Summer Reading

By Colleen A. Sheehan (Author) In the first study that combines an in-depth examination of Madison’s National Gazette essays of 1791–92 with a study of The Federalist, Colleen Sheehan traces...

By Mark Curriden and Leroy Phillips In this profound and fascinating book, the authors revisit an overlooked Supreme Court decision that changed forever how justice is carried out in the...

By Marlene Trestman (Author) Through a life that spanned every decade of the twentieth century, Supreme Court advocate Bessie Margolin shaped modern American labor policy while creating a place for...

By Peter Charles Hoffer The far-reaching Sedition Act of 1798 was introduced by Federalists to suppress Republican support of French revolutionaries and imposed fines and imprisonment "if any person shall...

By Lea VanderVelde Among the most infamous U.S. Supreme Court decisions is Dred Scott v. Sandford . Despite the case's signal importance as a turning point in America's history, the...

The first Chief Justice of the United States, John Jay faced many unique challenges. When the stability and success of the new nation were far from certain, a body of...

"So Forcibly Presented by His Counsel, Who Are of His Race": Cornelius Jones, The Forgotten Black Supreme Court Advocate and Fighter for Civil Rights in the Plessy Era James A. Feldman Influence Without...

By Jean Edward Smith It was in tolling the death of Chief Justice John Marshall in 1835 that the Liberty Bell cracked, never to ring again. An apt symbol of...

By Charles F. Hobson John Marshall remains one of the towering figures in the landscape of American law. From the Revolution to the age of Jackson, he played a critical...

By Ralph A. Rossum Lionized by the right and demonized by the left, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is the high court's quintessential conservative. Witty, outspoken, often abrasive, he is...

  By Linda Greenhouse *Signed Bookplate In this acclaimed biography, Linda Greenhouse of The New York Times draws back the curtain on America's most private branch of government, the Supreme...

By William H. Rehnquist Near midnight on Election Day in November 1876, the returns coming into Republican National headquarters signaled a victory for the Democratic presidential candidate, Samuel J. Tilden....