Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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36 of 37 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting, very readable, overall excellent, January 31, 2007
This is a very well written easy to read interesting book on the subject. My knowledge of the Legislative and Executive Branch is fair. Meanwhile, my knowledge of the Judicial Branch is close to nil. I suspect my experience is representative of the American public. This is because the other two branches get so much more exposure in the press, media, and nonfiction. Also, the Judicial Branch deals in a Byzantine language called legalese that none of us understand including even lawyers on certain occasions. I thought this book would shed some light on the topic without boring me to death using comprehensible prose. The author succeeded on all counts.
The author fleshed out the cases' implications. That made for fascinating reading. It makes you understand as a layperson why a specific case shaped the history of our modern society or will affect it for a long time to come.
The book is well organized. The 34 cases are grouped within 10 different chapters focusing on relevant judicial themes such as the separation of Church and State, discrimination, right of privacy, and free speech among others. In case you are much more interested in a specific issue it is easy to zero in on it.
I learned a few interesting related things along the way. For instance, among Supreme Court Justice the word "conservative" has a different meaning than within the two other branches of government. In this situation, conservative means traditional or literal. This means a justice applies the Constitution literally as written. Given how much our society has changed over the past two centuries since the document was written, it seems such a conservative position is increasingly challenging to maintain. And, I gather whether a justice is conservative is more a relative scale than a yes/no absolute answer.
The author also indicates that the politics of a justice before his or her nomination to the Supreme Court is apparently a poor indicator of this person's future political bent once on the Supreme Court. He mentions the case of Chief Justice Warren who was politically very conservative before joining the Court. But, he turned out to be a very liberal and activist chief justice.
You can tell that I strongly recommend this book. Usually, I always recommend other related books. In this case, I really can't because I am totally outside of my field of expertise. That tells you right there this is fit reading for a layperson. You certainly don't need to be a legal eagle to enjoy this short book.
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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A fantastic overview of landmark cases, March 20, 2007
Written for the lay reader, _The Supremes' Greatest Hits_ clearly outlines the issues, decisions and relevance of Supreme Court decisions that have an immeadiate impact on daily life. The cases you'd expect to find are here (Marbury v. Madison, Roe v. Wade, Miranda v. Arizona, Brown v. Board) but there are also several cases that I'd never heard of but are no less important (Griswold v. Connecticut, Texas v. Johnson). The facts of each case are broadly discussed, how they relate to the Constitutiuon is outlined, and a brief (1 - 2 page) explaination of why the Court made its decision is explained. A great introduction to landmark cases.
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Supremes' Greatest Hits, December 12, 2006
The Supremes' Greatest Hits is as entertaining as it is informative. In a non-lawyerly style, it presents each Supreme Court case that really matters as a compelling story involving real people, and brings the case to the level of everyday life in a way that people can understand and appreciate.
The Supreme Court is in many respects the most powerful branch of government -- it can nullify the actions of the other two branches. But while there is always a great hue and cry when a new Supreme Court justice is nominated, most people never get beyond a very few hot button issues and don't understand what the fuss is all about. In fact, as this book makes wonderfully clear, the Court has a dramatic impact on all of our lives in a wide variety of ways, and the institution itself is as fascinating as what it has done and is likely to do in the future.
There are books that focus on the history of the Supreme Court and on landmark decisions of the Supreme Court, but they don't home in on how the Court directly affects the lives of everyday people in a way that is easily understood. This book fills that gap and is at the same time a great read.
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