A court decision is a legal judgment reached by a judge or a jury based on facts and law. The decision usually affects the rights of the parties involved in the dispute. It can be an interlocutory decision settling an intermediate matter or a final decision which settles all matters in the case.
When judges reach decisions in cases, they are required to give reasons for their conclusions. This information helps the court’s justices and staff understand why a ruling is made, how the judge reached it, and why the decision should be followed in future cases. Depending on the case and its significance, a judge may write one or more opinions or “holdings.”
Court decisions are the basis for other law such as statutes and regulations. Decisions can also guide how a trial judge should charge a jury and what the judge should tell them about the law in a given situation. Court decisions also establish precedent, which is the principle that courts should follow the outcome of an earlier case with similar facts and issues.
The way a court’s decision is received by those outside the courtroom can influence its impact. In some cases, elites are able to calm negative public reaction to the results of a ruling; for example, Southern elites were able to defuse popular anger over school desegregation in the short run after Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.
Other factors that determine the impact of a court decision include whether or not someone follows up on it, who that someone is, and how they act. In particular, many people in important occupational groups such as police are not sufficiently trained to be cognizant of the Court’s rulings and thus may not be able to follow them properly.