Introduction

Marbury vs. Madison by William Nelson examines the doctrine of judicial review in America. There are five parts to the book which include: (1) A survey of American political and legal history and doctrines that preceded the Presidential election of 1800, and the controversies surrounding that election. (2) The facts and circumstances leading up to Marbury v. Madison, and the Supreme Court's decision. (3) The initial political and legal consequences of the Supreme Court's decision. (4) The later change in legal interpretations of the Supreme Court's decision in Marbury v. Madison, which broadened its scope and reach. (5) The spread of the doctrine of judicial review around the world, and the relevance of the doctrine of judicial review today.

In this text, tha author argues that the rule of law is our deepest political and cultural myth. He draws on the insights of modern cultural theory to investigate why the rule of law exerts its attraction, and how its premises became figments in our collective political imagination.

Marbury v. Madison, decided in 1803, is the foundation stone of the American doctrine of judicial review. Remarkably, the case was decided without the parties having presented an oral argument to the Supreme Court. This book begins with a unique transcript of an oral argument in the case, conducted before a bench of four distinguished federal judges. The transcript is followed by essays on Marburys intellectual background, its significance in U.S. constitutional history, and the way in which we might think of constitutional theory and judicial review in terms sensitive to the historical and political contexts in which the practice persists. Distinguished commentators question some of the claims made in the essays, and offer their own perspectives on Marburys importance.

Federalism—including its meanings and limits—remains one of the most contested principles in constitutional law. To fully understand its importance, we must turn to a landmark decision nearly two centuries old. M'Culloch v. Maryland (1819) is widely regarded as the Supreme Court's most important and influential decision-one that essentially defined the nature and scope of federal authority and its relationship to the states. Mark Killenbeck's sharply insightful study helps us understand why. Killenbeck recounts how the cashier of the Baltimore branch of the Second Bank of the United States refused to pay Maryland's tax on the bank and how that act precipitated a showdown in the Supreme Court, which addressed two questions: whether the U.S. Congress had the authority to establish a national bank and whether Maryland's tax on the bank was barred by the Constitution. In one of Chief Justice John Marshall's most famous opinions, the Court unanimously answered yes to both, authorizing the federal government to exercise powers not expressly articulated in the Constitution—and setting an alarming precedent for states—rights advocates. The issues at the heart of M'Culloch are as important today as they were then: the nature and scope of federal constitutional authority, the division of authority between federal and state governments, and the role of the Supreme Court in interpreting and applying the Constitution. Situating the case within the protracted debate about the bank and about federal-state relations, the Panic of 1819, the fate of the Second Bank following the Court's momentous decision, and the ever-expanding and increasingly contentious debate over slavery, Killenbeck's book provides a virtual constitutional history of the first fifty years of the nation. As such, it shows that the development of the Constitution as a viable governing document took place over time and that M'Culloch, with its very broad reading of federal power, marked a turning point for the Constitution, the Court, and the nation. As the Court continues to reshape the boundaries of federal power, M'Culloch looms large as a precedent in a debate that has never been fully settled. And as states today grapple with such questions as abortion, gay rights, medical marijuana, or assisted suicide, this book puts that precedent in perspective and offers a firm grasp of its implications for the future.

When the first Supreme Court convened in 1790, it was so ill-esteemed that its justices frequently resigned in favor of other pursuits. John Rutledge stepped down as Associate Justice to become a state judge in South Carolina; John Jay resigned as Chief Justice to run for Governor of New York; and Alexander Hamilton declined to replace Jay, pursuing a private law practice instead. As Bernard Schwartz shows in this landmark history, the Supreme Court has indeed travelled a long and interesting journey to its current preeminent place in American life. In A History of the Supreme Court, Schwartz provides the finest, most comprehensive one-volume narrative ever published of our highest court. With impeccable scholarship and a clear, engaging style, he tells the story of the justices and their jurisprudence--and the influence the Court has had on American politics and society. With a keen ability to explain complex legal issues for the nonspecialist, he takes us through both the great and the undistinguised Courts of our nation's history. He provides insight into our foremost justices, such as John Marshall (who established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison, an outstanding display of political calculation as well as fine jurisprudence), Roger Taney (whose legacy has been overshadowed by Dred Scott v. Sanford), Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and others. He draws on evidence such as personal letters and interviews to show how the court has worked, weaving narrative details into deft discussions of the developments in constitutional law. Schwartz also examines the operations of the court: until 1935, it met in a small room under the Senate--so cramped that the judges had to put on their robes in full view of the spectators. But when the new building was finally opened, one justice called it "almost bombastically pretentious," and another asked, "What are we supposed to do, ride in on nine elephants?" He includes fascinating asides, on the debate in the first Court, for instance, over the use of English-style wigs and gowns (the decision: gowns, no wigs); and on the day Oliver Wendell Holmes announced his resignation--the same day that Earl Warren, as a California District Attorney, argued his first case before the Court. The author brings the story right up to the present day, offering balanced analyses of the pivotal Warren Court and the Rehnquist Court through 1992 (including, of course, the arrival of Clarence Thomas). In addition, he includes four special chapters on watershed cases: Dred Scott v. Sanford, Lochner v. New York, Brown v. Board of Education, and Roe v. Wade. Schwartz not only analyzes the impact of each of these epoch-making cases, he takes us behind the scenes, drawing on all available evidence to show how the justices debated the cases and how they settled on their opinions. Bernard Schwartz is one of the most highly regarded scholars of the Supreme Court, author of dozens of books on the law, and winner of the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. In this remarkable account, he provides the definitive one-volume account of our nation's highest court.

What began as a standoff between competing steamship entrepreneurs ended as one of the Supreme Court's most significant cases. Gibbons v. Ogden in 1824 brought into sharp relief the ongoing tug-of-war for power between individual states and the federal government. By applying the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, the Court set a key precedent for federal authority. But, behind the scenes, the "Steamboat Case" also demonstrated Chief Justice John Marshall's instrumental role as mediator on the bench. Untangling the issues and the arguments in Gibbons, Herbert Johnson reveals the lasting impact of this landmark case on both commerce in the Early Republic and the understanding and growth of federal power during the last 200 years. Johnson brings the case's protagonists—including Marshall and Daniel Webster—vividly to life and deftly illuminates its key aspects: the ambiguity of the Court's judgment; Justice William Johnson's nationalist-oriented concurring opinion; Marshall's avoidance of such key issues as the role of the dormant commerce clause and the relationship of foreign trade, interstate commerce, and diplomatic relations; and Marshall's failure to address patents and state monopolies. Perhaps most significant, the author challenges the traditional view that Gibbons established that the Constitution bestowed upon Congress an exclusive power to regulate interstate commerce. Drawing on recent research into the early Court, Johnson shows how Gibbons provides a salient example of Marshall's ability to gain agreement despite severe differences among his colleagues. No longer surrounded by fellow Federalists on the bench, Marshall mustered all of his managerial skills to achieve consensus, and his opinion for the Court reflected the concessions and agreements that he engineered to achieve near unanimity in a decision that favored federal power without establishing a definitive endorsement of it. Johnson shows that the outcome of this case was a key moment in the economic history of the nation, heralding the expansion of entrepreneurship and technology while justifying federal primacy in the regulation of commerce. Concise and ideally suited for the classroom, his study not only provides new insight into this landmark case but also attests to its significance in the working of the early Court.

When the first Supreme Court convened in 1790, it was so ill-esteemed that its justices frequently resigned in favor of other pursuits. John Rutledge stepped down as Associate Justice to become a state judge in South Carolina; John Jay resigned as Chief Justice to run for Governor of New York; and Alexander Hamilton declined to replace Jay, pursuing a private law practice instead. As Bernard Schwartz shows in this landmark history, the Supreme Court has indeed travelled a long and interesting journey to its current preeminent place in American life. In A History of the Supreme Court, Schwartz provides the finest, most comprehensive one-volume narrative ever published of our highest court. With impeccable scholarship and a clear, engaging style, he tells the story of the justices and their jurisprudence--and the influence the Court has had on American politics and society. With a keen ability to explain complex legal issues for the nonspecialist, he takes us through both the great and the undistinguised Courts of our nation's history. He provides insight into our foremost justices, such as John Marshall (who established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison, an outstanding display of political calculation as well as fine jurisprudence), Roger Taney (whose legacy has been overshadowed by Dred Scott v. Sanford), Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and others. He draws on evidence such as personal letters and interviews to show how the court has worked, weaving narrative details into deft discussions of the developments in constitutional law. Schwartz also examines the operations of the court: until 1935, it met in a small room under the Senate--so cramped that the judges had to put on their robes in full view of the spectators. But when the new building was finally opened, one justice called it "almost bombastically pretentious," and another asked, "What are we supposed to do, ride in on nine elephants?" He includes fascinating asides, on the debate in the first Court, for instance, over the use of English-style wigs and gowns (the decision: gowns, no wigs); and on the day Oliver Wendell Holmes announced his resignation--the same day that Earl Warren, as a California District Attorney, argued his first case before the Court. The author brings the story right up to the present day, offering balanced analyses of the pivotal Warren Court and the Rehnquist Court through 1992 (including, of course, the arrival of Clarence Thomas). In addition, he includes four special chapters on watershed cases: Dred Scott v. Sanford, Lochner v. New York, Brown v. Board of Education, and Roe v. Wade. Schwartz not only analyzes the impact of each of these epoch-making cases, he takes us behind the scenes, drawing on all available evidence to show how the justices debated the cases and how they settled on their opinions. Bernard Schwartz is one of the most highly regarded scholars of the Supreme Court, author of dozens of books on the law, and winner of the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. In this remarkable account, he provides the definitive one-volume account of our nation's highest court.

The slave Dred Scott claimed that his residence in a free state transformed him into a free man. His lawsuit took many twists and turns before making its way to the Supreme Court in 1856. But when the Court ruled against him, the ruling sent shock waves through the nation and helped lead to civil war. Writing for the 7-to-2 majority, Chief Justice Roger Taney asserted that blacks were not and never could be citizens. Taney also ruled that the Missouri Compromise of 1820 was unconstitutional, upsetting the balance of slave and free states. Earl Maltz now offers a new look at this landmark case, presenting Dred Scott as a turning point in an already contentious national debate. Maltz's accessible account depicts Dred Scott as both a contributing factor to war and the result of a political climate that had grown so threatening to the South that overturning the Missouri Compromise was considered essential. As the nation continued its rapid expansion, Southerners became progressively more fearful of the free states' growing political clout. In that light, the ruling from a Court filled with justices sympathetic to the Southern cause, though far from surprising helped light the long fuse that eventually exploded into Civil War. Maltz offers an uncommonly balanced look at the case, taking Southern concerns seriously to cast new light on why proponents of slavery saw things as they did. He presents the arguments of all the parties impartially, tracks the sequence of increasingly strained compromises between pro- and anti-slavery forces, and demonstrates how political and sectional influences infiltrated the legal issues. He then traces the impact of the case on Northern and Southern public opinion, showing how a decision meant to resolve the question of slavery in the territories only aggravated sectional animosity. By presenting a more nuanced picture of the pro-Southern justices on the Court, Maltz offers readers a better understanding of how they came to their opinions, even as they failed to anticipate the impact their decision would have—a miscalculation that to some degree undermined the Court's power and authority within the American political system. Ultimately, as Maltz suggests, this is a story of judicial failure, one that remains a vital chapter in American law and one that must be mastered by anyone wishing to understand the peculiar nature of our national history.

Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil , first published in 2006, concerns what is entailed by pledging allegiance to a constitutional text and tradition saturated with concessions to evil. The Constitution of the United States was originally understood as an effort to mediate controversies between persons who disputed fundamental values, and did not offer a vision of the good society. In order to form a 'more perfect union' with slaveholders, late-eighteenth-century citizens fashioned a constitution that plainly compelled some injustices and was silent or ambiguous on other questions of fundamental right. This constitutional relationship could survive only as long as a bisectional consensus was required to resolve all constitutional questions not settled in 1787. Dred Scott challenges persons committed to human freedom to determine whether antislavery northerners should have provided more accommodations for slavery than were constitutionally strictly necessary or risked the enormous destruction of life and property that preceded Lincoln's new birth of freedom.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1979, The Dred Scott Case is a masterful examination of the most famous example of judicial failure--the case referred to as "the most frequently overturned decision in history." On March 6, 1857, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney delivered the Supreme Court's decision against Dred Scott, a slave who maintained he had been emancipated as a result of having lived with his master in the free state of Illinois and in federal territory where slavery was forbidden by the Missouri Compromise. The decision did much more than resolve the fate of an elderly black man and his family: Dred Scott v. Sanford was the first instance in which the Supreme Court invalidated a major piece of federal legislation. The decision declared that Congress had no power to prohibit slavery in the federal territories, thereby striking a severe blow at the legitimacy of the emerging Republican party and intensifying the sectional conflict over slavery. This book represents a skillful review of the issues before America on the eve of the Civil War. The first third of the book deals directly with the with the case itself and the Court's decision, while the remainder puts the legal and judicial question of slavery into the broadest possible American context. Fehrenbacher discusses the legal bases of slavery, the debate over the Constitution, and the dispute over slavery and continental expansion. He also considers the immediate and long-range consequences of the decision.

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1868, sought to protect the rights of the newly freed slaves; but its first important test did not arise until five years later. When it did, it centered on a vitriolic dispute among the white butchers of mid-Reconstruction New Orleans. The rough-and-tumble world of nineteenth-century New Orleans was a sanitation nightmare, with the city's many slaughterhouses dumping animal remains into neighboring backwaters. When Louisiana finally authorized a monopoly slaughterhouse to bring about sanitation reform, many butchers felt disenfranchised from their livelihoods. Framing their case as an infringement of fundamental rights protected by the new amendment, they flooded the lower courts with nearly 300 suits. The surviving cases that reached the U.S. Supreme Court pitted the butchers' right-to-labor against the state's "police power" to regulate public health. The result was a controversial and long-debated decision that for the first time addressed the meaning and import of the Fourteenth Amendment. Speaking for the slim majority in the Court's 5-4 decision, Justice Samuel F. Miller upheld the state's actions as a fair use of its "police power." Of much greater import, however, was Miller's finding that the Fourteenth Amendment was intended exclusively as a means of protecting and redressing the suffering of former slaves. The result was a very restricted interpretation of the "privileges and immunities," "due process," and "equal protection" clauses of the new amendment. Accustomed to a very limited federal presence in the states, the Court refused to allow the broad terms of a single amendment to alter the existing balance of power between the states and the federal government. In striking contrast, the minority, represented most notably by Justice Stephen Field, claimed that the Fourteenth Amendment had been intended to apply to all Americans, not just former slaves. In particular, the minority contended, it guaranteed the New Orleans butchers a right to equal treatment in the exercise of the police power. The position of the dissenters foreshadowed an aggressive use of the Court's power in the protection of fundamental rights in the future. In The Slaughterhouse Cases, Labb and Lurie take a much needed look at a landmark decision that has been far more cited than closely studied. Engagingly written and insightfully argued, the book provides the most complete analysis yet of this controversial Supreme Court decision, fills a major gap in American history, law, and politics, and sets the standard for all future discussions on the subject.

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1868, sought to protect the rights of the newly freed slaves; but its first important test did not arise until five years later. That test centered on a vitriolic dispute among the white butchers of mid-Reconstruction New Orleans. The rough-and-tumble world of nineteenth-century New Orleans was a sanitation nightmare, with the city's slaughterhouses dumping animal remains into local backwaters. When Louisiana authorized a monopoly slaughterhouse to bring about sanitation reform, many independent butchers felt disenfranchised. Framing their case as an infringement of rights protected by the new amendment, they flooded the lower courts with nearly 300 suits. The surviving cases that reached the U.S. Supreme Court pitted the butchers' right to labor against the state's "police power" to regulate public health. The result was a controversial decision that for the first time addressed the meaning and import of the Fourteenth Amendment. Speaking for the majority in the Court's 5-4 decision, Justice Samuel F. Miller upheld the state's actions as a fair use of its "police power." He also argued that the Fourteenth Amendment was intended exclusively as a means of protecting and redressing the suffering of former slaves. The result was a very restricted interpretation of the amendment's "privileges and immunities," "due process," and "equal protection" clauses. In striking contrast, the minority, led by Justices Stephen Field and Joseph Bradley, claimed that the Fourteenth Amendment had been intended to apply to all Americans, not just former slaves, and therefore protected the butchers' right to labor in their chosen profession. Engagingly written and concisely crafted for students and general readers, this newly abridged edition provides a very accessible guide to one of the Supreme Court's most famous cases.

Authoritative coverage examines the constitutional issues that are studied and litigated today. This text thoroughly analyzes and discusses the origins of judicial review and federal jurisdiction, the sources of national authority, the growth of federal commerce and fiscal powers, and the limits on state laws that burden interstate commerce. This book then explores and analyzes individual liberties and due process, including equal protection, freedom of speech and religion, federal powers to enforce the Bill of Rights, and limitations on the jurisdiction of federal courts. Finally, this one-volume treatise explores the separation of powers including the restrictions on the foreign affairs power and the recent cases on the war on terror. This book (and the 6-volume treatise by the same authors) has been cited by state and federal courts at all levels, from trial court to the U.S. Supreme Court, over 1,000 times.

When the American Railway Union went on strike against the Pullman Palace Car Company in 1894, it set into motion a chain of events whose repercussions are still felt today. The strike pitted America's largest industrial union against twenty-four railroads, paralyzed rail traffic in half the country, and in the end was broken up by federal troops and suppressed by the courts, with union leader Eugene Debs incarcerated. But behind the Pullman case lay a conflict of ideologies at a watershed time in our nation's history. David Ray Papke reexamines the events and personalities surrounding the 1894 strike, related proceedings in the Chicago trial courts, and the 1895 Supreme Court decision, In re Debs, which set important standards for labor injunctions. He shows how the Court, by upholding Debs's contempt citation, dealt fatal blows to broad-based unionism in the nation's most important industry and to any hope for a more evenhanded form of judicial involvement in labor disputes-thus setting the stage for labor law in decades to come. The Pullman case was a defining moment in the often violent confrontation between capital and labor. It matched wealthy industrialist George Pullman against Debs and gave a stage to Debs's fledgling attorney Clarence Darrow. Throughout the trial, capital and labor tried to convince the public of the justice of their cause: Debs decrying the company's treatment of workers and Pullman raising fears of radical unionists. Papke provides an analytically concise and highly readable account of these proceedings, offering insight into the strengths and weaknesses of the law at the peak of industrial capitalism, showcasing Debs's passionate commitment to workers' rights, and providing a window on America during a period of rapid industrialization and social transformation. Papke shows that the law was far from neutral in defending corporate interests and suggests what the Pullman case, by raising questions about both the legitimacy of giant corporations and the revolutionary style of industrial unions, can teach us about law and legal institutions in our own time. His book captures the passions of industrial America and tells an important story at the intersection of legal and cultural history.

Touching on history, economics, politics, and law, these stories steal behind the texts of the legal opinions into the larger-than-life personalities and struggles of their antagonists and protagonists. This title is an invaluable supplement to any federal courts casebook.

Six decades before Rosa Parks boarded her fateful bus, another traveler in the Deep South tried to strike a blow against racial discrimination—but ultimately fell short of that goal, leading to the Supreme Court's landmark 1896 decision in Plessy v. Ferguson. Now Williamjames Hull Hoffer vividly details the origins, litigation, opinions, and aftermath of this notorious case. In response to the passage of the Louisiana Separate Car Act of 1890, which prescribed "equal but separate accommodations" on public transportation, a group called the Committee of Citizens decided to challenge its constitutionality. At a pre-selected time and place, Homer Plessy, on behalf of the committee, boarded a train car set aside for whites, announced his non-white racial identity, and was immediately arrested. The legal deliberations that followed eventually led to the Court's 7-1 decision in Plessy, which upheld both the Louisiana statute and the state's police powers. It also helped create a Jim Crow system that would last deep into the twentieth century, until Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 and other cases helped overturn it. Hoffer's readable study synthesizes past work on this landmark case, while also shedding new light on its proceedings and often-neglected historical contexts. From the streets of New Orleans' Faubourg Trem district to the justices' chambers at the Supreme Court, he breathes new life into the opposing forces, dissecting their arguments to clarify one of the most important, controversial, and socially revealing cases in American law. He particularly focuses on Justice Henry Billings Brown's ruling that the statute's "equal, but separate" condition was a sufficient constitutional standard for equality, and on Justice John Marshall Harlan's classic dissent, in which he stated, "Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among its citizens." Hoffer's compelling reconstruction illuminates the controversies and impact of Plessy v. Ferguson for a new generation of students and other interested readers. It also pays tribute to a group of little known heroes from the Deep South who failed to hold back the tide of racial segregation but nevertheless laid the groundwork for a less divided America.

This publication provides a student with an understanding of 15 leading U.S. constitutional law cases, focusing on how the litigation was shaped by lawyers, judges and socioeconomic factors, and why the cases have attained landmark status. It is suitable for adoption as a supplement in an introductory constitutional law course, or as a text for an advanced seminar.

Lochner v. New York is an account of the politics and personalities during a period of American history. The Lochner decision became one of the most controversial decisions in the U.S. Supreme Court. The state supreme court, which found that the employer allowed his employee, a baker, to work more than 60 hours in one week in violation of 1897 N.Y. Laws art. 8, ch. 415, § 110, upheld the labor law as a constitutional exercise of the state's police power. The United States Supreme Court reversed.

Lochner v. New York: Economic Regulation on Trial detailed the judicially balanced and smoothly crafted narrative of the case and its times. The case did not give any rule for the limits of state intrusion, and it raised more serious questions about judicial-legislative relations.

When the first Supreme Court convened in 1790, it was so ill-esteemed that its justices frequently resigned in favor of other pursuits. John Rutledge stepped down as Associate Justice to become a state judge in South Carolina; John Jay resigned as Chief Justice to run for Governor of New York; and Alexander Hamilton declined to replace Jay, pursuing a private law practice instead. As Bernard Schwartz shows in this landmark history, the Supreme Court has indeed travelled a long and interesting journey to its current preeminent place in American life. In A History of the Supreme Court, Schwartz provides the finest, most comprehensive one-volume narrative ever published of our highest court. With impeccable scholarship and a clear, engaging style, he tells the story of the justices and their jurisprudence--and the influence the Court has had on American politics and society. With a keen ability to explain complex legal issues for the nonspecialist, he takes us through both the great and the undistinguised Courts of our nation's history. He provides insight into our foremost justices, such as John Marshall (who established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison, an outstanding display of political calculation as well as fine jurisprudence), Roger Taney (whose legacy has been overshadowed by Dred Scott v. Sanford), Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and others. He draws on evidence such as personal letters and interviews to show how the court has worked, weaving narrative details into deft discussions of the developments in constitutional law. Schwartz also examines the operations of the court: until 1935, it met in a small room under the Senate--so cramped that the judges had to put on their robes in full view of the spectators. But when the new building was finally opened, one justice called it "almost bombastically pretentious," and another asked, "What are we supposed to do, ride in on nine elephants?" He includes fascinating asides, on the debate in the first Court, for instance, over the use of English-style wigs and gowns (the decision: gowns, no wigs); and on the day Oliver Wendell Holmes announced his resignation--the same day that Earl Warren, as a California District Attorney, argued his first case before the Court. The author brings the story right up to the present day, offering balanced analyses of the pivotal Warren Court and the Rehnquist Court through 1992 (including, of course, the arrival of Clarence Thomas). In addition, he includes four special chapters on watershed cases: Dred Scott v. Sanford, Lochner v. New York, Brown v. Board of Education, and Roe v. Wade. Schwartz not only analyzes the impact of each of these epoch-making cases, he takes us behind the scenes, drawing on all available evidence to show how the justices debated the cases and how they settled on their opinions. Bernard Schwartz is one of the most highly regarded scholars of the Supreme Court, author of dozens of books on the law, and winner of the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. In this remarkable account, he provides the definitive one-volume account of our nation's highest court.

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

The Reagan Administration's belief that individual liberties are secondary to the requirements of national security has led to a massive assault on civil liberties. This book discusses the many ways in which the Reagan Administration has made radical departures with the past in its zealous enforcement of secrecy, censorship, and repression.

