Andrew D. Martin

Andrew D. Martin (born July 25, 1972) is a prominent political scientist. He currently serves as the dean of the University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and as a Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan. ^[1]

Previously, Martin held an appointment as Professor of Law,^[2] and Professor of Political Science^[3] at Washington University in St. Louis. He also serves as the founding director for the Center for Empirical Research in the Law^[4] and as a Resident Fellow in the Washington University Center in Political Economy.^[5] From 2007 to 2011, he served as Chair of Political Science Department at Washington University in St. Louis.^[6] Martin holds an A.B. in Mathematics and Government from The College of William and Mary and a PhD in Political Science from Washington University in St. Louis. Prior to his appointment to the faculty at Washington University, Martin served as an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at State University of New York at Stony Brook from 1998 to 2000.^[7]

Center for Empirical Research in the Law

Martin is the founding director of Washington University’s Center for Empirical Research in the Law^[8] (“CERL”). CERL was founded in 2006 under Dean Kent D. Syverud as a research unit within Washington University’s School of Law.^[9][10] CERL provides empirical legal research methods support and training to law faculty and scholars at Washington University, and serves as a point of connection to scholars and faculty at many other universities.^[9] At CERL, Martin has guided the technical efforts of several large-scale, nationally regarded data initiatives. Notably, CERL collaborates with the Northwestern University School of Law to host the Conducting Empirical Legal Scholarship workshop which offers intensive training to members of academia and the legal community,^[11] as well as hosting workshops and conferences on the Washington University campus. CERL’s prominent projects and collaborations include The Discography^[12] (conceived by WUSTL Law alum Loren Wells), The Judicial Elections Data Initiative,^[13] and the NSF-sponsored Supreme Court Database^[14] (see below).

Scholarship

Spanning judicial politics, quantitative political methodology, and empirical legal studies, Martin’s academic work has been published in a variety of different outlets, including the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Columbia Law Review, University of Pennsylvania Law Review and Northwestern University Law Review. Martin is the recipient of six grants from the National Science Foundation; his research has also been funded by the American Bar Association, the MacArthur Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health.

Martin has also made major contributions to statistical computing in the form of software. His most prominent contribution, with Kevin Quinn and Jong Hee Park, is the [R] package MCMCpack “which contains functions for Bayesian posterior simulation using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods for a number of statistical models”.^[15][16]

Martin-Quinn scores

One of Martin's most notable public successes is the Martin-Quinn scores.^[17][18] In this effort he and collaborator Kevin Quinn sought to programmatically identify the ideologies of U.S. Supreme Court justices.^[19]

Supreme Court database

The Supreme Court Database is an NSF-funded collaboration among six universities. The project’s inception occurred decades ago as Professor Harold J. Spaeth (Michigan State University) attempted to document and code every vote put forth by a U.S. Supreme Court justice in all argued cases over a five-decade span. Professor Spaeth's work has become an indispensable body of information for those who study supreme court politics. In 2007 Professor Lee Epstein (Northwestern University) was awarded NSF funding to modernize and extend Spaeth's Database. Professor Martin and CERL’s participation involves overseeing the expansion, including developing a comprehensive dataset as well as facilitating a backdating project which is currently classifying data from the founding of the court in 1790 through the current term.^[20]

Awards and recognition

Martin is the recipient of a number of awards including the Washington University Outstanding Faculty Mentor award,^[21] the Pi Sigma Alpha Award (for the best paper delivered at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association),^[22] the Harold Gosnell Prize (for the best work on political methodology presented at a political science conference),^[23] and the Mancur Olson award (for the best dissertation in political economy).^[24]

Contributions

Martin’s work has been highlighted in a number of venues. As chronicled in Ian Ayres’ 2007 book Super Crunchers, Martin and Quinn created a statistical forecasting model of voting by United States Supreme Court justices which produced superior predictions of votes to predictions by legal experts.^[25]

Martin’s scholarly work is often cited in prominent national news sources including The New York Times^[26][27][28] and The Washington Post.^[29][30] He is frequently called upon for interviews by various media outlets such as The New York Times.^[31] Martin has contributed an Op-Ed piece, with co-author Barry Friedman, to The New York Times.^[32]

Selected publications

Andrew D. Martin and Kevin M. Quinn. 2002. "Dynamic Ideal Point Estimation via Markov Chain Monte Carlo for the U.S. Supreme Court, 1953–1999." Political Analysis. 10:134–153.

Andrew D. Martin. 2001. "Congressional Decision Making and the Separation of Powers." American Political Science Review. 95: 361–378.

Christina L. Boyd, Lee Epstein, and Andrew D. Martin. 2010. "Untangling the Causal Effects of Sex on Judging." American Journal of Political Science. 54: 389–411.

Lee Epstein, Andrew D. Martin, Jeffrey A. Segal, and Chad Westerland. 2007. "The Judicial Common Space." Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization. 23: 303–325.

Personal

Martin was born in Lafayette, Indiana.^[33] He currently lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Sandpoint, Idaho, with his wife and their young daughter.

References

External links

• CERL website
• Andrew Martin's website
• WUSTL Law Faculty page
• WUSTL Political Science Faculty page