★★★★★ 5
Dispassionate, Authoritative & Delightful
Format: Hardcover
Impartial: This dispassionate history of the Supreme Court should be read by everyone genuinely concerned about the future of our country and the rule of law. It's impartiality will likely infuriate those on the Left or Right who would prefer to vilify and demolish this branch of our government. There are plenty of books out there that will support your rage. But this book is a deep breath of fresh air.
I speak as a member of the bar of the Supreme Court, a retired federal judge, and a lifelong Democrat. The Most Powerful Court In the World (an accurate title) It is the first serious and nonpartisan book written about the Supreme Court in at least the last 30 years. Chock full of details and yet eminently readable.
Context: Law Professor Banner puts today's Court in its historical context, demolishing the proposition that in the good old days the Court was a quiet and apolitical sanctum of wisdom and that it has only recently become controversial and political. It's been extremely controversial since at least 1803. Banner's recounting of the historical facts (including wonderful anecdotes) lifts the reader from the immediate tumult of 2024 headlines and provides us with the long view of the Court and the evolution of the law and the Court. Examples include:
1. Court packing (it started with John Marshall in 1801) and manipulating the number of Justices to help, or prevent, Presidential agenda's and appointments (1801).
2. Diversity on the Court (regional, religious, racial, gender)
3. Reconstruction and Jim Crow.
4. The Commerce Clause revolution and its sequel.
5. The rise of individual liberty litigation and decisions in the 20th century, starting with the novel idea of applying the Bill of Rights to the States. Religion, free speech, Roe, Dobbs.
5. The winning judicial strategies for challenging racial discrimination, sexual and gender discrimination and LGBTQ+ discrimination cases to the Court and their current erosion. Affirmative action and its demise.
6. The fact that the Court (composed of lawyers who are taught to revere history, precedent and law) has been a conservative institution for its entire history except for 15 years right after FDR when, for a short interval, it moved to the Left.
7. Movements to reform the Court (age limits, more justices, Congressional veto, jurisdiction stripping) have been perennial. Including Biden's Presidential Commission Report of 2021.
8. The fact that the Justices are human beings who have hobnobbed with the President, VP, Senators, Politicos and Business people forever. Frankfurter played poker with FDR, Douglas took a $12,000 per year salary from the owner of a Las Vegas Casino, Fortas took $20,000 per year from Louis Wolfson, who was later convicted and sent to prison. Spouses who worked for law firms that appeared before the Court.
The reader will note that in his discussion of every case, especially the modern ones, Professor Banner provides a representative and pithy quote from the Majority decision and from the dissent. He recounts them fairly and does not take sides. He lets the reader think about it.
This book is a delightful change from the norm for modern SCOTUS literature - which is either a partisan hatchet job by a journalist or professor, a compendium of gossip from the law clerks willing to talk, or the warm and neutral memoire or musings of a current Justice trying to make a buck or a former Justice burnishing his or her place in history. Banner gives you as straight, objective and unvarnished a history as you are likely to get these days. It is not a hit-job. It is not a hagiography.
The Most Powerful Court in the World should be required reading for any student of the Supreme Court.
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Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2024