In 1919 American Communist Party member Benjamin Gitlow was arrested for distributing a "Left Wing Manifesto," a publication inspired by the Russian Revolution. He was charged with violating New York's Criminal Anarchy Law of 1902, which outlawed the advocacy of any doctrine advocating to the violent overthrow of government. Gitlow argued that the law violated his right to free speech but was still convicted. He appealed and five years later the Supreme Court upheld his sentence by a vote of 7-2. Throughout the legal proceedings, much attention was devoted to the "bad tendency" doctrine—the idea that speakers and writers were responsible for the probable effects of their words—which the Supreme Court explicitly endorsed in its decision. According to Justice Edward T. Sanford, "A state may punish utterances endangering the foundations of organized government and threatening its overthrow by unlawful means." More important was Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes' dissent, in which he argued that the mere expression of ideas, separated from action, could not be punished under the "clear and present danger" doctrine. As Holmes put it, "Every idea is an incitement"—and the expression of an idea, no matter how disagreeable, was protected by the First Amendment. While the majority disagreed, it also raised and endorsed the idea that the Bill of Rights could be violated by neither the federal government nor individual states—an idea known as "incorporation" that was addressed for the first time in this case. In recreating Gitlow, Marc Lendler opens up the world of American radicalism and brings back into focus a number of key figures in American law: defense attorney Clarence Darrow; New York Court of Appeals justices Roscoe Pound and Benjamin Cardozo; Walter Pollak of the fledgling ACLU; and dissenting justices Oliver Wendell Holmes and Louis Brandeis. Lendler also traces the origins of the incorporation doctrine and the ebb and flow of Gitlow as a precedent through the end of the Cold War. In a time when Islamic radicalism raises many of the same questions as domestic Communism did, Lendler's cogent explication of this landmark case helps students and Court-watchers alike better understand "clear and present danger" tests, ongoing debates over incitement, and the importance of the Holmes-Brandeis dissent in our jurisprudence.

This publication provides a student with an understanding of ten leading U.S. constitutional law cases, focusing on how the litigation was shaped by lawyers, judges and socioeconomic factors, and why the cases have attained landmark status. It is suitable for adoption as a supplement in an introductory constitutional law course, or as a text for an advanced seminar.

This publication provides a student with an understanding of 15 leading U.S. constitutional law cases, focusing on how the litigation was shaped by lawyers, judges and socioeconomic factors, and why the cases have attained landmark status. It is suitable for adoption as a supplement in an introductory constitutional law course, or as a text for an advanced seminar.

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

In the depths of the Great Depression, when foreclosure rates skyrocketed across the United States, more than two dozen states passed mortgage-extension or -adjustment laws to help farmers and homeowners keep their properties. One such statute in Minnesota led to the most important property law case of its time and still casts a long shadow upon constitutional debates and our own era's severe economic downturn. Fighting Foreclosure marks the first book-length study of the landmark 1934 Supreme Court decision in Home Building and Loan Association v. Blaisdell, which, by a 5-4 vote, upheld the Minnesota Mortgage Moratorium Act. On the one hand, Blaisdell validated efforts by states to offer legislative relief to citizens struggling to keep their farms and homes. On the other, it caused an outcry among banking interests and conservative legal theorists, who argued that these laws violated the Contract Clause of the Constitution and interfered with our free market system. In his majority opinion, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes argued that the reasonable and limited nature of the law and the unusual severity of the emergency it addressed placed it firmly within the "police powers" of the states to protect the health and safety of the people. In a strongly worded dissent, Justice George Sutherland argued for a consistent and strict interpretation of the Contract Clause regardless of economic exigency. John Fliter and Derek Hoff provide a concise history and analysis of not only this landmark case and the reasoning behind its sharply divided decision but also of the entire history of the Contract Clause. They trace closely the agricultural crisis, political pressures, and farmer-protest movement that produced the Minnesota law. And their study contributes to scholarly debate about the origins of the Constitutional Revolution of 1937, by which the Supreme Court accepted the New Deal, as well as to public debates about constitutional interpretation and the role that government should play in providing relief to distressed citizens. In the midst of our nation's ongoing suffering from massive foreclosures and bankruptcies, Fighting Foreclosure also offers a potent reminder that the High Court's decisions often revolve around lives at risk as much as abstract legal debates.

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

When the American Railway Union went on strike against the Pullman Palace Car Company in 1894, it set into motion a chain of events whose repercussions are still felt today. The strike pitted America's largest industrial union against twenty-four railroads, paralyzed rail traffic in half the country, and in the end was broken up by federal troops and suppressed by the courts, with union leader Eugene Debs incarcerated. But behind the Pullman case lay a conflict of ideologies at a watershed time in our nation's history. David Ray Papke reexamines the events and personalities surrounding the 1894 strike, related proceedings in the Chicago trial courts, and the 1895 Supreme Court decision, In re Debs, which set important standards for labor injunctions. He shows how the Court, by upholding Debs's contempt citation, dealt fatal blows to broad-based unionism in the nation's most important industry and to any hope for a more evenhanded form of judicial involvement in labor disputes-thus setting the stage for labor law in decades to come. The Pullman case was a defining moment in the often violent confrontation between capital and labor. It matched wealthy industrialist George Pullman against Debs and gave a stage to Debs's fledgling attorney Clarence Darrow. Throughout the trial, capital and labor tried to convince the public of the justice of their cause: Debs decrying the company's treatment of workers and Pullman raising fears of radical unionists. Papke provides an analytically concise and highly readable account of these proceedings, offering insight into the strengths and weaknesses of the law at the peak of industrial capitalism, showcasing Debs's passionate commitment to workers' rights, and providing a window on America during a period of rapid industrialization and social transformation. Papke shows that the law was far from neutral in defending corporate interests and suggests what the Pullman case, by raising questions about both the legitimacy of giant corporations and the revolutionary style of industrial unions, can teach us about law and legal institutions in our own time. His book captures the passions of industrial America and tells an important story at the intersection of legal and cultural history.

Most recent discussion of the United States Constitution and war--both the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq--has been dominated by two diametrically opposed views: the alarmism of those who see many current policies as portending gross restrictions on American civil liberties, and the complacency of those who see these same policies as entirely reasonable accommodations to the new realities of national security. Whatever their contributions to the public discussion and policy-making processes, these voices contribute little to an understanding of the real constitutional issues raised by war. Providing the historical and legal context needed to assess competing claims, The Constitution in Wartime identifies and explains the complexities of the important constitutional issues brought to the fore by wartime actions and policies. Twelve prominent legal scholars and political scientists combine broad overviews of U.S. history and contemporary policy with detailed yet accessible analyses of legal issues of pressing concern today. Some of the essays are broad in scope, reflecting on national character, patriotism, and political theory; exploring whether war and republican government are compatible; and considering in what sense we can be said to be in wartime circumstances today. Others are more specific, examining the roles of Congress, the presidency, the courts, and the international legal community. Throughout the collection, balanced, unbiased analysis leads to some surprising conclusions, one of which is that wartime conditions have sometimes increased, rather than curtailed, civil rights and civil liberties. For instance, during the cold war, government officials regarded measures aimed at expanding African Americans' freedom at home as crucial to improving America's image abroad. Contributors. Sotirios Barber, Mark Brandon, James E. Fleming, Mark Graber, Samuel Issacharoff, David Luban, Richard H. Pildes, Eric Posner, Peter Spiro, William Michael Treanor, Mark Tushnet, Adrian Vermeule

H. L. Pohlman is the A. Lee Fritschler Professor of Public Policy and chair of the Political Science Department at Dickinson College.

This publication provides a student with an understanding of ten leading U.S. constitutional law cases, focusing on how the litigation was shaped by lawyers, judges and socioeconomic factors, and why the cases have attained landmark status. It is suitable for adoption as a supplement in an introductory constitutional law course, or as a text for an advanced seminar.

This publication provides a student with an understanding of 15 leading U.S. constitutional law cases, focusing on how the litigation was shaped by lawyers, judges and socioeconomic factors, and why the cases have attained landmark status. It is suitable for adoption as a supplement in an introductory constitutional law course, or as a text for an advanced seminar.

In his newly updated version of The Anatomy of a Constitutional Law Case, Alan F. Westin provides a documentary portrait of historically important constitutional law case, 'Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, ' from its rise in a bargaining dispute in the steel industry during 1952 to the aftermath of its decision by the United States Supreme Court. Westin has added to his classic book additional materials and personal commentaries collected since the work was first published. The new information covers what went on within the Truman administration, what went on within the Supreme Court when analyzing and resolving issues that come before it. Westin includes selections from transcripts, briefs and other official proceedings, adds notes describing each phase of the constitutional process, and a section of commentary and questions relating this case to others.

Iva Ikuku Toguri (1916-2006) was an American citizen, born on the 4th of July. Her parents, first-generation Japanese Americans, embraced their new nation and raised Iva to think, talk, and act like a patriotic American. But, despite her allegiance to the United States, she was forced to spend most of her adult life denying that she was a traitor or that she was World War II's infamous Tokyo Rose. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Iva was nursing an ailing aunt in Japan. Prevented from returning to home, she was viewed with suspicion by the Japanese authorities. They hounded her to renounce her American citizenship, which she adamantly refused to do. Pressured to find employment, she joined Radio Tokyo. Known as Orphan Ann, she did nothing more than emcee brief music segments on "The Zero Hour" during the war's last two years. She was never called "Tokyo Rose" by anyone and was but one of only a dozen or so English-speaking females heard on Japanese airwaves. In need of money to return home after the war, she made the mistake of allowing herself to be interviewed by two ambitious journalists who were certain that she was the Tokyo Rose, even though she denied it. The published story brought Iva to the attention of American authorities who tried and convicted Iva for treason, despite the lack of evidence and a reluctant jury. She was then stripped of her citizenship and sent to prison. Yasuhide Kawashima's account of Toguri's trials are deeply rooted in Japanese language sources, American legal archives, and the cultures of both nations. He identifies heroes and villains in both the United States and Japan and also highlights broader concerns: the internment of thousands of loyal Japanese Americans, the meaning of citizenship, the nation's commitment to the idea of fair trial, the impact of tabloid journalism, and the very concept of treason. Iva was eventually pardoned in 1977 by President Gerald Ford—she was the first person in U.S. history to be pardoned for treason—and had her citizenship restored. Yet when she died in 2006, obituaries continued to identify her as Tokyo Rose. Kafkaesque in its telling, Kawashima's tale provides a harsh reminder that the law does not always render justice.

When the first Supreme Court convened in 1790, it was so ill-esteemed that its justices frequently resigned in favor of other pursuits. John Rutledge stepped down as Associate Justice to become a state judge in South Carolina; John Jay resigned as Chief Justice to run for Governor of New York; and Alexander Hamilton declined to replace Jay, pursuing a private law practice instead. As Bernard Schwartz shows in this landmark history, the Supreme Court has indeed travelled a long and interesting journey to its current preeminent place in American life. In A History of the Supreme Court, Schwartz provides the finest, most comprehensive one-volume narrative ever published of our highest court. With impeccable scholarship and a clear, engaging style, he tells the story of the justices and their jurisprudence--and the influence the Court has had on American politics and society. With a keen ability to explain complex legal issues for the nonspecialist, he takes us through both the great and the undistinguised Courts of our nation's history. He provides insight into our foremost justices, such as John Marshall (who established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison, an outstanding display of political calculation as well as fine jurisprudence), Roger Taney (whose legacy has been overshadowed by Dred Scott v. Sanford), Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and others. He draws on evidence such as personal letters and interviews to show how the court has worked, weaving narrative details into deft discussions of the developments in constitutional law. Schwartz also examines the operations of the court: until 1935, it met in a small room under the Senate--so cramped that the judges had to put on their robes in full view of the spectators. But when the new building was finally opened, one justice called it "almost bombastically pretentious," and another asked, "What are we supposed to do, ride in on nine elephants?" He includes fascinating asides, on the debate in the first Court, for instance, over the use of English-style wigs and gowns (the decision: gowns, no wigs); and on the day Oliver Wendell Holmes announced his resignation--the same day that Earl Warren, as a California District Attorney, argued his first case before the Court. The author brings the story right up to the present day, offering balanced analyses of the pivotal Warren Court and the Rehnquist Court through 1992 (including, of course, the arrival of Clarence Thomas). In addition, he includes four special chapters on watershed cases: Dred Scott v. Sanford, Lochner v. New York, Brown v. Board of Education, and Roe v. Wade. Schwartz not only analyzes the impact of each of these epoch-making cases, he takes us behind the scenes, drawing on all available evidence to show how the justices debated the cases and how they settled on their opinions. Bernard Schwartz is one of the most highly regarded scholars of the Supreme Court, author of dozens of books on the law, and winner of the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. In this remarkable account, he provides the definitive one-volume account of our nation's highest court.

