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Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court Hardcover – July 9, 2019
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Justice Anthony Kennedy slipped out of the Supreme Court building on June 27, 2018, and traveled incognito to the White House to inform President Donald Trump that he was retiring, setting in motion a political process that his successor, Brett Kavanaugh, would denounce three months later as a “national disgrace” and a “circus.”
Justice on Trial, the definitive insider’s account of Kavanaugh’s appointment to the Supreme Court, is based on extraordinary access to more than one hundred key figures—including the president, justices, and senators—in that ferocious political drama.
The Trump presidency opened with the appointment of Neil Gorsuch to succeed the late Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. But the following year, when Trump drew from the same list of candidates for his nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, the justice being replaced was the swing vote on abortion, and all hell broke loose.
The judicial confirmation process, on the point of breakdown for thirty years, now proved utterly dysfunctional. Unverified accusations of sexual assault became weapons in a ruthless campaign of personal destruction, culminating in the melodramatic hearings in which Kavanaugh’s impassioned defense resuscitated a nomination that seemed beyond saving.
The Supreme Court has become the arbiter of our nation’s most vexing and divisive disputes. With the stakes of each vacancy incalculably high, the incentive to destroy a nominee is nearly irresistible. The next time a nomination promises to change the balance of the Court, Hemingway and Severino warn, the confirmation fight will be even uglier than Kavanaugh’s.
A good person might accept that nomination in the naïve belief that what happened to Kavanaugh won’t happen to him because he is a good person. But it can happen, it does happen, and it just happened. The question is whether America will let it happen again.
- Print length375 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherRegnery
- Publication dateJuly 9, 2019
- Dimensions6 x 1.3 x 9 inches
- ISBN-101621579832
- ISBN-13978-1621579830
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“It is to be hoped that this fine, even-handed book will help to bring an end to the political savagery that has characterized all too many Supreme Court confirmation hearings.” -- MARY ANN GLENDON, Learned Hand Professor of Law, Harvard University
“Justice on Trial reads like a John Grisham novel, filled with intrigue and well-paced plot development that’s a roller-coaster ride even if we know how it ends. This is destined to become the definitive account of a crucial episode in American life.” -- ILYA SHAPIRO, Cato Institute
“A riveting inside look at the nasty politics of character assassination that have plagued the confirmation process going back to my father, Robert H. Bork.” -- ROBERT H. BORK JR., president, Bork Communication Group
“Even if you closely followed the confirmation hearings, you will learn a lot from this real-life legal thriller.” -- JOSH BLACKMAN, South Texas College of Law, author of Unraveled
“An amazingly well-sourced, behind-the-scenes chronicle of a Supreme Court nomination process that became a national circus. Everyone concerned with how broken the judicial confirmation process has become needs to read this riveting blow-by-blow account.” -- RANDY E. BARNETT, Georgetown Law School, author of Our Republican Constitution
“The authors’ deep knowledge of the players and the constitutional stakes shines throughout the book and makes for a thrilling and revealing read.” -- EDWIN MEESE III, 75th U.S. Attorney General
"[A] brand new smash book with enormous amounts of actual real reporting, interviews, behind-the-scenes fact-digging and analysis… You won’t get it anywhere else unless you get this book.” -- Laura Ingraham, Fox News
About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : Regnery; First Edition (July 9, 2019)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 375 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1621579832
- ISBN-13 : 978-1621579830
- Item Weight : 1.35 pounds
- Dimensions : 6 x 1.3 x 9 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #167,912 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- Customer Reviews:
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Customers find the book thoughtful, entertaining, and insightful into the judicial appointment process. They also say the authors provide an in-depth, researched account with timeless lessons about courage, honor, and standing up for what's right. Readers describe the narrative style as honest, riveting, and difficult to put down. Opinions differ on the plot complexity, with some finding it exciting and informative, while others say it's hard to read.
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Customers find the book's content in-depth, readable, and accurate. They also say it's a necessary ingredient for an informed opinion, and a great book with timeless lessons about courage, honor, and standing up for what's right.
"...All in all, this is an in-depth analysis of not only the Kavanaugh hearings and confirmation but it goes back in our history to other Supreme Court..." Read more
"...and Carrie Severino have written a book that is riveting, highly informative and important...." Read more
"...and policy director for the Judicial Crisis Network, provide an in-depth researched and highly readable account of the nomination, hearings, and..." Read more
"...hearings at the time, and here in one place is an accurate compilation of the key elements, bookended by a background on vituperative judicial..." Read more
Customers find the writing style extremely well written, clear, and hard-hitting. They also say the book reads like a thriller with no boring, tired, dry passages. Readers describe the speech as powerful and moving. They say the 306-page book is a detailed account of the process by Judge Brett Kavanaugh and is riveting, enthralling, and difficult to put down.
