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Introduction
STEPHEN BREYER
Stephen Breyer, L.L.B., is Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Portions of this Introduction appear in Stephen Breyer, The Interdependence of Science and Law, 280
Science 537 (1998).
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Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence
i n T his a Ge o f s CienCe , s CienCe s hould e xpeCT T o find a warm wel-
come, perhaps a permanent home, in our courtrooms. The reason is a simple
one. The legal disputes before us increasingly involve the principles and tools of
science. Proper resolution of those disputes matters not just to the litigants, but
also to the general public—those who live in our technologically complex society
and whom the law must serve. Our decisions should reflect a proper scientific and
technical understanding so that the law can respond to the needs of the public.
Consider, for example, how often our cases today involve statistics—a tool
familiar to social scientists and economists but, until our own generation, not to
many judges. In 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court heard Zuni Public Schools District
No. 89 v. Department of Education,1 in which we were asked to interpret a statis-
tical formula to be used by the U.S. Secretary of Education when determining
whether a state’s public school funding program “equalizes expenditures” among
local school districts. The formula directed the Secretary to “disregard” school
districts with “per-pupil expenditures . . . above the 95th percentile or below the
5th percentile of such expenditures . . . in the State.” The question was whether
the Secretary, in identifying the school districts to be disregarded, could look to
the number of pupils in a district as well as the district’s expenditures per pupil.
Answering that question in the affirmative required us to draw upon technical
definitions of the term “percentile” and to consider five different methods by
which one might calculate the percentile cutoffs.
In another recent Term, the Supreme Court heard two cases involving con-
sideration of statistical evidence. In Hunt v. Cromartie,2 we ruled that summary
judgment was not appropriate in an action brought against various state officials,
challenging a congressional redistricting plan as racially motivated in violation of
the Equal Protection Clause. In determining that disputed material facts existed
regarding the motive of the state legislature in redrawing the redistricting plan, we
placed great weight on a statistical analysis that offered a plausible alternative inter-
pretation that did not involve an improper racial motive. Assessing the plausibility
of this alternative explanation required knowledge of the strength of the statistical
correlation between race and partisanship, understanding of the consequences of
restricting the analysis to a subset of precincts, and understanding of the relation-
ships among alternative measures of partisan support.
In Department of Commerce v. United States House of Representatives,3 residents
of a number of states challenged the constitutionality of a plan to use two forms
of statistical sampling in the upcoming decennial census to adjust for expected
“undercounting” of certain identifiable groups. Before examining the constitu-
tional issue, we had to determine if the residents challenging the plan had standing
to sue because of injuries they would be likely to suffer as a result of the sampling
1. 127 S. Ct. 1534 (2007).
2. 119 S. Ct. 1545 (1999).
3. 119 S. Ct. 765 (1999).
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Introduction
plan. In making this assessment, it was necessary to apply the two sampling strate-
gies to population data in order to predict the changes in congressional apportion-
ment that would most likely occur under each proposed strategy. After resolving
the standing issue, we had to determine if the statistical estimation techniques were
consistent with a federal statute.
In each of these cases, we judges were not asked to become expert statisti-
cians, but we were expected to understand how the statistical analyses worked.
Trial judges today are asked routinely to understand statistics at least as well, and
probably better.
But science is far more than tools, such as statistics. And that “more” increas-
ingly enters directly into the courtroom. The Supreme Court, for example, has
recently decided cases involving basic questions of human liberty, the resolution
of which demanded an understanding of scientific matters. Recently we were
asked to decide whether a state’s method of administering a lethal injection to
condemned inmates constituted cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the
Eighth Amendment.4 And in 1997, we were asked to decide whether the Consti-
tution protects a right to physician-assisted suicide.5 Underlying the legal questions
in these cases were medical questions: What effect does a certain combination of
drugs, administered in certain doses, have on the human body, and to what extent
can medical technology reduce or eliminate the risk of dying in severe pain? The
medical questions did not determine the answer to the legal questions, but to do
our legal job properly, we needed to develop an informed—although necessarily
approximate—understanding of the science.
Nor were the lethal-injection and “right-to-die” cases unique in this respect.