For some, he was "America's leading smut king," hauled into court repeatedly over thirty years for peddling obscene publications through the mail. But when Samuel Roth appealed a 1956 conviction, he forced the Supreme Court to finally come to grips with a problem that had plagued both American society and constitutional law for longer than he had been in business. For while the facts of Roth v. United States were unexceptional, its constitutional issues would define the relationship of obscenity to the First Amendment. The Supreme Court's 6-3 decision in Roth for the first time tried to definitively rule on the issue of obscenity in American life and law—and failed. In this first book-length examination of the case, Whitney Strub lays out the history of obscenity's meaning as a legal concept, highlights the influence of antivice crusaders like Anthony Comstock and John Sumner, and chronicles the shadowy career that led Roth to spend nearly a decade of his life imprisoned for the allegedly obscene materials that he sent through the mails. Strub then unwraps the events that produced Roth v. United States, placing the trial in the context of its times—the Kinsey Reports, the Kefauver hearings, free speech debates—by using Roth's own private papers along with the records of the various prosecutions and the memos of the justices. The significance of Roth, as Strub reveals, lay in the two faces of Justice William Brennan's majority opinion—which on the one hand reflected the liberalizing attitude toward sexual matters in mid-century America, but on the other kept "obscene" expressions beyond First Amendment protection. Because that ruling points up the contradictions of a society where the prurient and repressive commingle uncomfortably, Strub shows how Roth says much more about American sexual values than Brennan's written words necessarily acknowledged. In our era of internet pornography and Fifty Shades of Grey, it may be difficult to imagine a time when obscenity was a matter for the courts. As Strub tracks the legacy of Roth and obscenity law through the ongoing policing of acceptable sexuality into the twenty-first century, his riveting narrative brings those times to life and helps readers navigate the fine line between what is socially acceptable and what is criminally obscene.

Americans were riveted to their television sets in 1957, when a violent mob barred black students from entering Little Rock's Central High School and faced off against paratroopers sent by a reluctant President Eisenhower. That set off a firestorm of protest throughout the nation and ultimately led to the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Cooper v. Aaron, reaffirming Brown v. Board of Education's mandate for school integration "with all deliberate speed" and underscoring the supremacy of federal and constitutional authority over state law. Noted scholar Tony Freyer, arguably our nation's top authority on this subject, now provides a concise, lucid, and eminently teachable summary of that historic case and shows that it paved the way for later civil rights victories. He chronicles how the Little Rock school board sought court approval to table integration efforts and how the black community brought suit against the board's watered-down version of compliance. The board's request was denied by a federal appeals court and taken to the Supreme Court, where the unanimous ruling in Cooper reaffirmed federal law-but left in place the maddening ambiguities of "all deliberate speed." While other accounts have focused on the showdown on the schoolhouse steps, Freyer takes readers into the courts to reveal the centrality of black citizens' efforts to the origins and outcome of the crisis. He describes the work of the Little Rock NAACP—with its Legal Defense Fund led by Thurgood Marshall and Wiley Branton—in defining the issues and abandoning gradualism in favor of direct confrontation with the segregationist South. He also includes the previously untold account of Justice William Brennan's surprising influence upon Justice Felix Frankfurter's controversial concurring opinion, which preserved his own "deliberate speed" wording from Brown. With Cooper, the "well morticed high wall" of segregation had finally cracked. As the most important test of Brown, which literally contained the means to thwart its own intent, it presaged the civil rights movement's broader nonviolent mass action combining community mobilization and litigation to finally defeat Jim Crow. It was not only a landmark decision, but also a turning point in America's civil rights struggle.

Because the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court tell us what Constitution means, they can create constitutional change. For quite some time, general readers who have been interested in understanding those changes have not had a concise volume that explores major decisions in which those changes occur. Traditional casebooks used in law schools typically pay scant attention to the historical and political context in which cases are decided, as well as the motives of litigants, the involvement of interest groups, and the justices' concerns with policy outcomes, even though all these factors are critical to understanding the Court's decisions. Other books do address these concerns, but they almost always focus on a single policy issue, rather than on a broader range of constitutional conflicts that populate the Court's docket. Kevin T. McGuire commissioned twenty-two outstanding scholars to write essays on a selected series of Supreme Court cases. Chosen for their contemporary relevance, most of the cases addressed in this informative reader are from the last half-century, extending right up through Bush v. Gore and the 2003 Michigan affirmative action cases. In each of these roughly two dozen cases, the authors address a number of questions that provide readers with a deeper understanding of the Court and its policies: How did the conflict originate? What role did organized interests have in the case? What did the litigants, personally and professionally, have at stake? What was the practical result of the Court's decision? Did the Court respond to lobbying or public opinion? These detailed historical and personal accounts in this all-new collection of essays offer engaging and illuminating perspectives on law and politics.

In Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, a critical abortion rights case, a bitterly divided Supreme Court produced no less than six different opinions. Writing for the plurality, Chief Justice Rehnquist attacked the trimester framework established in Roe v. Wade because it was "not found in the text of the Constitution or in any place else one would expect to find a constitutional principle." This approach, writes legal authority Joseph Goldstein, confuses constitutional principles (in this case, the right to privacy) with the means to protect them (here, the trimester system). As a result, the Court left the public bewildered about the constitutional scope of a woman's right to reproductive choice--failing in its duty to speak clearly to the American public about the Constitution. In The Intelligible Constitution, Goldstein makes a compelling argument that, in a democracy based upon informed consent, the Supreme Court has an obligation to communicate clearly and candidly to We the People when it interprets the Constitution. After a fascinating discussion of the language of the Constitution and Supreme Court opinions (including the analysis of Webster), he presents a series of opinion studies in important cases, focusing not on ideology but on the Justices' clarity of thought and expression. Using the two Brown v. Board of Education cases, Cooper v. Aaron, Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, and others as his examples, Goldstein demonstrates the pitfalls to which the Court has succumbed in the past: Writing deliberately ambiguous decisions to win the votes of colleagues, challenging each others' opinions in private but not in public, and not speaking honestly when the writer knows a concurring Justice misunderstands the opinion which he or she is supporting. Even some landmark decisions, he writes, have featured seriously flawed opinions--preventing We the People from understanding why the Justices reasoned as they did, and why they disagreed with each other. He goes on to suggest five "canons of comprehensibility" for Supreme Court opinions, to ensure that the Justices explain themselves clearly, honestly, and unambiguously, so that all the various opinions in each case would constitute a comprehensible message about their accord and discord in interpreting the Constitution. Both a fascinating look at how the Court shapes its opinions and a clarion call to action, this book provides an important addition to our understanding of how to maintain the Constitution as a living document, by and for the People, in its third century.

Although she came to be known as merely "that girl with the dirty books," Dollree Mapp was a poor but proud black woman who defied a predominantly white police force by challenging the legality of its search-and-seizure methods. Her case, which went all the way to the Supreme Court, remains hotly debated and highly controversial today. In 1957, Cleveland police raided Mapp's home on a tip—from future fight promoter Don "the Kid" King—that they'd find evidence linked to a recent bombing. What they confiscated instead was sexually explicit material that led to Mapp's conviction for possessing "lewd and lascivious books"—a conviction that initially pitted Ohio police and judges against Mapp and the American Civil Liberties Union. At stake was not only the search-and-seizure question but also the "exclusionary rule" concerning the use of evidence not specified in a search warrant. Carolyn Long follows the police raid into Mapp's home and then chronicles the events that led to the Court's 5-4 ruling in Mapp v. Ohio (1961), which redefined the rights of the accused and set strict limits on how police could obtain and use evidence. Long traces the case through the legal labyrinth, discusses the controversies it created, and assesses its impact on police behavior, as well as subsequent prosecutions and convictions of the accused. She also analyzes Justice Tom Clark's creative use of Mapp's case to overturn Wolf v. Colorado, which had ruled that the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches applied only to federal law, and presents Justice John Harlan's strong federalist-based dissent. As entertaining as it is informative, Long's book features a host of intriguing characters: Mapp, her seasoned and determined attorney, A. L. Kearns, and police sergeant Carl Delau, among others. Combined with her concise and insightful explanations of key legal principles—including the exclusionary rule itself—Long's deft narrative provides an ideal format for teachers and students in criminology, legal history, constitutional law, and political science, as well as anyone who loves a good story. The Mapp case is still much debated, especially in light of the recent reauthorization of the U.S. Patriot Act and the free rein given to law enforcement officers in matters of search and seizure. Long's compelling study thus poses important questions regarding privacy and individual rights that still matter today, even as it also illuminates one of the keystones of the Warren Court's criminal procedure revolution.

The application of the Fourth Amendment's Exclusionary Rule has divided the Justices of the Supreme Court for nearly a century. As the legal remedy for when police violate the Fourth Amendment rights of a person and discover criminal evidence through illegal search and seizure, it is the mostfrequently litigated constitutional issue in United States courts. Tracey Maclin's The Supreme Court and the Fourth Amendment's Exclusionary Rule traces the rise and fall of the exclusionary rule using insight and behind-the-scenes access into the Court's thinking.Based on original archival research into the private papers of retired Justices, Professor Maclin's analysis clarifies the motivations and thoughts that explain the Court's exclusionary rule jurisprudence. He includes a comprehensive scholarly and objective discussion of the reasoning behind theCourt decisions, and demonstrates that like other constitutional doctrines, the exclusionary rule is a political mechanism that expands and contracts as the times and Justices change. Ultimately, this book will help readers understand how constitutional law is constructed by judges with diversepolitical perspectives.

The application of the Fourth Amendment's Exclusionary Rule has divided the Justices of the Supreme Court for nearly a century. As the legal remedy for when police violate the Fourth Amendment rights of a person and discover criminal evidence through illegal search and seizure, it is the mostfrequently litigated constitutional issue in United States courts. Tracey Maclin's The Supreme Court and the Fourth Amendment's Exclusionary Rule traces the rise and fall of the exclusionary rule using insight and behind-the-scenes access into the Court's thinking.Based on original archival research into the private papers of retired Justices, Professor Maclin's analysis clarifies the motivations and thoughts that explain the Court's exclusionary rule jurisprudence. He includes a comprehensive scholarly and objective discussion of the reasoning behind theCourt decisions, and demonstrates that like other constitutional doctrines, the exclusionary rule is a political mechanism that expands and contracts as the times and Justices change. Ultimately, this book will help readers understand how constitutional law is constructed by judges with diversepolitical perspectives.

