitions that were filed in Indian Law cases between 1986 and 1994.  To my knowledge, this is the first attempt to systematically analyze certiorari petitions in tribal cases.  Professor Fletcher concludes that petitions brought by tribes during the period studied were often denied by the Court as factbound and splitless, while state and local governments received much more favorable treatment at the certiorari stage in tribal cases.  Although I must confess that I do not agree with some of the conclusions reached in this paper, Fletcher’s article is thought-provoking and interesting. [David Stras]