One Supreme Court

Despite over two hundred years of experience with constitutional government, much remains unclear about the power of the political branches to curtail or re-define the judicial power of the United States. Uncertainty persists about the basis on which state courts and federal agencies may hear federal claims and the degree to which federal courts must review their decisions. Scholars approach these questions from a range of vantage points and have arrived at widely varying conclusions about the relationship between congressional and judicial power. Deploying familiar forms of legal analysis, and relying upon a new account of the Court's supremacy in relation to lower courts and tribunals, James Pfander advances a departmental conception of the judiciary. He argues that Congress can enlist the state courts, lower federal courts, and administrative agencies to hear federal claims in the first instance, but all of these tribunals must operate within a hierarchical framework over which the "one supreme Court" identified in the Constitution exercises ultimate supervisory authority. In offering the first general account of the Court as department head, Pfander takes up such important debates in the federal courts' literature as Congress's power to strip the federal courts of jurisdiction to review state court decisions, its authority to assign decision-making authority to state courts and non-Article III tribunals, its control over the doctrine of vertical stare decisis, and its ability to craft rules of practice for the federal system.

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 undistinguished 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.

This book explores some of the most glaring misunderstandings about the U.S. Supreme Court—and makes a strong case for why our Supreme Court Justices should not be entrusted with decisions that affect every American citizen. Supreme Myths: Why the Supreme Court is Not a Court and its Justices are Not Judges presents a detailed discussion of the Court's most important and controversial constitutional cases that demonstrates why it doesn't justify being labeled "a court of law." Eric Segall, professor of law at Georgia State University College of Law for two decades, explains why this third branch of the national government is an institution that makes important judgments about fundamental questions based on the Justices' ideological preferences, not the law. A complete understanding of the true nature of the Court's decision-making process is necessary, he argues, before an intelligent debate over who should serve on the Court—and how they should resolve cases—can be held. Addressing front-page areas of constitutional law such as health care, abortion, affirmative action, gun control, and freedom of religion, this book offers a frank description of how the Supreme Court truly operates, a critique of life tenure of its Justices, and a set of proposals aimed at making the Court function more transparently to further the goals of our representative democracy.

"The U.S. Supreme Court: A Very Short Introduction draws on the Court's history and its written and unwritten rules to show how it operates in the twenty-first century. Today's Supreme Court, housed in a majestic building on Capitol Hill, bears little resemblance to the institution launched by the Framers of the Constitution and was originally seen as the weakest of the three branches of government. Over the next 200 years, the Court put the independence the Framers gave it to use and now largely defines itself, exercising so much power over how Americans live that some have begun to question whether the Court has gone too far. How do cases reach the Supreme Court? What features have other courts around the world taken from the Supreme Court, and what have they left?"--

"Challenges the argument that court-packing will politicize the Court and undermine its institutional legitimacy, arguing that the "law-politics dichotomy" is a myth because politics always has and always will influence Supreme Court decision-making"--

A comprehensive history of the people and cases that have changed history, this is the definitive account of the nation's highest court featuring a forward by Howard Zinn Recent changes in the Supreme Court have placed the venerable institution at the forefront of current affairs, making this comprehensive and engaging work as timely as ever. In the tradition of Howard Zinn's classic A People's History of the United States, Peter Irons chronicles the decisions that have influenced virtually every aspect of our society, from the debates over judicial power to controversial rulings in the past regarding slavery, racial segregation, and abortion, as well as more current cases about school prayer, the Bush/Gore election results, and "enemy combatants." To understand key issues facing the supreme court and the current battle for the court's ideological makeup, there is no better guide than Peter Irons. This revised and updated edition includes a foreword by Howard Zinn. "A sophisticated narrative history of the Supreme Court . . . [Irons] breathes abundant life into old documents and reminds readers that today's fiercest arguments about rights are the continuation of the endless American conversation." -Publisher's Weekly (starred review)

“With Supreme Inequality, Adam Cohen has built, brick by brick, an airtight case against the Supreme Court of the last half-century...Cohen’s book is a closing statement in the case against an institution tasked with protecting the vulnerable, which has emboldened the rich and powerful instead.” —Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor, Slate A revelatory examination of the conservative direction of the Supreme Court over the last fifty years. In Supreme Inequality, bestselling author Adam Cohen surveys the most significant Supreme Court rulings since the Nixon era and exposes how, contrary to what Americans like to believe, the Supreme Court does little to protect the rights of the poor and disadvantaged; in fact, it has not been on their side for fifty years. Cohen proves beyond doubt that the modern Court has been one of the leading forces behind the nation’s soaring level of economic inequality, and that an institution revered as a source of fairness has been systematically making America less fair. A triumph of American legal, political, and social history, Supreme Inequality holds to account the highest court in the land and shows how much damage it has done to America’s ideals of equality, democracy, and justice for all.

Both historically and in the present, the Supreme Court has largely been a failure In this devastating book, Erwin Chemerinsky—“one of the shining lights of legal academia” (The New York Times)—shows how, case by case, for over two centuries, the hallowed Court has been far more likely to uphold government abuses of power than to stop them. Drawing on a wealth of rulings, some famous, others little known, he reviews the Supreme Court’s historic failures in key areas, including the refusal to protect minorities, the upholding of gender discrimination, and the neglect of the Constitution in times of crisis, from World War I through 9/11. No one is better suited to make this case than Chemerinsky. He has studied, taught, and practiced constitutional law for thirty years and has argued before the Supreme Court. With passion and eloquence, Chemerinsky advocates reforms that could make the system work better, and he challenges us to think more critically about the nature of the Court and the fallible men and women who sit on it.

One of America's preeminent constitutional scholars, Sunstein mounts a defense of the most striking characteristic of modern constitutional law: the inclination to decide one case at a time. Examining various controversies, he shows how--and why--the Court has avoided broad rulings, and in doing so has fostered public debate on difficult topics.

** WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER **USA TODAY BESTSELLER ** PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY BESTSELLER ** NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ** With a simple majority on the Supreme Court, the left would have the power to curtail or even abolish the freedoms that have made America a beacon to the world. We are one vote away from losing our most precious constitutional rights. As a Supreme Court clerk, solicitor general of Texas, and private litigator, Ted Cruz played a key role in some of the most important legal cases of the past two decades. In One Vote Away, you will discover how often the high court decisions that affect your life have been decided by the narrowest of margins. One vote preserves your right to speak freely, to bear arms, and to exercise your faith. One vote will determine whether your children enjoy their full inheritance as American citizens. God may endow us with "certain unalienable rights," but whether we enjoy them depends on nine judges—the "high priests" who have the last say in our system of government. Drawing back the curtain of their temple, Senator Cruz reveals the struggles, arguments, and strife that have shaped the fate of those rights. No one who reads One Vote Away can ever again take a single seat on the Supreme Court for granted.