"...It is well-written and I believe a most honest presentation of the events leading up to the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh...." Read more
"..." Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino have written a book that is riveting, highly informative and important...." Read more
"...While they reflect a conservative viewpoint, the authors are surprisingly fair, acknowledging missteps, exaggerations, and blatant lies on both sides..." Read more
"...by two conservatives, it’s fair to say, “Justice on Trial” is a riveting, enthralling book...." Read more
Customers find the book thoughtful, fascinating, and helpful. They also say it raises very important issues about due process and the judicial appointment process. Customers also describe the book as entertaining and a great book by a conservative writer.
"...It’s the best political book I’ve read since “Game Change” and "Shattered."..." Read more
"...This book details all the dirt that was thrown. Remembering what happened, the hearing with Dr. Blasey-Ford was especially interesting to recall...." Read more
"...A story of valor, angst, and tremendous passion for what is right, played out like a Frank Capra cinematic allegory...." Read more
"Excellent! A well written and fascinating look inside the political gamesmanship and shockingly bad conduct of Democrats and leftwing interest..." Read more
Customers find the narrative style honest, insightful, and great. They also say the authors are credible and tell the truth. Readers also mention that the book presents a balanced view of the judicial approval.
"...It is well-written and I believe a most honest presentation of the events leading up to the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh...." Read more
"...The latter is a different type of book, more autobiographical and extremely powerful...." Read more
"...-class reporters (with apparently unlimited access), they are great storytellers, too, and do a great job explaining the context and history of this..." Read more
"...Molly Hemingway is one of the most informed and insightful journalists reporting on current events in our capitol...." Read more
Customers find the evidence in the book accurate, well-written, and balanced.
"Great job to Mollie and Carrie. This is a detailed and sourced & accurate account of Justice Kavanaugh 's journey to the court...." Read more
"I teach constitutional law and can verify this work is excellent in not only accurately and in minute detail telling how a decent man was wrongly..." Read more
"...These claims were ultimately rejected for lack of credible evidence despite the insistence of opponents of the nomination that several female..." Read more
"Informative. Historical. Balanced. Well-sourced. Eye opening...." Read more
Customers find the book very fast and hard to stop reading.
"...The book reads very quickly and is difficult to put down. The material was presented fairly and with exhaustive references...." Read more
"...The book is well footnoted for more research possibilities. Not a quick read; I took my time absorbing the information...." Read more
"First off, this book read fast for me for someone reason. I think it's because of the good connections between paragraphs and sections...." Read more
"...It's a very fast read and well researched...." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the plot complexity of the book. Some find it exciting and compelling, while others say it's hard to read and boring.
"...The book gives me both hope and fear...." Read more
"...It’s a hard story to read, but it goes to the heart of the beliefs and actions that are tearing at the fabric of national life." Read more
"...to read every page for yourself to get a clear, objective, and even entertaining..." Read more
"...For me, this book was exciting to read as I couldn’t wait to find out what happened next. Highly recommended!" Read more
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While the book is co-authored the narrative is seamless. It is not as if MH is covering the journalistic details and CS the legal details. The book is 'conservative' in its outlook but it is not a screed. It is conservative in the sense that the best of conservative news is so—in its inclusion of things that are commonly suppressed. It includes interesting anecdotes (Chief Justice Roberts' behind-the-scenes deal to label the Obamacare 'individual mandate' a 'tax') but stops short of the salacious, revealing, for example, that Christine Blasey Ford was known as a hard drinker in high school. The absolutely vicious pressures exerted against Senator Collins and her staff are detailed (ricin and anthrax threats, the late night confrontation with the Senator at her home with an individual claiming to be a reporter, a caller threatening a staff member and expressing the wish that she be raped and impregnated). Senator Collins is one of the principal heroines of the narrative.
The basic elements of the story are anchored in contemporary reportage and interviews with more than a hundred individuals (including the president and Justice Kavanaugh), some more than ten hours in length. The documentation is extensive and the book includes a simple index. Some of the important though 'explicit' material is to be found in the footnotes, thus preserving the book's authenticity without making it a lurid read.
This is one of the best political books of recent memory; I can see why it is an Amazon.com #1 book in multiple categories.
