He cites one study in which officers were asked to determine the legality of police searches in six scenarios based on facts from Supreme Court cases where three of the searches were legal and three were illegal. Bradley also conducted a preliminary study of decisions in fourth amendment cases rendered by nine state appellate courts. He found that 15.7 percent of the 233 opinions reversed the lower court decision. Bradley concludes that these studies when combined with expert and lay opinion provide the necessary empirical underpinning for his pessimistic view of the current state of fourth amendment law. The causes for this state of affairs, Bradley claims, are the uncertainty and incompleteness of the Court's decisions.
Uncertainty is especially important.
Attempts to settle constitutional issues create more, not less uncertainty. In his fourth chapter, Bradley argues uncertainty in the law is very nearly inevitable for several reasons. The justices invariably justify their decisions on various grounds. The Court's opinions reflect the compromises that characterize collective decision making. At the same time, justices who join the majority opinion may remain silent about issues because they do not feel strongly about them even though the issues ought to be ventilated.