Available as a single volume or as part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or as part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or as part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or as part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or as part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

Available as a single volume or part of the 10 volume set Supreme Court in American Society

In Democracy in America, de Tocqueville observed that there is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one. Two hundred years of American history have certainly born out the truth of this remark. Whether a controversy is political, economic, or social, whether it focuses on child labor, prayer in public schools, war powers, busing, abortion, business monopolies, or capital punishment, eventually the battle is taken to court. And the ultimate venue for these vital struggles is the Supreme Court. Indeed, the Supreme Court is a prism through which the entire life of our nation is magnified and illuminated, and through which we have defined ourselves as a people. Now, in The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States, readers have a rich source of information about one of the central institutions of American life. Everything one would want to know about the Supreme Court is here, in more than a thousand alphabetically arranged entries. There are biographies of every justice who ever sat on the Supreme Court (with pictures of each) as well as entries on rejected nominees and prominent judges (such as Learned Hand), on presidents who had an important impact on - or conflict with - the Court (including Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt), and on other influential figures (from Alexander Hamilton to Cass Gilbert, the architect of the Supreme Court Building). More than four hundred entries examine every major case that the court has decided, from Marbury v. Madison (which established the Court's power to declare federal laws unconstitutional) and Scott v. Sandford (the Dred Scott Case) toBrown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade. In addition, there are extended essays on the major issues that have confronted the Court (from slavery to national security, capital punishment to religion, affirmative action to the Vietnam War), entries on judicial matters and legal terms (ranging from judicial review and separation of powers to amicus brief and habeas corpus), articles on all Amendments to the Constitution, and an extensive, four-part history of the Court. And as in all Oxford Companions, the contributions combine scholarship with engaging insight, giving us a sense of the personality and the inner workings of the Court. They examine everything from the wanderings of the Supreme Court (the first session was held in the Royal Exchange Building in New York City, and the Court at times has met in a Congressional committee room, a tavern, a rented house, and finally, in 1935, its own building), to the Jackson-Black feud and the clouded resignation of Abe Fortas, to the Supreme Court's press room and the paintings and sculptures adorning the Supreme Court building. The decisions of the Supreme Court have touched - and will continue to influence - every corner of American society. A comprehensive, authoritative guide to the Supreme Court, this volume is an essential reference source for everyone interested in the workings of this vital institution and in the multitude of issues it has confronted over the course of its history.

With a survey of the thirty Supreme Court cases that, in the opinion of U.S. Supreme Court justices and leading civics educators and legal historians, are the most important for American citizens to understand, The Pursuit of Justice is the perfect companion for those wishing to learn more about American civics and government. The cases range across three centuries of American history, including such landmarks as Marbury v. Madison (1803), which established the principle of judicial review; Scott v. Sandford (1857), which inflamed the slavery argument in the United States and led to the Civil War; Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which memorialized the concept of separate but equal; and Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which overturned Plessy. Dealing with issues of particular concern to students, such as voting, school prayer, search and seizure, and affirmative action, and broad democratic concepts such as separation of powers, federalism, and separation of church and state, the book covers all the major cases specified in the national and state civics and American history standards.
For each case, there is an introductory essay providing historical background and legal commentary as well as excerpts from the decision(s); related documents such as briefs or evidence, with headnotes and/or marginal commentary, some possibly in facsimile; and features or sidebars on principal players in the decisions, whether attorneys, plaintiffs, defendants, or justices. An introductory essay defines the criteria for selecting the cases and setting them in the context of American history and government, and a concluding essay suggests the role that the Court will play in the future.

With a survey of the thirty Supreme Court cases that, in the opinion of U.S. Supreme Court justices and leading civics educators and legal historians, are the most important for American citizens to understand, The Pursuit of Justice is the perfect companion for those wishing to learn more about American civics and government. The cases range across three centuries of American history, including such landmarks as Marbury v. Madison (1803), which established the principle of judicial review; Scott v. Sandford (1857), which inflamed the slavery argument in the United States and led to the Civil War; Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which memorialized the concept of separate but equal; and Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which overturned Plessy. Dealing with issues of particular concern to students, such as voting, school prayer, search and seizure, and affirmative action, and broad democratic concepts such as separation of powers, federalism, and separation of church and state, the book covers all the major cases specified in the national and state civics and American history standards. For each case, there is an introductory essay providing historical background and legal commentary as well as excerpts from the decision(s); related documents such as briefs or evidence, with headnotes and/or marginal commentary, some possibly in facsimile; and features or sidebars on principal players in the decisions, whether attorneys, plaintiffs, defendants, or justices. An introductory essay defines the criteria for selecting the cases and setting them in the context of American history and government, and a concluding essay suggests the role that the Court will play in the future.