Note that Carrie Severino is chief counsel and policy director for the Judicial Crisis Network, an organization that supports the appointment of originalist justices. While this may have tempted her to indulge in special-pleading it also gave her access to unique information that could contribute materially to the narrative. Note that she holds a law degree from Harvard and that she clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas. I have read and reviewed Mollie Hemingway's brief 'broadside', Trump vs. the Media; Justice on Trial is a substantial book , one of a completely different order. Without criticizing her broadside, I hope that she will continue to write books such as Justice on Trial, since she has here demonstrated her ability to do so with great effectiveness.
Highly recommended.
Before I purchased this book, I also read the bios of the authors. Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino. Both have diverse careers and involvement with the major television networks.
The book contains information that I have never read before and goes back in our history further than I expected. And, in the case of Judge Kavanaugh it also covers his background information including his hiring of his law clerks. I never thought about a nomination to the Supreme Court Justice being measured not only by their legal opinions rendered but also by their law clerks. Most interesting to me.
Christine Blasey Ford, of course, is covered in detail including the 5 extensions she was given to testify. In actuality, this process in DC is at times staggering. The number of written questions given to Brett Kavanaugh prior to his hearing were staggering. To paraphrase from this book....Scalia - 3 ; Gorsuch - 324 and Kavanaugh - 1287. Wow....
The bias of the media is also presented ...I stopped watching the news on TV at least a year ago. Just from switching the channels, I could see that some of them left out parts of the interviews or answers to some of the questions. One example in this book concerns MSNBC and the ariing of the Georgetown Prep portion. I call this bias by omission and it is certainly prevalent in most of the media. And, there are more examples than this particular one.
All in all, this is an in-depth analysis of not only the Kavanaugh hearings and confirmation but it goes back in our history to other Supreme Court nominations and confirmations.
It is well-written and I believe a most honest presentation of the events leading up to the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh. And, also the future of the US Supreme Court.
Most highly recommended and for multiple reasons.
Top reviews from other countries
I am not going to pretend that I believe in any way in the good faith of those who opposed Kavanaugh's confirmation. Just when that seemed about to proceed, Californian Senator Dianne Feinstein suddenly produced a letter on which, it transpired, she had been figuratively sitting for quite some time. The letter contained obscure allegations against Brett Kavanaugh from an academic at a California campus associated with left-wing causes (well, it's in California). The accusations involved events supposedly from when the accuser and Kavanaugh were both still at school. Everything about the claims was vague: date, location, even the basic circumstances. Witnesses were named, but none had any recollection of the purported events.
Yet it was the age of #metoo. The reputations of numerous prominent Democrats had been trashed and the party desperately needed to turn the problem into one for the Republicans. Despite her inability to produce any evidence whatever to support her claims, the accuser was "believed," even though her own untrustworthiness was clearly on display. She supposedly had a terror of flying, which she convolutedly ascribed to her mythical experience with Brett Kavanaugh. Luckily, this fear of aeroplanes didn't kick in when she went on holiday to Hawaii.
It is a flaw in the legal systems on both sides of the Atlantic, apparently, that multiple analogous allegations can be treated as mutually supportive, even when they provide no real support at all, in evidentiary terms. Several accusers now exploited this, as did the left-leaning media. The allegations against Kavanaugh started life as preposterous and went downhill from there, but there was no lack of appetite for them. As the authors point out, "...more than one thousand female Yale Law School graduates signed a letter supporting Kavanaugh's accusers." Nice to know those graduates at least learned, at vast expense, how to write their names, even if they remained a bit sketchy about that whole law thing.
Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino themselves are appropriately judicious, a quality that completely escaped Kavanaugh's antagonists. This very well written book never reads like a polemic, even if it's clear where the authors' sympathies lie. Kavanaugh's appointment was finally confirmed and, as a Supreme Court Justice (surprise, surprise), he has been boringly middle-of-the-road in his opinions.
(That has not, however, stopped the attacks on him. Democrats were plotting to impeach him before and all the way through his confirmation hearings and those threats have not stopped since then. In reality, it is unlikely that the Democrats will ever have enough Senate votes to secure impeachment, so Plan B seems to be to expand the numbers of Supreme Court Justices and pack it with people with left-of-centre opinions and no qualms about legislating from the bench.)
This book is quite a shocking illustration of the state of Washington DC politics today, but that is no reflection on the writers, who deserve every credit for their work.
This is a very comprehensive history of the confirmation battle, from the 2016 battle over Merrick Garland through to the final confirmation vote.