Until The New Press first published May It Please the Court in 1993, few Americans knew that every case argued before the Supreme Court since 1955 had been recorded. The original book-and-tape set was a revelation to readers and reviewers, quickly becoming a bestseller and garnering praise across the nation. May It Please the Court includes both live recordings and transcripts of oral arguments in twenty-three of the most significant cases argued before the Supreme Court in the second half of the twentiethcentury. This edition makes the recordings available on an MP3 audio CD. Through the voices of some of the nation's most important lawyers and justices, including Thurgood Marshall, Archibald Cox, and Earl Warren, it offers a chance to hear firsthand our justice system at work, in the highest court of the land. Cases included: Gideon v. Wainwright (right to counsel) Abington School District v. Schempp (school prayer) Miranda v. Arizona ("the right to remain silent") Roe v. Wade (abortion rights) Edwards v. Aguillard (teaching "creationism") Regents v. Bakke (reverse discrimination) Wisconsin v. Yoder (compulsory schooling for the Amish) Tinker v. Des Moines (Vietnam protest in schools) Texas v. Johnson (flag burning) New York Times v. United States (Pentagon Papers) Cox v. Louisiana (civil rights demonstrations) Communist Party v. Subversive Activities Control Board (freedom of association) Terry v. Ohio ("stop and frisk" by police) Gregg v. Georgia (capital punishment) Cooper v. Aaron (Little Rock school desegregation) Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (public accommodations) Palmer v. Thompson (swimming pool integration) Loving v. Virginia (interracial marriage) San Antonio v. Rodriguez (equal funding for public schools) Bowers v. Hardwick (homosexual rights) Baker v. Carr ("one person, one vote") United States v. Nixon (Watergate tapes) DeShaney v. Winnebago County (child abuse)

It has become known to many as the moment when the U.S. Supreme Court kicked God out of the public schools, supposedly paving the way for a decline in educational quality and a dramatic rise in delinquency and immorality. The 6-to-1 decision in Engel v. Vitale (1962) not only sparked outrage among a great many religious Americans, it also rallied those who cried out against what they perceived as a dangerously activist Court. Bruce Dierenfield has written a concise and readable guide to the first—and still most important—case that addressed the constitutionality of prayer in public schools. The 22-word recitation in a Long Island school that was challenged in Engel v. Vitale was hardly denominational—not even overtly Christian—but a handful of parents saw it as a violation of the First Amendment's proscription again the establishment of religion. The case forced the Supreme Court to take a stand on Jefferson's "wall of separation" between church and state. When it did so, the Court declared that by endorsing the prayer recitation—no matter how brief, non-denominational, or voluntary—the Long Island school board had unconstitutionally approved the establishment of religion in school. Writing with impeccable fairness and sensitivity, Dierenfield sets his account of the Engel decision in the larger historical and political context, citing battles over a wide range of religious activities in public schools throughout American history. He takes readers behind the scenes at school board meetings and Court deliberations to show real people wrestling with deeply personal issues. Through interviews with many of the participants, he also reveals the large price paid by the plaintiffs and their children, who were frequently harassed both during and after the trial. For a long time, opponents of the decision have loudly claimed that it was based on a distorted reading of the First Amendment and deprived Americans of their right to practice religion. Dierenfield shows that the polarizing effect of Engel—a decision every bit as controversial as Roe v. Wade—has reverberated through the subsequent decades and gained intensity with the rise of the religious right. His book helps readers understand why, even in the face of this landmark decision, Americans remain divided on how divided church and state should be.

First Amendment rights have been among the most fiercely debated topics in the aftermath of 9/11. In the current environment and fervor for homeland security, personal freedoms in exchange for security are coming under more scrutiny. Among these guaranteed freedoms are the protection of religious expression given by the U.S. Constitution and the constitutional prohibitions against behaviors that violate the separation of church and state. The mandate that the government shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof is a general principle that has guided American courts in interpreting the original intent of the First Amendment. In "Religious Expression and the American Constitution," Haiman focuses on the current state of American law with respect to a broad range of controversial issues affecting religious expression, both verbal and nonverbal, along with a review of the recent history of each issue to provide a full understanding."

Unlike casebooks, this title goes with greater detail into the human stories and the social, political, and legal contexts of the "big" Supreme Court cases regarding criminal justice. It unearths details not available anywhere else. In addition to great narrative enrichment, it provides the provocative thoughts of highly respected scholars who are each experts on the particular cases they address. This book will greatly enhance the teaching of both police practices (a/k/a "Cops and Robbers") and criminal adjudication (a/k/a "Bail to Jail") by providing both important context not available in any casebook and by offering the insights of some of the scholars who have thought the most deeply about these cases and issues.

The struggle for civil rights in America was fought at the lunch counter as well as in the streets. It ultimately found victory in the halls of government—but, as Richard Cortner reveals, only through a creative use of congressional power and critical judicial decisions. Title II of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination in public accommodations, and shortly after its passage blacks were refused service at the Heart of Atlanta Motel and at Ollie's Barbecue in Birmingham, Alabama, as a test of the new law by business owners who claimed the right to choose their own customers. These challenges made their way to the Supreme Court, becoming landmark cases frequently cited in law. Until now, however, they have never benefited from book-length analysis. Cortner provides an inside account of the litigation in both decisions to tell how they spelled the end to segregation in the South The fact that blacks could not travel in the South without assured access to food and lodging led Congress to enforce civil rights on the basis of its authority to regulate interstate commerce. The Supreme Court unanimously sustained Title II's constitutionality under the commerce clause in both test cases, joining the executive and legislative branches in defining the power of the federal government to desegregate society, even by circuitous means. Drawing on justice department files, Supreme Court justices' papers, and records of defense attorneys, Cortner provides the background for the cases, including previous legal battles over sit-ins. He describes the roles of key players in the litigation—particularly Solicitor General Archibald Cox and members of the Warren Court. In addition, he uses presidential files, oral histories, and other primary sources to give readers a clear picture of the forces at work in the creation, implementation, and validation of the Civil Rights Act. Cortner's thorough account illuminates the nature of constitutional litigation and the judicial process, as well as the role of the Constitution and law, in two decisions that marked the crowning achievement of the civil rights movement and changed the face of America forever.

Illuminating a classic case from the turbulent civil rights era of the 1960s, two of America's foremost legal historians—Kermit Hall and Melvin Urofsky—provide a compact and highly readable updating of one of the most memorable decisions in the Supreme Court's canon. When the New York Times published an advertisement that accused Alabama officials of willfully abusing civil rights activists, Montgomery police commissioner Lester Sullivan filed suit for defamation. Alabama courts, citing factual errors in the ad, ordered the Times to pay half a million dollars in damages. The Times appealed to the Supreme Court, which had previously deferred to the states on libel issues. The justices, recognizing that Alabama's application of libel law threatened both the nation's free press and equal rights for African Americans, unanimously sided with the Times. As memorably recounted twenty years ago in Anthony Lewis's Make No Law, the 1964 decision profoundly altered defamation law, which the Court declared must not hinder debate on public issues even if it includes "vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials." The decision also introduced a new First Amendment test: a public official cannot recover damages for libel unless he proves that the statement was made with the knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false. Hall and Urofsky, however, place a new emphasis on this iconic case. Whereas Lewis's book championed freedom of the press, the authors here provide a stronger focus on civil rights and southern legal culture. They convey to readers the urgency of the civil rights movement and the vitriolic anger it inspired in the Deep South. Their insights place this landmark case within a new and enlightening frame.

The struggle for civil rights in America was fought at the lunch counter as well as in the streets. It ultimately found victory in the halls of government—but, as Richard Cortner reveals, only through a creative use of congressional power and critical judicial decisions. Title II of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination in public accommodations, and shortly after its passage blacks were refused service at the Heart of Atlanta Motel and at Ollie's Barbecue in Birmingham, Alabama, as a test of the new law by business owners who claimed the right to choose their own customers. These challenges made their way to the Supreme Court, becoming landmark cases frequently cited in law. Until now, however, they have never benefited from book-length analysis. Cortner provides an inside account of the litigation in both decisions to tell how they spelled the end to segregation in the South The fact that blacks could not travel in the South without assured access to food and lodging led Congress to enforce civil rights on the basis of its authority to regulate interstate commerce. The Supreme Court unanimously sustained Title II's constitutionality under the commerce clause in both test cases, joining the executive and legislative branches in defining the power of the federal government to desegregate society, even by circuitous means. Drawing on justice department files, Supreme Court justices' papers, and records of defense attorneys, Cortner provides the background for the cases, including previous legal battles over sit-ins. He describes the roles of key players in the litigation—particularly Solicitor General Archibald Cox and members of the Warren Court. In addition, he uses presidential files, oral histories, and other primary sources to give readers a clear picture of the forces at work in the creation, implementation, and validation of the Civil Rights Act. Cortner's thorough account illuminates the nature of constitutional litigation and the judicial process, as well as the role of the Constitution and law, in two decisions that marked the crowning achievement of the civil rights movement and changed the face of America forever.

Americans value privacy as one of their most cherished rights, yet the word "privacy" isn't even mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. It took the Supreme Court's ruling in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) to bestow constitutional protection upon this right. That remains one of the Court's most hotly debated rulings and led directly to an even more controversial decision in Roe v. Wade (1973). John Johnson's masterly critique of Griswold—which observes its 40th anniversary on June 7, 2005—reminds us once again of its crucial impact on both American law and society. Johnson explores Griswold's origins in a challenge to Connecticut's 1879 anti-contraception law, provides a detailed narrative of its progress, examines the unfolding of the newly secured right of privacy up to recent controversies over same-sex relations, and grounds the story in two key contexts: the struggle within one state to establish the right to birth control and the national debate over the right of privacy. He also provides important insights into the Supreme Court decision in Poe v. Ullman (1961), which rejected challenges to the Connecticut's law and was itself immediately challenged. In response to Poe, Planned Parenthood opened a clinic in New Haven to dispense birth control advice and devices to married women. Ten days later, a local prosecutor shut the clinic down and indicted executive director Estelle Griswold and her medical director, C. Lee Buxton. Tracing the progress of Griswold's case, Johnson clarifies how privacy or "the right to be let alone" became a judicially constructed right. In one of the most idiosyncratic opinions in the Court's history, Justice William O. Douglas ruled that "emanations" from five constitutional amendments afforded protection to the right of privacy, while several other justices proposed competing rationales in support. As he unravels this fascinating tale, Johnson reveals a multifaceted decision that was not in fact the doctrinal novelty that many scholars have argued. For two generations, Griswold has functioned as the legal basis for judicial rulings involving issues of sexual intimacy, reproductive rights, and family life. Even today, it continues to set the agenda for debates about privacy in American life and about how the Constitution itself should be interpreted. Johnson's deft and incisive analysis of the case will interest anyone concerned about the nature, scope, and future of privacy in America.

"Roe v. Wade's 1973 constitutional guarantee of a woman's right to choose abortion emerged from a long and remarkable battle to extend Americans' individual liberties to include a fundamental right to sexual privacy. Only in 1965 had the Supreme Court first begun to protect such intimate personal freedoms by finally invalidating an archaic Connecticut criminal law that had prohibited the use of birth control." "Despite the landmark importance of this crucial struggle, not until now has this legal revolution received the comprehensive treatment it deserves." "Roe v. Wade's origins lie not in the U.S. Supreme Court's dramatic internal deliberations of 1971-72 or even in the grassroots women's movement of the late 1960s but, instead, in the 1920s and 1930s efforts to win repeal of the Connecticut birth control law. Those initial attempts failed, but twenty years later Connecticut Planned Parenthood director Estelle Trebert Griswold launched a new crusade against the statute. After one appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court lost by the narrowest of margins in 1961, Griswold and a medical colleague were convicted for providing birth control services in open defiance of the law. When their appeal finally reached the Supreme Court, the justices held that such a fundamental constitutional right to privacy did indeed exist." "That resounding Supreme Court decision in Griswold v. Connecticut opened a previously unimagined constitutional door: the opportunity to argue that a woman's access to a safe, legal abortion was a fundamental individual right. In 1969, the first abortion rights case was filed in federal court in New York, soon followed by others, including Roe v. Wade in Texas and Doe v. Bolton in Georgia. After those two challenges were upheld by local federal courts, the U.S. Supreme Court - which so far had confronted the abortion issue on only one occasion - agreed to review both decisions." "The comprehensive, once-secret files of former Justices William J. Brennan, William O. Douglas, and Thurgood Marshall now allow for the first fully documented and comprehensive account of the Court's dramatic internal debates. Likewise, those papers also offer an inside-the-court look at the post-Roe abortion cases that have highlighted America's emotion-ridden battles over abortion for two full decades since 1973." "However, despite the Supreme Court's 1992 reaffirmation of Roe in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Court so far has refused to acknowledge that the right to privacy likewise shields gay Americans from governmental intrusion into their personal lives." "Based upon hundreds of interviews and nationwide archival sources, Liberty and Sexuality provides a compelling account of the remarkable women and men who made the right to privacy a meaningful part of America's constitutional heritage."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

The issue of abortion has sharply divided America. The bitter debate over Roe v. Wade - in the courts, legislatures, press and streets - has grown ever more ferocious since the Supreme Court's landmark decision in 1973. For years pro-choicers have applauded Roe as a guarantee of women's rights, while pro-lifers have condemned it as the work of an activist and atheistic Court. Now it looms at the centre of a growing political storm, as a new president, and old Court, and a divided Congress reconsider Roe's status in the wake of the controversial 2000 elections.

