When the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians--a small tribe of only 25 members--first opened a high-stakes bingo parlor, the operation was shut down by the State of California as a violation of its gambling laws. It took a Supreme Court decision to overturn the state's action, confirm the autonomy of tribes, and pave the way for other tribes to operate gaming centers throughout America.

Ralph Rossum explores the origins, arguments, and impact of "California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians," the 1987 Supreme Court decision that reasserted the unique federally supported sovereignty of Indian nations, effectively barring individual states from interfering with that sovereignty and opening the door for the explosive growth of Indian casinos over the next two decades.

Rossum has crafted an evenhanded overview of the case itself-its origins, how it was argued at every level of the judicial system, and the decision's impact-as he brings to life the essential debates pitting Indian rights against the regulatory powers of the states. He also provides historical grounding for the case through a cogent analysis of previous Supreme Court decisions and legislative efforts from the late colonial period to the present, tracking the troubled course of Indian law through a terrain of abrogated treaties, unenforced court decisions, confused statutes, and harsh administrative rulings.

In its decision, the Court held that states are barred from interfering with tribal gaming enterprises catering primarily to non-Indian participants and operating in Indian country. As a result of that ruling-and of Congress's subsequent passage of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act-tribal gaming has become a multibillion dollar business encompassing 425 casinos operated by 238 tribes in 29 states. Such enormous growth has funded a renaissance of reservation self-governance and culture, once written off as permanently impoverished.

As Rossum shows, "Cabazon" also brings together in one case a debate over the meaning of tribal sovereignty, the relationship of tribes to the federal government and the states, and the appropriateness of having distinctive canons of construction for federal Indian law. His concise and insightful study makes clear the significance of this landmark case as it attests to the sovereignty of both Native Americans and the law.

The first comprehensive, reasoned, andsympathetic analysis of how Scalia hasdecided cases now covers his entireSupreme Court tenure. In the new afterwordRalph Rossum discusses the thirty-eightmajor opinions since the original 2006publication, including Scalia’s seminalopinion on the Second Amendment inDistrict of Columbia v. Heller, his dissent inthe Obamacare cases of NFIB v. Sebelius andKing v. Burwell, the important recessappointments case of NLRB v. Noel Canning,his criminal procedure decisions on theFourth Amendment and the ConfrontationClause, his equal protection (racial preference)opinions, and Hein v. Freedom fromReligion Foundation.

Though Clarence Thomas has been a Supreme Court Justice for nearly 25 years and has written close to five hundred opinions, legal scholars and pundits have given him short shrift, often, in fact, dismissing him as a narrow partisan, a silent presence on the bench, an enemy of his race, a tool of Antonin Scalia. And yet, as this book makes clear, few justices of the Supreme Court have developed as clear and consistent a constitutional jurisprudence as Thomas. Also little known but apparent in Ralph A. Rossum's detailed assessment of the justice's jurisprudence is how profound Thomas's impact has been in certain areas of constitutional law--not only on the bench but also even among some of his erstwhile disparaging critics.

During his years on the Court, Thomas has pursued an original general meaning approach to constitutional interpretation; he has been unswayed by claims of precedent--by the gradual build-up of interpretations that, to his mind, come to distort the original meaning of the constitutional provision in question, leading to muddled decisions and contradictory conclusions. In a close reading of Thomas's hundreds of well-crafted, extensively researched, and passionately argued majority, concurring, and dissenting opinions, Rossum explores how the justice applies this original meaning approach to questions of constitutional structure as they relate to federalism; substantive rights found in the First Amendment's religion and free speech and press clauses, the Second Amendment's right to keep and bear arms, the Fifth Amendment's restrictions on the taking of private property, and the Fourteenth Amendment regarding abortion rights; and various criminal procedural provisions found in the "Ex Post Facto" Clauses and the Bill of Rights.

Thomas grounds his original general meaning approach in the Declaration of Independence and its "self evident" truth that "all men are created equal"; that truth, he insists, "preced es] and underl ies] the Constitution." "Understanding Clarence Thomas" traces the many consequences that, for Thomas, flow from the centrality of that "self evident" truth, and how these shape his opinions in cases concerning desegregation, racial preference, and voting rights.