A different case concerned a criminal defendant who was found to be mentally
competent to stand trial but not mentally competent to represent himself. We
held that a state may insist that such a defendant proceed to trial with counsel.6
Our opinion was grounded in scientific literature suggesting that mental illness
can impair functioning in different ways, and consequently that a defendant may
be competent to stand trial yet unable to carry out the tasks needed to present
his own defense.
The Supreme Court’s docket is only illustrative. Scientific issues permeate
the law. Criminal courts consider the scientific validity of, say, DNA sampling or
voiceprints, or expert predictions of defendants’ “future dangerousness,” which
can lead courts or juries to authorize or withhold the punishment of death. Courts
review the reasonableness of administrative agency conclusions about the safety of
a drug, the risks attending nuclear waste disposal, the leakage potential of a toxic
waste dump, or the risks to wildlife associated with the building of a dam. Patent
law cases can turn almost entirely on an understanding of the underlying technical
4. Baze v. Rees, 128 S. Ct. 1520 (2008).
5. Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702 (1997); Vacco v. Quill, 521 U.S. 793 (1997).
6. Indiana v. Edwards, 128 S. Ct. 2379 (2008).
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Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence
or scientific subject matter. And, of course, tort law often requires difficult deter-
minations about the risk of death or injury associated with exposure to a chemical
ingredient of a pesticide or other product.
The importance of scientific accuracy in the decision of such cases reaches
well beyond the case itself. A decision wrongly denying compensation in a toxic
substance case, for example, can not only deprive the plaintiff of warranted com-
pensation but also discourage other similarly situated individuals from even trying
to obtain compensation and encourage the continued use of a dangerous substance.
On the other hand, a decision wrongly granting compensation, although of imme-
diate benefit to the plaintiff, can improperly force abandonment of the substance.
Thus, if the decision is wrong, it will improperly deprive the public of what can
be far more important benefits—those surrounding a drug that cures many while
subjecting a few to less serious risk, for example. The upshot is that we must search
for law that reflects an understanding of the relevant underlying science, not for law
that frees companies to cause serious harm or forces them unnecessarily to abandon
the thousands of artificial substances on which modern life depends.
The search is not a search for scientific precision. We cannot hope to inves-
tigate all the subtleties that characterize good scientific work. A judge is not a
scientist, and a courtroom is not a scientific laboratory. But consider the remark
made by the physicist Wolfgang Pauli. After a colleague asked whether a certain
scientific paper was wrong, Pauli replied, “That paper isn’t even good enough
to be wrong!”7 Our objective is to avoid legal decisions that reflect that paper’s
so-called science. The law must seek decisions that fall within the boundaries of
scientifically sound knowledge.
Even this more modest objective is sometimes difficult to achieve in practice.
The most obvious reason is that most judges lack the scientific training that might
facilitate the evaluation of scientific claims or the evaluation of expert witnesses
who make such claims. Judges typically are generalists, dealing with cases that can
vary widely in subject matter. Our primary objective is usually process-related:
seeing that a decision is reached fairly and in a timely way. And the decision in a
court of law typically (though not always) focuses on a particular event and specific
individualized evidence.
Furthermore, science itself may be highly uncertain and controversial with
respect to many of the matters that come before the courts. Scientists often express
considerable uncertainty about the dangers of a particular substance. And their
views may differ about many related questions that courts may have to answer.
What, for example, is the relevance to human cancer of studies showing that a
substance causes some cancers, perhaps only a few, in test groups of mice or rats?
What is the significance of extrapolations from toxicity studies involving high
doses to situations where the doses are much smaller? Can lawyers or judges or
anyone else expect scientists always to be certain or always to have uniform views
7. Peter W. Huber, Galileo’s Revenge: Junk Science in the Courtroom 54 (1991).
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Introduction
with respect to an extrapolation from a large dose to a small one, when the causes
of and mechanisms related to cancer are generally not well known? Many difficult
legal cases fall within this area of scientific uncertainty.
Finally, a court proceeding, such as a trial, is not simply a search for dispas-
sionate truth. The law must be fair. In our country, it must always seek to protect
basic human liberties. One important procedural safeguard, guaranteed by our
Constitution’s Seventh Amendment, is the right to a trial by jury. A number of
innovative techniques have been developed to strengthen the ability of juries to
consider difficult evidence.8 Any effort to bring better science into the courtroom
must respect the jury’s constitutionally specified role—even if doing so means that,
from a scientific perspective, an incorrect result is sometimes produced.