Until The New Press first published May It Please the Court in 1993, few Americans knew that every case argued before the Supreme Court since 1955 had been recorded. The original book-and-tape set was a revelation to readers and reviewers, quickly becoming a bestseller and garnering praise across the nation. May It Please the Court includes both live recordings and transcripts of oral arguments in twenty-three of the most significant cases argued before the Supreme Court in the second half of the twentiethcentury. This edition makes the recordings available on an MP3 audio CD. Through the voices of some of the nation's most important lawyers and justices, including Thurgood Marshall, Archibald Cox, and Earl Warren, it offers a chance to hear firsthand our justice system at work, in the highest court of the land. Cases included: Gideon v. Wainwright (right to counsel) Abington School District v. Schempp (school prayer) Miranda v. Arizona ("the right to remain silent") Roe v. Wade (abortion rights) Edwards v. Aguillard (teaching "creationism") Regents v. Bakke (reverse discrimination) Wisconsin v. Yoder (compulsory schooling for the Amish) Tinker v. Des Moines (Vietnam protest in schools) Texas v. Johnson (flag burning) New York Times v. United States (Pentagon Papers) Cox v. Louisiana (civil rights demonstrations) Communist Party v. Subversive Activities Control Board (freedom of association) Terry v. Ohio ("stop and frisk" by police) Gregg v. Georgia (capital punishment) Cooper v. Aaron (Little Rock school desegregation) Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (public accommodations) Palmer v. Thompson (swimming pool integration) Loving v. Virginia (interracial marriage) San Antonio v. Rodriguez (equal funding for public schools) Bowers v. Hardwick (homosexual rights) Baker v. Carr ("one person, one vote") United States v. Nixon (Watergate tapes) DeShaney v. Winnebago County (child abuse)

Unlike casebooks, this title goes with greater detail into the human stories and the social, political, and legal contexts of the "big" Supreme Court cases regarding criminal justice. It unearths details not available anywhere else. In addition to great narrative enrichment, it provides the provocative thoughts of highly respected scholars who are each experts on the particular cases they address. This book will greatly enhance the teaching of both police practices (a/k/a "Cops and Robbers") and criminal adjudication (a/k/a "Bail to Jail") by providing both important context not available in any casebook and by offering the insights of some of the scholars who have thought the most deeply about these cases and issues.

When fifteen-year-old Gerald Gault of Globe, Arizona, allegedly made an obscene phone call to a neighbor, he was arrested by the local police, who failed to inform his parents. After a hearing in which the neighbor didn't even testify, Gault was promptly sentenced to six years in a juvenile "boot camp"—for an offense that would have cost an adult only two months. Even in a nation fed up with juvenile delinquency, that sentence seemed over the top and inspired a spirited defense on Gault's behalf. Led by Norman Dorsen, the ACLU ultimately took Gault's case to the Supreme Court and in 1967 won a landmark decision authored by Justice Abe Fortas. Widely celebrated as the most important children's rights case of the twentieth century, In re Gault affirmed that children have some of the same rights as adults and formally incorporated the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protections into the administration of the nation's juvenile courts. Placing this case within the context of its changing times, David Tanenhaus shows how the ACLU litigated Gault by questioning the Progressive Era assumption that juvenile courts should not follow criminal procedure. He then takes readers to the Supreme Court to fully explore the oral arguments and examine how the Court came to decide Gault, focusing on Justice Fortas's majority opinion, concurring opinions, Justice Potter Stewart's lone dissent, and initial responses to the decision. The book explores the contested legacy of Gault, charting changes and continuity in juvenile justice within the contexts of the ascendancy of conservative constitutionalism and Americans' embrace of mass incarceration as a penal strategy. An epilogue about Redding v. Safford—a 2009 decision involving a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl, also from Arizona, who was forced to undress because she was suspected of hiding drugs in her underwear—reminds us why Gault is of lasting consequence. Gault is a story of revolutionary constitutionalism that also reveals the tenacity of localism in American legal history. Tanenhaus's meticulous explication raises troubling questions about how local communities treat their children as it confirms the importance of the Supreme Court's decisions about the constitutional rights of minors.

This sequel to the bestselling May It Please the Court focuses on key First Amendment cases illustrating the most controversial debates over issues of free speech, freedom of the press, and the right to assemble, including: Burnes v. Glen Theater (nude dancing), New York Times v. United States (the Pentagon Papers case), Texas v. Johnson (American flag burning), Brandenburg v. Ohio (hate speech by Klansmen), and Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell ("emotional distress" for parody advertisement). The transcripts of actual oral arguments made before the Supreme Court identify the speakers and put the cases in context. They offer an unrivaled view of the Supreme Court in action that will interest anyone wanting firsthand exposure to American law and history. Cases include: Abington School District v. Schempp (school prayer) County of Allegheny v. ACLU (nativity crèche and menorah display) Barnes v. Glen Theater, Inc. (nude dancing) Branzburg v. Hayes (reporters' sources) Employment Division v. Smith (peyote) New York Times v. Sullivan (libel) New York Times v. United States (Pentagon Papers case) R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, Minnesota (cross burning) Texas v. Johnson (American flag burning) Tinker v. Des Moines (wearing black armbands in school) United States v. O'Brien (draft card burning)

The tension between free speech and social stability has been a central concern throughout American history. In the 1960s that concern reached a fever pitch with the anti-Vietnam War movement. When anti-war sentiment "invaded" American schools, official resolve to retain order in the classroom vied with the rights of students to speak freely. A key event in that face-off was the Supreme Court decision in Tinker v. Des Moines. In 1965, five public school students in Des Moines-including John Tinker, a Methodist minister's son-protested the Vietnam War by wearing black armbands in defiance of school policy. Suspended on disciplinary grounds that were upheld in federal court, the students took their case to the Supreme Court, arguing that they had been denied their right of freedom of expression under the First Amendment. Ruling in their favor, the Court determined that armbands did not constitute a sufficient reason to abridge free speech-a decision which helped provide a legal foundation for subsequent anti-war protests. John Johnson now offers a detailed account of Tinker that captures the personal struggle of the litigants and places this seminal constitutional controversy in the legal and historical context of the 1960s. In this highly readable book, he shows that the case is important for its divergent perspectives on the limits of free speech and explains how the majority and dissenting Court opinions mirrored contemporary attitudes toward the permissible limits of public protest. As the most important student rights case ever to reach the Supreme Court, Tinker raises important issues regarding First Amendment freedoms and is a strong precedent for both the rights of public school students and legitimate civil disobedience. The Struggle for Student Rights contains previously unpublished information and insights on this well-known case and provides a fascinating legal window on a turbulent era. With federal and state courts now considering the limits of speech and symbolic expressions in our schools, it makes a significant contribution to understanding the principles that are at stake.

Like all the other volumes in the Stories collection, this book provides students with a three dimensional picture of the most important cases that are addressed in nearly every employment discrimination casebook and course. These stories give the students and faculty members a deeper understanding of the historical and cultural background of the cases and an insight into their long term impact on the development of employment discrimination law.

When Arthur Gochman filed a class-action suit in 1968 on behalf of San Antonio school children, he and his clients were directly challenging the inequality of education funding in Texas. They argued that quality education, not merely basic schooling, was a constitutional right, and a district court agreed. But the Supreme Court overruled that decision, signaling a halt to the idea that the Constitution contained a right to an equal education and marking an important transition from the Warren to the Burger Court. Paul Sracic assesses the impact of this 5-4 decision to explore the legacy of a landmark case, telling the story of the Supreme Court and school finance in a new way. His is the first book to consider Rodriguez, tracing its progress from inception through appeal to provide a fascinating account of the legal maneuvering of the two sides-and a lesson in the limits of judicial solutions to discrimination in education. Balanced and judicious in his assessment, Sracic brings together the varied strands-oral history, litigation, constitutional law, political context-in this complex case, while clarifying the positions on both sides of the conflict. Justice Lewis Powell argued that education was not a constitutionally protected right and that the Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality or precisely equal advantages, while dissenting Justice Thurgood Marshall called the decision a retreat from America's commitment to equal opportunity that denigrated Brown v. Board of Education. Although Powell's and Marshall's opinions have been documented, until now little has been written about the history behind the case. Sracic puts a human face on the account. Among other things, he interviewed Demetrio Rodriguez, the parent whose name headlined the original suit, along with several students involved in the case. He also delved into Justice Powell's papers to show the influence of his prior experience championing local rather than state control over education and his fear of centralization's potential constraint on states' rights. In the wake of Rodriguez, the issue of school funding acquired a much higher national profile, even as efforts to reform it struggled towards varied degrees of success—in Texas and many other states. Sracic's very readable account unravels the complex legal doctrine links this vitally important case to the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection—and argues that one cannot fully grasp the scope of that amendment without fully understanding Rodriguez.

When the first Supreme Court convened in 1790, it was so ill-esteemed that its justices frequently resigned in favor of other pursuits. John Rutledge stepped down as Associate Justice to become a state judge in South Carolina; John Jay resigned as Chief Justice to run for Governor of New York; and Alexander Hamilton declined to replace Jay, pursuing a private law practice instead. As Bernard Schwartz shows in this landmark history, the Supreme Court has indeed travelled a long and interesting journey to its current preeminent place in American life. In A History of the Supreme Court, Schwartz provides the finest, most comprehensive one-volume narrative ever published of our highest court. With impeccable scholarship and a clear, engaging style, he tells the story of the justices and their jurisprudence--and the influence the Court has had on American politics and society. With a keen ability to explain complex legal issues for the nonspecialist, he takes us through both the great and the undistinguised Courts of our nation's history. He provides insight into our foremost justices, such as John Marshall (who established judicial review in Marbury v. Madison, an outstanding display of political calculation as well as fine jurisprudence), Roger Taney (whose legacy has been overshadowed by Dred Scott v. Sanford), Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and others. He draws on evidence such as personal letters and interviews to show how the court has worked, weaving narrative details into deft discussions of the developments in constitutional law. Schwartz also examines the operations of the court: until 1935, it met in a small room under the Senate--so cramped that the judges had to put on their robes in full view of the spectators. But when the new building was finally opened, one justice called it "almost bombastically pretentious," and another asked, "What are we supposed to do, ride in on nine elephants?" He includes fascinating asides, on the debate in the first Court, for instance, over the use of English-style wigs and gowns (the decision: gowns, no wigs); and on the day Oliver Wendell Holmes announced his resignation--the same day that Earl Warren, as a California District Attorney, argued his first case before the Court. The author brings the story right up to the present day, offering balanced analyses of the pivotal Warren Court and the Rehnquist Court through 1992 (including, of course, the arrival of Clarence Thomas). In addition, he includes four special chapters on watershed cases: Dred Scott v. Sanford, Lochner v. New York, Brown v. Board of Education, and Roe v. Wade. Schwartz not only analyzes the impact of each of these epoch-making cases, he takes us behind the scenes, drawing on all available evidence to show how the justices debated the cases and how they settled on their opinions. Bernard Schwartz is one of the most highly regarded scholars of the Supreme Court, author of dozens of books on the law, and winner of the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. In this remarkable account, he provides the definitive one-volume account of our nation's highest court.

The issue of abortion has sharply divided America. The bitter debate over Roe v. Wade - in the courts, legislatures, press and streets - has grown ever more ferocious since the Supreme Court's landmark decision in 1973. For years pro-choicers have applauded Roe as a guarantee of women's rights, while pro-lifers have condemned it as the work of an activist and atheistic Court. Now it looms at the centre of a growing political storm, as a new president, and old Court, and a divided Congress reconsider Roe's status in the wake of the controversial 2000 elections.

The Supreme Court decision of 1973 in the case of Roe vs. Wade has had more impact on women than any other judicial decision in history. It is the story of a courageous young woman and her two brilliant young women lawyers. While virtually no one is for abortion per se, no other issue triggers such impassioned views pro and con.