The most thorough explication ever given of the jurisprudence of this prolific but little-understood justice, this work offers a unique opportunity to grasp not just the meaning of Clarence Thomas's opinions but their significance for the Supreme Court and constitutional interpretation in our day.

Freedom and the Rule of Law takes a critical look at the historical beginnings of law in the United States, and how that history has influenced current trends regarding law and freedom. Anthony Peacock has compiled articles that examine the relationship between freedom and the rule of law in America. Although this is a theme that has been a perennial one since America's founding, it is also one of particular importance today, and this book explains how history makes this apparent. The rule of law is fundamental to all liberal constitutional regimes whose political orders recognize the equal natural rights of all, and whose purpose is to protect those natural rights in addition to the general welfare. The rule of law was essential to achieving both of these ends and to reconciling them where necessary. But just how free is America today? It was certainly within the contemplation of the Founders that the federal judiciary would have a significant role in interpreting the Constitution, federal laws, and treaties, but it would be difficult to argue that those who framed and ratified the Constitution contemplated a role for the courts, particularly for the United States Supreme Court, of the magnitude they have today. The writers take the reader far back into history to the very roots of American Law by examining the English common law roots that provided the foundation for the rule of law in America. This book explores these phenomena and other recent developments in American freedom through history.

Arguments over constitutional interpretation increasingly highlight the full range of political, moral, and cultural fault lines in American society. Yet all the contending parties claim fealty to the Constitution. This volume brings together some of America's leading scholars of constitutional originalism to reflect on the nature and significance of various approaches to constitutional interpretation and controversies. Throughout the book, the contributors highlight the moral and political dimensions of constitutional interpretation. In doing so, they bring constitutional interpretation and its attendant disputes down from the clouds, showing their relationship to the concerns of the citizen. In addition to matters of interpretation, the book deals with the proper role of the judiciary in a free society, the relationship of law to politics, and the relationship of constitutional originalism to the deepest concerns of political thought and philosophy.

Arguments over constitutional interpretation increasingly highlight the full range of political, moral, and cultural fault lines in American society. Yet all the contending parties claim fealty to the Constitution. This volume brings together some of America's leading scholars of constitutional originalism to reflect on the nature and significance of various approaches to constitutional interpretation and controversies. Throughout the book, the contributors highlight the moral and political dimensions of constitutional interpretation. In doing so, they bring constitutional interpretation and its attendant disputes down from the clouds, showing their relationship to the concerns of the citizen. In addition to matters of interpretation, the book deals with the proper role of the judiciary in a free society, the relationship of law to politics, and the relationship of constitutional originalism to the deepest concerns of political thought and philosophy.

Abraham Lincoln worried that the "walls" of the constitution would ultimately be leveled by the "silent artillery of time." His fears materialized with the 1913 ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment, which, by eliminating federalism's structural protection, altered the very nature and meaning of federalism. Ralph A. Rossum's provocative new book considers the forces unleashed by an amendment to install the direct election of U.S. Senators. Far from expecting federalism to be protected by an activist court, the Framers, Rossum argues, expected the constitutional structure, particularly the election of the Senate by state legislatures, to sustain it. In Federalism, the Supreme Court, and the Seventeenth Amendment Rossum challenges the fundamental jurisprudential assumptions about federalism. He also provides a powerful indictment of the controversial federalist decisions recently handed down by an activist U.S. Supreme Court seeking to fill the gap created by the Seventeenth Amendment's ratification and protect the original federal design. Rossum's masterful handling of the development of federalism restores the true significance to an amendment previously consigned to the footnotes of history. It demonstrates how the original federal design has been amended out of existence; the interests of states as states abandoned and federalism left unprotected, both structurally and democratically. It highlights the ultimate irony of constitutional democracy: that an amendment intended to promote democracy, even at the expense of federalism, has been undermined by an activist court intent on protecting federalism, at the expense of democracy.