Where he desires to punish an outsider (pro se) for having the audacity to disturb the status quo, an unpublished opinion is the perfect tool. He may avoid the undesirable side effect of bad precedent while providing the desirable side effect of enhancing his capital within the judicial community.

Michael Lee

First, establishing a firm tradition of adherence to precedent promotes consistency and serves as a limit on judicial power. Second, disrespect for precedent might undermine the political capital of the judiciary and may lead to a backlash by other branches or the public, thus undermining the judiciary’s power in the future. Third, departing from precedent gradually undermines the function of adherence to precedent, which helps establish the legitimacy of judicial decisions. Undermining this source of legitimacy renders impotent one of the primary sources of judicial power.

For Federal judges, at any rate, and at very least in the context of statutory interpretation, perhaps we could add a fourth issue (albeit of a distinctly non-pragmatic variety) – that stare decisis may well have been part of the original understanding of the judicial power, per Prof. Strang?