Among the surprising events in Eastern Europe in 1989, none astonished the world more than the nonviolent overthrow of the East German Communist regime. This book examines the collapse of East Germany as it unfolded in one city, Leipzig. Analyzing the leading role of the GDR's second largest city, Bartee combines chronological and descriptive narration of events with an in-depth critique of leading actors and groups. Prominent among these are the Protestant churches and the array of opposition groups concerned for peace, freedom, human rights, justice, and the environment.

Bartee focuses in particular on the famous peace prayer services in St. Nicholas Church and the protest activities of the groups as they expanded into the mass demonstrations of late 1989. Using surveys and interviews with participants, as well as Leipzig archives, this study examines the motivations and methods of the demonstrators. Bartee concludes that, while the prayer services provided hope, inspiration, and information, the strong desire for a free, open society served as the group's chief motivation.

This volume is a thematic study in legal history that uses past and present landmark court cases to analyze the legal and historical development of moral regulatory policies in America and resulting debates. Using a critical variable approach, the book demonstrates how different elements of the legal process have historically influenced the litigation of various moral issues. Five moral policies are included: abortion, sodomy, pornography, criminal insanity, and the death penalty. The book's framework for analysis uses examples from English legal history and links them to American cases, demonstrating how moral regulatory policies are impacted by the legal process: by laws, by judges and juries, by legal scholars, and by attorneys.

Following a brief introduction, Chapter 1 examines how protagonists in the bitter moral and legal controversy over abortion in America have sought to fortify their positions with the views of prominent English legal authorities. The authors discuss the role of English legal scholars in court opinion and oral arguments in Webster and in Roe v. Wade, and debates Roe's interpretation of the English legalists. Chapter 2 describes how attempts to expand a right of privacy under the federal Constitution to include sodomy failed the test for common law rights (Rights of Englishmen) in Bowers v. Hardwick (1986), and includes a history of sodomy in early English and American law. Chapter 3 discusses pornography standards and laws, highlighting the history of legal actions taken against Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure in both England and the U.S., demonstrating the role of precedent in American judicial efforts to define pornography. In Chapter 4, which deals with the criminal insanity defense, the influential role of the defense attorney on case outcomes is illustrated in cases such as England's McNaughton case (1843) and America's Hinckley case (1982). Chapter 5 deals with cruel and unusual punishment throughout U.S. and English history. The book ends with an epilogue which ties together the idea of the American legal process as an inherited English process, reiterating how decisionmakers continually mine the past to find traditions and sources of moral values for justifying or criticizing current laws and policies.