Despite the difficulties, I believe there is an increasingly important need for
law to reflect sound science. I remain optimistic about the likelihood that it will
do so. It is common to find cooperation between governmental institutions and
the scientific community where the need for that cooperation is apparent. Today,
as a matter of course, the President works with a science adviser, Congress solicits
advice on the potential dangers of food additives from the National Academy of
Sciences, and scientific regulatory agencies often work with outside scientists, as
well as their own, to develop a product that reflects good science.
The judiciary, too, has begun to look for ways to improve the quality of
the science on which scientifically related judicial determinations will rest. The
Federal Judicial Center is collaborating with the National Academy of Sciences
through the Academy’s Committee on Science, Technology, and Law.9 The
Committee brings together on a regular basis knowledgeable scientists, engineers,
judges, attorneys, and corporate and government officials to explore areas of inter-
action and improve communication among the science, engineering, and legal
communities. The Committee is intended to provide a neutral, nonadversarial
forum for promoting understanding, encouraging imaginative approaches to prob-
lem solving, and discussing issues at the intersection of science and law.
In the Supreme Court, as a matter of course, we hear not only from the par-
ties to a case but also from outside groups, which file amicus curiae briefs that help
us to become more informed about the relevant science. In the “right-to-die”
case, for example, we received about 60 such documents from organizations of
doctors, psychologists, nurses, hospice workers, and handicapped persons, among
others. Many discussed pain-control technology, thereby helping us to identify
areas of technical consensus and disagreement. Such briefs help to educate the
justices on potentially relevant technical matters, making us not experts, but
moderately educated laypersons, and that education improves the quality of our
decisions.
8. See generally Jury Trial Innovations (G. Thomas Munsterman et al. eds., 1997).
9. A description of the program can be found at Committee on Science, Technology, and Law,
http://www.nationalacademies.org/stl (last visited Aug. 10, 2011).
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Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence
Moreover, our Court has made clear that the law imposes on trial judges the
duty, with respect to scientific evidence, to become evidentiary gatekeepers.10
The judge, without interfering with the jury’s role as trier of fact, must determine
whether purported scientific evidence is “reliable” and will “assist the trier of
fact,” thereby keeping from juries testimony that, in Pauli’s sense, isn’t even good
enough to be wrong. This requirement extends beyond scientific testimony to all
forms of expert testimony.11 The purpose of Daubert’s gatekeeping requirement
“is to make certain that an expert, whether basing testimony upon professional
studies or personal experience, employs in the courtroom the same level of intel-
lectual rigor that characterizes the practice of an expert in the relevant field.”12
Federal trial judges, looking for ways to perform the gatekeeping func-
tion better, increasingly have used case-management techniques such as pretrial
conferences to narrow the scientific issues in dispute, pretrial hearings where
potential experts are subject to examination by the court, and the appointment
of specially trained law clerks or scientific special masters. For example, Judge
Richard Stearns of Massachusetts, acting with the consent of the parties in a
highly technical genetic engineering patent case,13 appointed a Harvard Medical
School professor to serve “as a sounding board for the court to think through
the scientific significance of the evidence” and to “assist the court in determining
the validity of any scientific evidence, hypothesis or theory on which the experts
base their testimony.”14 Judge Robert E. Jones of Oregon appointed experts from
four different fields to help him assess the scientific reliability of expert testimony
in silicone gel breast implant litigation.15 Judge Gladys Kessler of the District of
Columbia hired a professor of environmental science at the University of Califor-
nia at Berkeley “to answer the Court’s technical questions regarding the meaning
of terms, phrases, theories and rationales included in or referred to in the briefs
and exhibits” of the parties.16 Judge A. Wallace Tashima of the Ninth Circuit has
described the role of technical advisor as “that of a … tutor who aids the court
in understanding the ‘jargon and theory’ relevant to the technical aspects of the
evidence.”17
Judge Jack B. Weinstein of New York suggests that courts should some-
times “go beyond the experts proffered by the parties” and “appoint indepen-
10. Gen. Elec. Co. v. Joiner, 522 U.S. 136 (1997); Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharms., Inc., 509
U.S. 579 (1993).
11. Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, 119 S. Ct. 1167 (1999).
12. Id. at 1176.
13. Biogen, Inc. v. Amgen, Inc., 973 F. Supp. 39 (D. Mass. 1997).
14. MediaCom Corp. v. Rates Tech., Inc., 4 F. Supp. 2d 17 app. B at 37 (D. Mass. 1998)
(quoting the Affidavit of Engagement filed in Biogen, Inc. v. Amgen, Inc., 973 F. Supp. 39 (D. Mass.
1997) (No. 95-10496)).
15. Hall v. Baxter Healthcare Corp., 947 F. Supp. 1387 (D. Or. 1996).
16. Conservation Law Found. v. Evans, 203 F. Supp. 2d 27, 32 (D.D.C. 2002).
17. Ass’n of Mexican-American Educators v. State of California, 231 F.3d 572, 612 (9th Cir.
2000) (en banc) (Tashima, J., dissenting).
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Introduction
dent experts” as the Federal Rules of Evidence allow.18 Judge Gerald Rosen of
Michigan appointed a University of Michigan Medical School professor to testify
as an expert witness for the court, helping to determine the relevant facts in a
case that challenged a Michigan law prohibiting partial-birth abortions.19 Chief
Judge Robert Pratt of Iowa hired two experts—a professor of insurance and an
actuary—to help him review the fairness of a settlement agreement in a complex
class-action insurance-fraud case.20 And Judge Nancy Gertner of Massachusetts
appointed a professor from Brandeis University to assist the court in assessing a
criminal defendant’s challenge to the racial composition of the jury venire in the
Eastern Division of the District of Massachusetts.21
In what one observer has described as “the most comprehensive attempt to
incorporate science, as scientists practice it, into law,”22 Judge Sam Pointer, Jr.,
of Alabama appointed a “neutral science panel” of four scientists from different
disciplines to prepare a report and testimony on the scientific basis of claims in sili-
cone gel breast implant product liability cases consolidated as part of a multidistrict
litigation process.23 The panel’s report was cited in numerous decisions exclud-
ing expert testimony that connected silicone gel breast implants with systemic
injury.24 The scientists’ testimony was videotaped and made part of the record
so that judges and jurors could consider it in cases returned to the district courts
from the multidistrict litigation process. The use of such videotape testimony can
result in more consistent decisions across courts, as well as great savings of time
and expense for individual litigants and courts.
These case-management techniques are neutral, in principle favoring neither
plaintiffs nor defendants. When used, they have typically proved successful. None-
theless, judges have not often invoked their rules-provided authority to appoint
their own experts.25 They may hesitate simply because the process is unfamiliar
or because the use of this kind of technique inevitably raises questions. Will use
of an independent expert, in effect, substitute that expert’s judgment for that of
the court? Will it inappropriately deprive the parties of control over the presenta-
tion of the case? Will it improperly intrude on the proper function of the jury?
Where is one to find a truly neutral expert? After all, different experts, in total
honesty, often interpret the same data differently. Will the search for the expert
18. Jack B. Weinstein, Individual Justice in Mass Tort Litigation: The Effect of Class Actions,
Consolidations, and Other Multiparty Devices 116 (1995).
19. Evans v. Kelley, 977 F. Supp. 1283 (E.D. Mich. 1997).
20. Grove v. Principal Mutual Life Ins. Co., 200 F.R.D. 434, 443 (S.D. Iowa 2001).
21. United States v. Green, 389 F. Supp. 2d 29, 48 (D. Mass. 2005).
22. Olivia Judson, Slide-Rule Justice, Nat’l J., Oct. 9, 1999, at 2882, 2885.
23. In re Silicone Gel Breast Implant Prod. Liab. Litig., Order 31 (N.D. Ala. filed May 30,
1996) (MDL No. 926).
24. See Laura L. Hooper et al., Assessing Causation in Breast Implant Litigation: The Role of Science
Panels, 64 Law & Contemp. Probs. 139, 181 n.217 (collecting cases).
