Storming the Court: How a Band of Yale Law Students Sued the President--and Won [Hardcover]

Brandt Goldstein (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 27, 2005

A tale more riveting than fiction, Storming the Court is the true story of idealistic law students who challenged the United States government in a battle for freedom and human rights that went all the way to the Supreme Court -- and resonates today more than ever.

In 1992, three hundred innocent men, women, and children who had qualified for political asylum in the United States were forced into a detention camp at the American naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and told they might never be freed. Storming the Court takes readers inside this modern-day atrocity to tell the tale of Yvonne Pascal -- a young, charismatic activist -- and other Haitian refugees who had fled their violent homeland only to end up prisoners at Guantánamo. They had no lawyers, no contact with the outside world, and no hope...except for a band of students at Yale Law School fifteen hundred miles away.

Led by Harold Koh, a gifted but untested law professor, these remarkable twentysomethings waged a legal war against two U.S. presidents to defend the Constitution and the principles symbolized by the Statue of Liberty. It was an education in law unlike any other. With the refugees' lives at stake, the students threw aside classes and career plans to fight an army of government attorneys in a case so politically volatile that the White House itself intervened in the legal strategy.

Featuring a real-life cast that includes Kenneth Starr and other top Justice Department officials, U.S. marines, radical human-rights lawyers, and Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Storming the Court follows the students from the classrooms at Yale to the prison camp at Guantánamo to the federal courts in New York and Washington as they struggle to save Yvonne Pascal and her fellow Haitian refugees.

At a time when the treatment of post-9/11 Guantánamo detainees has been challenged in the public arena and the courts, this book traces the origins of the legal battle over America's use of the naval base as a prison and illuminates the troubling ways that politics can influence legal decisions. Above all, though, Storming the Court is the David-and-Goliath story of a group of passionate law students who took on their government in the name of the greatest of American values: freedom.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In 1992 a team of Yale law students and other human rights activists sought to enjoin the government from detaining Haitian refugees indefinitely at Guantánamo Bay, without charges or access to counsel. Lawyer Goldstein tells their story with authority: he was a classmate of many of the student activists, although not a participant in the case. Two of the primary characters are Harold Koh, the dedicated, even driven, Yale professor who led the legal fight, and the courageous, pseudonymous "Yvonne Pascal," who emerged as a spokeswoman for the Haitian refugees. Goldstein's sympathies are wholeheartedly with the Haitians and those working on their behalf. A greater effort to articulate the government's argument would have improved the book and made the case's mixed outcome more understandable. After protracted litigation in federal court and the U.S. Supreme Court, the Haitians were discharged from Gitmo, but the policy questions involving the reach of the government's power were resolved in the government's favor. This is a timely (given the issue of detaining terror suspects today) and passionate account, but would have benefited from less hero worship of the activists and less demonizing of the government.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Goldstein has written a compelling story with contemporary significance that thus far has failed to capture the public attention. In 1992, a group of Yale law students began a heroic and substantial effort to free 300 Haitian refugees held by the U.S. at Guantanamo Bay. The students plodded through this arduous process alone, often risking their goal of high-end employment, and found a way to take on the president and the U.S. government. And they won. This story has a ring of similarity with the Northwestern University journalism students who helped to free some death-row convicts and spark a moratorium on the death penalty in Illinois. But a major difference is the lack of public awareness of the law----student efforts, which may reflect a greater discomfort with the issues involved. These 300 detainees were all black Haitians, men, women, and children--all HIV-positive. The Haitians have since all been granted political asylum in the U.S. This story provides an interesting backdrop to discussions about the application of U.S. law to persons held by the U.S. at Guantanamo Bay. Vernon Ford
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Scribner (September 27, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743230019
• ISBN-13: 978-0743230018
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #779,625 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic Inspirational Book for Any Young Lawyer, February 17, 2006

By 

Thomas G. Coale (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Storming the Court: How a Band of Yale Law Students Sued the President--and Won (Hardcover)

I am a 3L about to graduate from law school and this book makes me want to shake off law firm salaries for the sake of making a change in this world. In less grandious terms, it makes me proud to be a future lawyer.

I saw Brandt Goldstein speak just before reading the book and he mentioned that he wrote the book to read like a legal thriller. I was not disappointed in this respect. He parallels the plight of the Haitians with the efforts of the law students. Politics, Legal Procedure, Trial strategy, and diplomacy are all addressed in an entertaining narrative. The cover gives away the ending but the value of this book lies in the way the author pulls the reader into full identification with amatuer lawyers. Although it is a must read for all lawyers, anyone would find enjoyment from this short read.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Human AND legal drama....., December 20, 2005

By 

Timothy Kelly "Dawg Reader" (Athens, GA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Storming the Court: How a Band of Yale Law Students Sued the President--and Won (Hardcover)

A great book. I am a law student and after three weeks of studying and taking finals the last thing I usually want to do is pick up a book, especially one having to do with law. But as soon as I picked this book up I was hooked and wound up finishing it the weekend after finals. Compelling and readable for those well-versed OR mystified by the law alike.

I would HIGHLY recommend this to all law students out there. When immersed in legal education it is easy to lose focus as to why and how you got there in the first place. The book and story is inspiring. In reading about students, professors, and hghly regarded attorneys helping those that sought their help and offering to those who simply NEEDED it, the story help me recapture the desires I held when I started law school.

Great work Mr. Goldstein and I look forward to reading your future work.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Damn you, Brandt Goldstein!, November 16, 2005

By 

Book Addict - See all my reviews

This review is from: Storming the Court: How a Band of Yale Law Students Sued the President--and Won (Hardcover)

Damn you, Brandt Goldstein! I had a ton of work to do to get ready for a recent court appearance, but couldn't tear myself away from your book. And I already knew how it came out. As a lawyer, I was impressed by how you were able to take complicated legal concepts and make them not only easily understandable, but compelling reading. While it's obvious you had a good story to work with, you made it come alive in a way that makes me think you'd be great in front of a jury -- you're a real storyteller. While the events happened in the '90s, the book is as fresh as today's headlines about detainees at Guantanamo. Thanks for a great read.