The Supreme Court has been the site of some of the great debates of American history, from child labor and prayer in the schools, to busing and abortion. The Oxford Guide to United States Supreme Court Decisions offers lively and insightful accounts of the most important cases ever argued before the Court, from Marbury v. Madison and Scott v. Sandford (the Dred Scott decision) to Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade.
This new edition of the Guide contains more than 450 entries on major Supreme Court cases, including 53 new entries on the latest landmark rulings. Among the new entries are Bush v. Gore, Nixon v. United States, Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights. Four decisions--Hamdi v. Bush, Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, Rasu v. Bush, and Rumsfeld v. Padilla--are considered in a single essay entitled "Enemy Combatant Cases." Arranged alphabetically and written by eminent legal scholars, each entry provides the United States Reports citation, the date the case was argued and decided, the vote of the Justices, who wrote the opinion for the Court, who concurred, and who dissented. More important, the entries feature an informative account of the particulars of the case, the legal and social background, the reasoning behind the Court's decision, and the case's impact on American society. For this edition, Ely has added an extensive Further Reading section and revised the Case Index and Topical Index. The Guide also features the Constitution of the United States, an appendix on the Justices, and a legal glossary.
For anyone interested in the great controversies of our time, this invaluable book is a mustread--a primer on the epic constitutional battles that have informed American life.

In recent years the Supreme Court has been at the center of such political issues as abortion rights, the administration of police procedures, and the determination of the 2000 presidential election. The checks and balances provided by the three branches of federal government are essential to nurturing and maintaining American democracy. With the guidance of coeditors Kermit L. Hall and Kevin T. McGuire, this volume of essays examines the role of the Judicial Branch in American democracy and the dynamic between the other branches of government, compares international models, and discusses possible measures for reform.
The Judicial Branch considers the impact of courts on American life and addresses such central questions as: Is the Supreme Court an institution of social justice? Is there a case for judicially created and protected social rights? Have the courts become sovereign when interpreting the Constitution?
Essays examine topics that include the judiciary in the founding of the nation; turning points in the history of the American judicial system; the separation of powers between the other branches of government; how the Supreme Court resolves political conflicts through legal means; what Americans know about the judiciary and its functions; and whether the American scheme of courts is the best way to support democracy.

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.

Taking their cue from the late Paul L. Murphy, one of our nation's leading legal historians, this illustrious group of scholars argues that the field of constitutional history is "too important to be left solely to lawyers and judges." Their "state-of-the-field" volume reclaims constitutional history's rightful place as a vital and necessary part of our intellectual enterprise, in part by pushing the field onto fresh, even controversial, terrain. The result is a provocative new look at the past, present, and future of American constitutionalism, one that opens a window on the larger American soul.

Much as Murphy has done, these scholars contend that this restoration is much needed and will greatly enrich judicial and public policy, advance a tradition of justice worthy of America's democratic aspirations, give due attention to cultural contexts, and, most importantly, afford Americans a richer understanding of their constitutional heritage.

Their essays explore, for example, the ways in which previously excluded groups have come more fully into the Constitution's orbit of freedom, the ongoing importance of institutions and doctrines, and the ways in which theory and informal texts might enrich the field. How, they ask, might scholars take account of the lived experiences of litigants, reformers, and lawyers in the forging of constitutional change?

A kind of prospectus for the future of American constitutional history, these essays address fundamental questions about the field and its evolution. More important, they persuasively argue that the best way to reinvigorate the study of constitutionalism is to reconnect it to its social and cultural contexts, to appreciate the continuing necessity of archival research, to recognize and support the value of new approaches and perspectives, and to reaffirm in the end that the best way to explain the history of rights is to remember the courage of the people who had the vision and conviction to put the judges through their constitutional paces.

This collection of thirteen essays examines the leaders of the southern states during the Civil War. Malcolm C. McMillan writes of the futile efforts of Alabama's wealthy governors to keep the trust of the poor non-slaveholding whites. Paul D. Escott shows Georgia Governor Joseph Emerson Brown's ability to please both the planter elite and the yeoman farmers. John B. Edmunds, Jr. examines the tremendous problems faced by the governors of South Carolina, the state that would suffer the highest losses. Each of the contributors describes the governor's reaction to undertaking duties never before required of men in their positions--urging men to battle, searching for means to feed and clothe the poor, boosting morale, and defending their state's territories, even against great odds.