The Best Defense [Paperback]

Alan M. Dershowitz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 12, 1983

The author presents his most famous, and infamous, cases and clients, and in the process, takes a critical, informed look at a legal system that he regards as deeply corrupt.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

The author presents his most famous, and infamous, cases and clients, and in the process, takes a critical, informed look at a legal system that he regards as deeply corrupt.

Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; 1st Vintage Books ed edition (May 12, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 039471380X
• ISBN-13: 978-0394713809
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 1 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #187,475 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #21 in Books > Law > Administrative Law > Civil Law

More About the Author

ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ is a Brooklyn native who has been called 'the nation's most peripatetic civil liberties lawyer' and one of its 'most distinguished defenders of individual rights,' 'the best-known criminal lawyer in the world,' 'the top lawyer of last resort,' and 'America's most public Jewish defender.' He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Dershowitz, a graduate of Brooklyn College and Yale Law School, joined the Harvard Law School faculty at age 25 after clerking for Judge David Bazelon and Justice Arthur Goldberg. While he is known for defending clients such as Anatoly Sharansky, Claus von B'low, O.J. Simpson, Michael Milken and Mike Tyson, he continues to represent numerous indigent defendants and takes half of his cases pro bono. Dershowitz is the author of 20 works of fiction and non-fiction, including 6 bestsellers. His writing has been praised by Truman Capote, Saul Bellow, David Mamet, William Styron, Aharon Appelfeld, A.B. Yehoshua and Elie Wiesel. More than a million of his books have been sold worldwide, in numerous languages, and more than a million people have heard him lecture around the world. His most recent nonfiction titles are The Case For Peace: How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Can be Resolved (August 2005, Wiley); Rights From Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origins of Rights (November 2004, Basic Books), The Case for Israel (September 2003, Wiley), America Declares Independence, Why Terrorism Works, Shouting Fire, Letters to a Young Lawyer, Supreme Injustice, and The Genesis of Justice. His novels include The Advocate's Devil and Just Revenge. Dershowitz is also the author of The Vanishing American Jew, The Abuse Excuse, Reasonable Doubts, Chutzpah (a #1 bestseller), Reversal of Fortune (which was made into an Academy Award-winning film), Sexual McCarthyism and The Best Defense.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An arcane process made fascinating, August 2, 2000

By 

Tom Munro "tomfrombrunswick" (Melbourne, Victoria Australia) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Best Defense (Paperback)

The author of this book is a law professor who does appellant work part time. Unlike the cut and thrust of jury work appeals have generally been seen as dry rarefied and uninteresting. The author however writes in an entertaining and self deprecating way which brings the process alive. It is one of the most enjoyable books written about the law that I have read for some time.

The author also writes about the cases he loses. So many books by advocates focus on the success and are about self grandisment.

Overall the impression given is how much of a dogged slog it is to achieve justice in the American System and how much calculation and thought has to go into every strategy and move. One of the amazing things in the book is how the author is so critical of a number of judges and how willing he is to make those criticisms.

It is an excellent book which shows the many flaws and weakness of the American justice system.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars engaging, insightful, personal, educational, January 26, 2004

By 

J. Duncan (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Best Defense (Paperback)

this book succeeds on many levels and as such should appeal to many readers:

1. as an explanation for how our judicial system is setup and operates;
2. putting a face and personal touch behind many famous (porn star harry reams, prince of the city robert leuci, etc. etc.) and less famous, but just as interesting, trials;
3. as a series of engaging human interest stories;
4. as a chronicle of the early careers of now wildly famous people like, for example, rudy guiliani who appears as a young prosecutor in the case involving robert leuci.

this book was written at a time when dershowitz was more focused on trials as opposed to politics, so it reads without the over tones of his later works. this will be good for readers that don't agree with his politics and it's a refreshing change during this time where there are so many books that carry a political agenda.

each chapter averages about 20 pages and discusses a different case. so you can read one a night or a polish off a few while travelling. dershowitz' delivery is completely candid about the the conversations and people involved in each case. i was continually surprised about the intimate details revealed for each case.

i think this book will have great appeal to readers of spy-thrillers because they will be entertained by the stories, plot twists and uncertain endings (dershowitz discusses cases in which he won and lost), while at the same time discovering many realities of our courts and beyond.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the real Dershowitz., April 30, 1998

By 

Greg Harris ([e-mail]) (Somerville, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Best Defense (Paperback)

Forget what you've seen on television. This book reveals Prof. Dershowitz for what he truly is--a principled civil libertarian of the first order. I was fortunate enough to study criminal law with Prof. Dershowitz, and this book recounts the very best of his early "war stories." It's as readable as fiction, and far more interesting! Read this book and find out why William F. Buckley, whose politics differ widely from Prof. Dershowitz's, called for him to receive the Medal of Freedom for his "fundamentalist" defense of the American legal system. From Soviet Jews, to teenagers on death row, to porn-star Harry Reems, Prof. Dershowitz has defended the powerless and the unpopular and suffered the criticism of others with good humor and a constant willingness to debate. I read this book in high school, and again in law school. I cannot recommend it highly enough.