Based on 20 years of research, including an examination of the papers of eight of the nine Justices who voted in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton,Abuse of Discretion is a critical review of the behind-the-scenes deliberations that went into the Supreme Court's abortion decisions and how the mistakes made by the Justices in 1971-1973 have led to the turmoil we see today in legislation, politics, and public health. The first half of the book looks at the mistakes made by the Justices, based on the case files, the oral arguments, and the Justices’ papers. The second half of the book critically examines the unintended consequences of the abortion decisions in law, politics, and women’s health. Why do the abortion decisions remain so controversial after almost 40 years, despite more than 50,000,000 abortions, numerous presidential elections, and a complete turnover in the Justices? Why did such a sweeping decision--with such important consequences for public health, producing such prolonged political turmoil--come from the Supreme Court in 1973? Answering those questions is the aim of this book. The controversy over the abortion decisions has hardly subsided, and the reasons why are to be found in the Justices’ deliberations in 1971-1972 that resulted in the unprecedented decision they issued.

In January 1973, the Supreme Court's opinion in Roe v. Wade struck down most of the country's abortion laws, and held for the first time that women had a constitutional right to safe and legal abortions. Three decades later, Roe v. Wade remains one of the Supreme Court's most controversial decisions, and political struggles over abortion rights still divide American politics. Roe has emerged as a central issue in federal judicial nominations, becoming a powerful symbol in debates about judicial restraint, judicial activism, and the proper role of courts in a democratic society. In What Roe v. Wade Should Have Said, eleven distinguished constitutional scholars rewrite the opinions in this landmark case in light of thirty years of experience but making use only of sources available at the time of the original decision. Taking positions both for and against the constitutional right to abortion, the contributors offer novel and illuminating arguments that get to the heart of this fascinating case. In addition, Jack Balkin gives a detailed introduction to Roe v. Wade, chronicling the history of the Roe litigation, the constitutional and political clashes that followed it, and the state of abortion rights in the U.S. today. Contributing their versions of Roe are: Anita Allen, Akhil Amar, Jack M. Balkin, Teresa Stanton Collett, Michael Stokes Paulsen, Jeffrey Rosen, Jed Rubenfeld, Reva Siegel, Cass Sunstein, Mark Tushnet, and Robin West.

Until The New Press first published May It Please the Court in 1993, few Americans knew that every case argued before the Supreme Court since 1955 had been recorded. The original book-and-tape set was a revelation to readers and reviewers, quickly becoming a bestseller and garnering praise across the nation. May It Please the Court includes both live recordings and transcripts of oral arguments in twenty-three of the most significant cases argued before the Supreme Court in the second half of the twentiethcentury. This edition makes the recordings available on an MP3 audio CD. Through the voices of some of the nation's most important lawyers and justices, including Thurgood Marshall, Archibald Cox, and Earl Warren, it offers a chance to hear firsthand our justice system at work, in the highest court of the land. Cases included: Gideon v. Wainwright (right to counsel) Abington School District v. Schempp (school prayer) Miranda v. Arizona ("the right to remain silent") Roe v. Wade (abortion rights) Edwards v. Aguillard (teaching "creationism") Regents v. Bakke (reverse discrimination) Wisconsin v. Yoder (compulsory schooling for the Amish) Tinker v. Des Moines (Vietnam protest in schools) Texas v. Johnson (flag burning) New York Times v. United States (Pentagon Papers) Cox v. Louisiana (civil rights demonstrations) Communist Party v. Subversive Activities Control Board (freedom of association) Terry v. Ohio ("stop and frisk" by police) Gregg v. Georgia (capital punishment) Cooper v. Aaron (Little Rock school desegregation) Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (public accommodations) Palmer v. Thompson (swimming pool integration) Loving v. Virginia (interracial marriage) San Antonio v. Rodriguez (equal funding for public schools) Bowers v. Hardwick (homosexual rights) Baker v. Carr ("one person, one vote") United States v. Nixon (Watergate tapes) DeShaney v. Winnebago County (child abuse)

When Arthur Gochman filed a class-action suit in 1968 on behalf of San Antonio school children, he and his clients were directly challenging the inequality of education funding in Texas. They argued that quality education, not merely basic schooling, was a constitutional right, and a district court agreed. But the Supreme Court overruled that decision, signaling a halt to the idea that the Constitution contained a right to an equal education and marking an important transition from the Warren to the Burger Court. Paul Sracic assesses the impact of this 5-4 decision to explore the legacy of a landmark case, telling the story of the Supreme Court and school finance in a new way. His is the first book to consider Rodriguez, tracing its progress from inception through appeal to provide a fascinating account of the legal maneuvering of the two sides-and a lesson in the limits of judicial solutions to discrimination in education. Balanced and judicious in his assessment, Sracic brings together the varied strands-oral history, litigation, constitutional law, political context-in this complex case, while clarifying the positions on both sides of the conflict. Justice Lewis Powell argued that education was not a constitutionally protected right and that the Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality or precisely equal advantages, while dissenting Justice Thurgood Marshall called the decision a retreat from America's commitment to equal opportunity that denigrated Brown v. Board of Education. Although Powell's and Marshall's opinions have been documented, until now little has been written about the history behind the case. Sracic puts a human face on the account. Among other things, he interviewed Demetrio Rodriguez, the parent whose name headlined the original suit, along with several students involved in the case. He also delved into Justice Powell's papers to show the influence of his prior experience championing local rather than state control over education and his fear of centralization's potential constraint on states' rights. In the wake of Rodriguez, the issue of school funding acquired a much higher national profile, even as efforts to reform it struggled towards varied degrees of success—in Texas and many other states. Sracic's very readable account unravels the complex legal doctrine links this vitally important case to the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection—and argues that one cannot fully grasp the scope of that amendment without fully understanding Rodriguez.

In the wake of Brown v. Board of Education, racial equality in American public education appeared to have a bright future. But, for many, that brightness dimmed considerably following the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Milliken v. Bradley (1974). While the literature on Brown is voluminous, Joyce Baugh's measured and insightful study offers the only available book-length analysis of Milliken, the first major desegregation case to originate outside the South. As Baugh chronicles, when the city of Detroit sought to address school segregation by busing white students to black schools, a Michigan statute signed by Gov. William Milliken overruled the plan. In response, the NAACP sued the state on behalf of Ronald Bradley and other affected parents. The federal district court sided with the plaintiffs and ordered the city and state to devise a "metropolitan" plan that crossed city lines into the suburbs and encompassed a total of fifty-four school districts. The state, however, appealed that decision all the way to the Supreme Court. In its controversial 5-4 decision, the Court's new conservative majority ruled that, since there was no evidence that the suburban school districts had deliberately engaged in a policy of segregation, the lower court's remedy was "wholly impermissible" and not justified by Brown—which the Court said could only address de jure, not de facto segregation. While the Court's majority expressed concern that the district court's remedy threatened the sanctity of local control over schools, the minority contended that the decision would allow residential segregation to be used as a valid excuse for school segregation. To reconstruct the proceedings and give all claims a fair hearing, Baugh interviewed lawyers representing both sides in the case, as well as the federal district judge who eventually closed the litigation; plumbed the papers of Justices Blackmun, Brennan, Douglas, and Marshall; talked with the main reporter who covered the case; and researched the NAACP files on Milliken. What emerges is a detailed account of how and why Milliken came about, as well as its impact on the Court's school-desegregation jurisprudence and on public education in American cities.

Until The New Press first published May It Please the Court in 1993, few Americans knew that every case argued before the Supreme Court since 1955 had been recorded. The original book-and-tape set was a revelation to readers and reviewers, quickly becoming a bestseller and garnering praise across the nation. May It Please the Court includes both live recordings and transcripts of oral arguments in twenty-three of the most significant cases argued before the Supreme Court in the second half of the twentiethcentury. This edition makes the recordings available on an MP3 audio CD. Through the voices of some of the nation's most important lawyers and justices, including Thurgood Marshall, Archibald Cox, and Earl Warren, it offers a chance to hear firsthand our justice system at work, in the highest court of the land. Cases included: Gideon v. Wainwright (right to counsel) Abington School District v. Schempp (school prayer) Miranda v. Arizona ("the right to remain silent") Roe v. Wade (abortion rights) Edwards v. Aguillard (teaching "creationism") Regents v. Bakke (reverse discrimination) Wisconsin v. Yoder (compulsory schooling for the Amish) Tinker v. Des Moines (Vietnam protest in schools) Texas v. Johnson (flag burning) New York Times v. United States (Pentagon Papers) Cox v. Louisiana (civil rights demonstrations) Communist Party v. Subversive Activities Control Board (freedom of association) Terry v. Ohio ("stop and frisk" by police) Gregg v. Georgia (capital punishment) Cooper v. Aaron (Little Rock school desegregation) Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (public accommodations) Palmer v. Thompson (swimming pool integration) Loving v. Virginia (interracial marriage) San Antonio v. Rodriguez (equal funding for public schools) Bowers v. Hardwick (homosexual rights) Baker v. Carr ("one person, one vote") United States v. Nixon (Watergate tapes) DeShaney v. Winnebago County (child abuse)

Twice denied admission to a California medical school despite better grades and test scores than successful minority applicants, Allan Bakke took his grievance to court and set off a major controversy over affirmative action. Bakke claimed that he was a victim of reverse discrimination, and his case has been considered by many as the most important civil rights decision since the end of segregation—and also one of the most difficult ever heard by the Supreme Court. Howard Ball now reviews the many issues raised by this case that placed affirmative action on trial. He examines the law and politics surrounding Bakke in an even-handed manner, presenting both sides of the debate and discussing key arguments presented by pressure groups. He also offers a behind-the-scenes look at what transpired during the months between oral arguments before the Court and the justices' final decision, including secret conference sessions and judicial memos. While four justices confirmed that Bakke had been the victim of reverse discrimination, four others agreed that the school's affirmative action plan was a logical application of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Justice Lewis Powell sided with both viewpoints, resulting in Bakke's admission to the school and the upholding of affirmative action. The Court's unusual split decision invalidated UC-Davis's quota program for minorities but also struck down a California court's ruling that race could not be used as a factor in considering applicants. In light of eroding public support for affirmative action today, Ball examines the impact of Bakke and its use as a precedent. He also reviews recent events such as California Proposition 209, Washington Initiative 200, the "One Florida Initiative" program, and the Supreme Court's refusal to overturn Texas v. Hopwood—a decision that forced the University of Texas to eliminate affirmative action in its law school. As affirmative action continues to divide judges, legislatures, and citizens, the fragile consensus forged by Justice Powell seems to be collapsing. This book offers essential background for anyone interested in the controversy, helping readers to better understand the dynamics of Supreme Court decision making in emotionally charged litigation and to arrive at a more informed opinion over this vexing issue.

Behind Bakke recounts the inside story of the Court's 1978 decision in the Bakke case.

In its controversial Bakke decision of 1978, the Supreme Court upheld racial and ethnic diversity in university admissions—but it was not to be the last word on the matter. When Jennifer Gratz and Barbara Grutter challenged the University of Michigan's admission policies because they were passed over in favor of ostensibly less-qualified minority applicants, the Court was once again compelled to address affirmative action. Barbara Perry takes readers behind the scenes to tell the riveting story of how the two rejected applicants allied with conservative interest groups in an attempt to overturn affirmative action programs in higher education-and how in a 5-4 decision Justice Sandra Day O'Connor provided the decisive vote reaffirming Bakke. While the plaintiffs argued that their rights to equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act had been violated, the Court in 2003 disagreed and upheld the constitutionality of affirmative action, citing the goal of diversity as a legitimate state interest but also making it clear that there were limits to that interest and the policies to implement it. Drawing on interviews with key figures in the litigation, Perry follows the twists and turns of the district and appellate cases, then reveals the inside story of how Justice O'Connor joined her liberal colleagues to uphold the use of race in university admissions and thereby establish an important new precedent. Perry provides a play-by-play account of the dramatic oral arguments before the Court, explains how the Court's decisions emerged, and reveals how Justice O'Connor's personal, professional, and judicial background brought her to that pivotal moment in legal history. As Perry shows, the Supreme Court's decisions frustrated both conservatives and civil rights advocates, who continue to battle each other when anti-affirmative action initiatives appear on state ballots. Her compelling study helps us understand why affirmative action remains one of our most hotly contested issues.

