This seminar has two basic purposes: (1) To introduce graduate (and law) students to the state of the art in legal and social-scientific studies of the Supreme Court; and (2) to cover a series of particular topics, with emphasis on the major controversies in the field. Students will come away from this class with an appreciation of how justices on the Court operate in an interdependent environment in which their actions turn on their preferences, the preferences of their colleagues, institutions, and political context.