Whether judge can present dissenting opinion in the judgment?

The subject of this article is a dissenting opinion. Dissenting opinion, if it exists in country’s judicial system, can be reasoned or not; it can be published in the judgment or it can be attached to case file. The basic consideration in this article is given to status of dissenting opinion in Lithuania and USA. The tasks of this article are: 1) to traverse and to compare world legal systems‘ attitude towards dissenting opinion; 2) to evaluate status of dissenting opinion in USA and Lithuania 3) to traverse advantages and disadvantages of dissenting opinion being presented in the judgment. In this article it was noticed that presentation of dissenting opinion in the judgment is not characteristic of civil law countries. In civil law countries there is a single anonymous judgment with no dissent made public, all judges sign the judgment. In common and in Nordic law countries judge‘s right to present dissenting opinion in the judgment is not so restrictive. Judges of International Court of Justice and European Court of Human rights can present dissenting opinion in the judgment, judges of European Court of Justice, however, can‘t do it. In USA dissenting opinion is presented in the judgment.[...]Vytauto Didžiojo universiteta