When fifteen-year-old Gerald Gault of Globe, Arizona, allegedly made an obscene phone call to a neighbor, he was arrested by the local police, who failed to inform his parents. After a hearing in which the neighbor didn't even testify, Gault was promptly sentenced to six years in a juvenile "boot camp"—for an offense that would have cost an adult only two months. Even in a nation fed up with juvenile delinquency, that sentence seemed over the top and inspired a spirited defense on Gault's behalf. Led by Norman Dorsen, the ACLU ultimately took Gault's case to the Supreme Court and in 1967 won a landmark decision authored by Justice Abe Fortas. Widely celebrated as the most important children's rights case of the twentieth century, In re Gault affirmed that children have some of the same rights as adults and formally incorporated the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protections into the administration of the nation's juvenile courts. Placing this case within the context of its changing times, David Tanenhaus shows how the ACLU litigated Gault by questioning the Progressive Era assumption that juvenile courts should not follow criminal procedure. He then takes readers to the Supreme Court to fully explore the oral arguments and examine how the Court came to decide Gault, focusing on Justice Fortas's majority opinion, concurring opinions, Justice Potter Stewart's lone dissent, and initial responses to the decision. The book explores the contested legacy of Gault, charting changes and continuity in juvenile justice within the contexts of the ascendancy of conservative constitutionalism and Americans' embrace of mass incarceration as a penal strategy. An epilogue about Redding v. Safford—a 2009 decision involving a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl, also from Arizona, who was forced to undress because she was suspected of hiding drugs in her underwear—reminds us why Gault is of lasting consequence. Gault is a story of revolutionary constitutionalism that also reveals the tenacity of localism in American legal history. Tanenhaus's meticulous explication raises troubling questions about how local communities treat their children as it confirms the importance of the Supreme Court's decisions about the constitutional rights of minors.

This study provides a guide to a crucial case in the affirmative action/reverse discrimination debate in America. The text also covers the Supreme Court's 1987 reaffirmation that it was legitimate for employers to consider gender in hiring.

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

When Gregory Lee Johnson burned a flag, he was convicted for flag desecration under Texas law, but the Court of Appeals reversed the conviction. This work examines the case and the attendant controversy over whether protection of the flag conflicts with constitutional guarantees of free speech.

The authoritative ACLU guide to patient rights in a completely revised editionNow in its third edition, "The Rights of Patients "has long been considered the definitive guide to understanding the legal and ethical issues patients face in our often mismanaged healthcare system. Offering fully documented exposition and explanation of the rights of patients from birth to death, this concise reference covers topics such as informed consent, emergency treatment, refusing treatment, human experimentation, privacy and confidentiality, patient safety, and medical malpractice.George J. Annas s fully revised and updated edition also offers specific advice to individuals on serving as patient advocates for friends and family members and focuses on helping patients and their advocates preserve their human rights, as well as their independence and dignity, while undergoing medical care. The volume is an invaluable resource not only for patients and their families, but also for physicians, hospital administrators, medical and nursing students, and other healthcare workers. Among the helpful appendixes Annas includes are a discussion of internet resources and a pregnant patient s bill of rights."

How we define our right to die is the result of a complex negotiation between personal autonomy and public control, founded on many of the same concepts that underpin Roe v. Wade. From beginning to end, the lives of all Americans are in the hands of the courts, and historian Melvin I. Urofsky informs us about what we can expect from those courts and how we can ensure for ourselves the right to make the most fundamental decisions about the quality of our lives. Urofsky maps out the legal debate surrounding the right to die in an authoritative discussion of the compelling issues of personal autonomy, privacy, and the First Amendment. Drawing upon precedents from celebrated court cases such as Nancy Cruzan and Karen Ann Quinlan, Urofsky then clarifies the ethical ambiguities in personal terms with which everyone can identify. He confronts the problems posed by living wills, the withdrawal of life support systems, and the pros and cons of a rational person's choosing the option of suicide. As modern medicine prolongs life beyond all previous limits, how we die is perhaps the greatest moral and legal dilemma we face. Letting Go is for anybody concerned with how America conceives the rights of the individual in the late twentieth century, as well as those facing painful, personal decisions of life and death.

"In June 1992, accompanied by the clamor of pro-choice and anti-abortion demonstrations, the Supreme Court made its most significant statement to date about the right to an abortion under the Constitution in its decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey." "The legal attack on a restrictive Pennsylvania law requiring parental consent, a twenty-four-hour waiting period, and spousal notification produced one of the more important constitutional confrontations in our history. Numerous parties - historians, doctors, representatives of minority groups, religious opponents, as well as the Justice Department - submitted amicus briefs presenting their position on the controversy. The lawyers for the parties examined the legal underpinnings and constitutional background to the abortion right in analytic briefs. They also presented their position in an oral argument before the Supreme Court." "The final Supreme Court decision is a remarkable statement about the state of the law, the nature of constitutional determinations, the role of the Court in our democratic society, and the Justices' personal agony about the abortion controversy." "The legal record collected in this book not only examines the legal and constitutional implications but constitutes a valuable resource laying out the historical record on abortion, the medical issues, and the impact of the decision on minorities and religious groups." "Fascinating to read, the Supreme Court record is essential for anyone concerned about the political and social impact of restricting the right to an abortion."

In Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court, Terry Eastland brings together the Court's leading First Amendment cases, some 60 in all, starting with Schenck v. United States (1919) and ending with Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1998). Complete with a comprehensive introduction, pertinent indices and a useful bibliography, Freedom of Expression in the Supreme Court offers the general and specialized reader alike a thorough treatment of the Court's understanding on the First Amendment's speech, press, assembly, and petition clauses.

" One would like to think that the U.S. Supreme Court, the highest Court in the land, is the one island of sanity still remaining. But if what you folks are about to read is any indication, we've all got a lot to worry about. The question that presents itself is whether the near pathological dizziness and irrationality in our society has so invaded this nation's marrow that, like a wild-infectious virus, even the Supreme Court is not immune." --from NO ISLAND OF SANITY Now, in the powerful premiere of the Library of Contemporary Thought, Vincent Bugliosi takes a timely swipe at the Supreme Court's decision in Paula Jones v. Bill Clinton. Famed as the prosecutor of Charles Manson and author of the classic bestseller HELTER SKELTER, Bugliosi argues that the high court has rarely been proved so wrong, so fast. NO ISLAND OF SANITY is only the beginning of an ongoing dialogue with some of the most original writers working today. Each month, the Library of Contemporary Thought will bring you a different voice on a hot-button topic in American life, politics, and culture. From Mickey Mouse to Tiger Woods, from how we age to how we read, no subject is too controversial or too unlikely for these powerful and provocative books.

When fifteen-year-old Gerald Gault of Globe, Arizona, allegedly made an obscene phone call to a neighbor, he was arrested by the local police, who failed to inform his parents. After a hearing in which the neighbor didn't even testify, Gault was promptly sentenced to six years in a juvenile "boot camp"—for an offense that would have cost an adult only two months. Even in a nation fed up with juvenile delinquency, that sentence seemed over the top and inspired a spirited defense on Gault's behalf. Led by Norman Dorsen, the ACLU ultimately took Gault's case to the Supreme Court and in 1967 won a landmark decision authored by Justice Abe Fortas. Widely celebrated as the most important children's rights case of the twentieth century, In re Gault affirmed that children have some of the same rights as adults and formally incorporated the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protections into the administration of the nation's juvenile courts. Placing this case within the context of its changing times, David Tanenhaus shows how the ACLU litigated Gault by questioning the Progressive Era assumption that juvenile courts should not follow criminal procedure. He then takes readers to the Supreme Court to fully explore the oral arguments and examine how the Court came to decide Gault, focusing on Justice Fortas's majority opinion, concurring opinions, Justice Potter Stewart's lone dissent, and initial responses to the decision. The book explores the contested legacy of Gault, charting changes and continuity in juvenile justice within the contexts of the ascendancy of conservative constitutionalism and Americans' embrace of mass incarceration as a penal strategy. An epilogue about Redding v. Safford—a 2009 decision involving a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl, also from Arizona, who was forced to undress because she was suspected of hiding drugs in her underwear—reminds us why Gault is of lasting consequence. Gault is a story of revolutionary constitutionalism that also reveals the tenacity of localism in American legal history. Tanenhaus's meticulous explication raises troubling questions about how local communities treat their children as it confirms the importance of the Supreme Court's decisions about the constitutional rights of minors.

In the late 1990s, two lawsuits by white applicants who had been rejected by the University of Michigan began working their way through the federal court system, aimed at the abolition of racial preferences in college admissions. The stakes were high, the constitutional questions profound, the politics and emotions explosive. It was soon evident that the matter was headed for the highest court in the land, but there all clarity ended. <p>To the plaintiffs and the feisty public-interest law firm that backed them, the suits were a long overdue assault on reverse discrimination. The Constitution, strictly construed, was color-blind. Discrimination under any guise was not only illegal, it was the wrong way to set history right in a nation that had been troubled and divided by the uses and misuses of race for more than two hundred years.</p> <p>To the University of Michigan, and to other top institutions striving to expand opportunity and create diverse, representative student bodies, it looked as if most of what had been put in place since the 1978 <i>Bakke v. University of California</i> decision was about to be undone. Black and Hispanic students were in danger of being once again largely shut out of the most important avenue of advancement in America, an elite education. To some, it appeared likely that racial integration was about to suffer their worst setback since the start of the civil rights movement.</p> <p>In <i>A Black and White Case,</i> veteran Supreme Court reporter Greg Stohr portrays the individual dramas and exposes the human passions that colored and propelled this momentous legal struggle. His fascinating account takes us deep inside America s court system, where logic collides with emotion, and common sense must contend with the majesty and sometimes the seeming perversity of the law. He follows the trail from Michigan to Washington, DC, revealing how lawyers argued and strategized, how lower-court judges fought behind the scenes for control of the cases, and why the White House filed a brief in support of the white students, in opposition to a chorus of retired generals and admirals worried that the military academies would no longer reflect the face of America.</p> <p>Finally, Stohr details the fallout from the Supreme Court′s controversial 2003 ruling that both upheld affirmative action and upended some of the methods that had been used to effect it. And he shows how colleges and universities are reshaping their affirmative action policies--an evolution closely watched by lower courts, employers, civil rights lawyers, legislators, regulators, and the public.</p> <p><i>A Black and White Case</i> brings alive and brilliantly explains one of the most important Supreme Court decisions on the fundamental and divisive subject of race relations in America.</p>

When fifteen-year-old Gerald Gault of Globe, Arizona, allegedly made an obscene phone call to a neighbor, he was arrested by the local police, who failed to inform his parents. After a hearing in which the neighbor didn't even testify, Gault was promptly sentenced to six years in a juvenile "boot camp"—for an offense that would have cost an adult only two months. Even in a nation fed up with juvenile delinquency, that sentence seemed over the top and inspired a spirited defense on Gault's behalf. Led by Norman Dorsen, the ACLU ultimately took Gault's case to the Supreme Court and in 1967 won a landmark decision authored by Justice Abe Fortas. Widely celebrated as the most important children's rights case of the twentieth century, In re Gault affirmed that children have some of the same rights as adults and formally incorporated the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protections into the administration of the nation's juvenile courts. Placing this case within the context of its changing times, David Tanenhaus shows how the ACLU litigated Gault by questioning the Progressive Era assumption that juvenile courts should not follow criminal procedure. He then takes readers to the Supreme Court to fully explore the oral arguments and examine how the Court came to decide Gault, focusing on Justice Fortas's majority opinion, concurring opinions, Justice Potter Stewart's lone dissent, and initial responses to the decision. The book explores the contested legacy of Gault, charting changes and continuity in juvenile justice within the contexts of the ascendancy of conservative constitutionalism and Americans' embrace of mass incarceration as a penal strategy. An epilogue about Redding v. Safford—a 2009 decision involving a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl, also from Arizona, who was forced to undress because she was suspected of hiding drugs in her underwear—reminds us why Gault is of lasting consequence. Gault is a story of revolutionary constitutionalism that also reveals the tenacity of localism in American legal history. Tanenhaus's meticulous explication raises troubling questions about how local communities treat their children as it confirms the importance of the Supreme Court's decisions about the constitutional rights of minors.