The research project reported in this paper sought to discover what, if any, factors present among school boards and court decisions appeared to be associated with the degree to which school boards responded to court decisions. The study, in an effort to assess the impact of the courts on local school boards, also asked whether school boards not directly involved in specific litigation generally ignore the legal directives of the courts. Using two random samples of school boards in California and six carefully selected court decisions, the researcher found that there did not appear to be any personnel or decision-related variables that were associated with the level or rate of response to the courts. Moreover, it was found that there was less than a 4 percent response rate by the sampled local boards to a variety of court decisions, which may indicate that local boards do, in fact, tend to ignore the legal directives of the courts. The research suggests that the impact of the courts on local school boards may be far more limited than one might assume, given the general tone and content of earlier research and the current rhetoric of schoolmen. (Author)