25. Joe S. Cecil & Thomas E. Willging, Accepting Daubert’s Invitation: Defining a Role for Court-
Appointed Experts in Assessing Scientific Validity, 43 Emory L.J. 995, 1004 (1994).
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Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence
create inordinate delay or significantly increase costs? Who will pay the expert?
Judge William Acker, Jr., of Alabama writes:
Unless and until there is a national register of experts on various subjects and a
method by which they can be fairly compensated, the federal amateurs wear-
ing black robes will have to overlook their new gatekeeping function lest they
assume the intolerable burden of becoming experts themselves in every discipline
known to the physical and social sciences, and some as yet unknown but sure
to blossom.26
A number of scientific and professional organizations have come forward
with proposals to aid the courts in finding skilled experts. The National Confer-
ence of Lawyers and Scientists, a joint committee of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the Science and Technology Section
of the American Bar Association, has developed a program to assist federal and
state judges, administrative law judges, and arbitrators in identifying indepen-
dent experts in cases that present technical issues, when the adversarial system is
unlikely to yield the information necessary for a reasoned and principled resolu-
tion of the disputed issues. The program locates experts through professional and
scientific organizations and with the help of a Recruitment and Screening Panel
of scientists, engineers, and health care professionals.27
The Private Adjudication Center at Duke University—which unfortunately
no longer exists—established a registry of independent scientific and technical
experts who were willing to provide advice to courts or serve as court-appointed
experts.28 Registry services also were available to arbitrators and mediators and
to parties and lawyers who together agreed to engage an independent expert at
the early stages of a dispute. The registry recruited experts primarily from major
academic institutions and conducted targeted searches to find experts with the
qualifications required for particular cases. Registrants were required to adhere to
a code of conduct designed to ensure confidence in their impartiality and integrity.
Among those judges who have thus far experimented with court-appointed
scientific experts, the reaction has been mixed, ranging from enthusiastic to dis-
appointed. The Federal Judicial Center has examined a number of questions
arising from the use of court-appointed experts and, based on interviews with
participants in Judge Pointer’s neutral science panel, has offered lessons to guide
courts in future cases. We need to learn how better to identify impartial experts,
to screen for possible conflicts of interest, and to instruct experts on the scope of
26. Letter from Judge William Acker, Jr., to the Judicial Conference of the United States et al.
(Jan. 2, 1998).
27. Information on the AAAS program can be found at Court Appointed Scientific Experts,
http://www.aaas.org/spp/case/case.htm (last visited Aug. 10, 2011).
28. Letter from Corinne A. Houpt, Registry Project Director, Private Adjudication Center, to
Judge Rya W. Zobel, Director, Federal Judicial Center (Dec. 29, 1998) (on file with the Research
Division of the Federal Judicial Center).
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Introduction
their duties. Also, we need to know how better to protect the interests of the par-
ties and the experts when such extraordinary procedures are used. We also need to
know how best to prepare a scientist for the sometimes hostile legal environment
that arises during depositions and cross-examination.29
It would also undoubtedly be helpful to recommend methods for efficiently
educating (i.e., in a few hours) willing scientists in the ways of the courts, just as
it would be helpful to develop training that might better equip judges to under-
stand the ways of science and the ethical, as well as practical and legal, aspects of
scientific testimony.30
In this age of science we must build legal foundations that are sound in sci-
ence as well as in law. Scientists have offered their help. We in the legal com-
munity should accept that offer. We are in the process of doing so. This manual
seeks to open legal institutional channels through which science—its learning,
tools, and principles—may flow more easily and thereby better inform the law.
The manual represents one part of a joint scientific–legal effort that will further
the interests of truth and justice alike.
29. Laura L. Hooper et al., Neutral Science Panels: Two Examples of Panels of Court-Appointed
Experts in the Breast Implants Product Liability Litigation 93–98 (Federal Judicial Center 2001);
Barbara S. Hulka et al., Experience of a Scientific Panel Formed to Advise the Federal Judiciary on Silicone
Breast Implants, 342 New Eng. J. Med. 812 (2000).
30. Gilbert S. Omenn, Enhancing the Role of the Scientific Expert Witness, 102 Envtl. Health Persp.
674 (1994).
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