Scalia: A Court of One Hardcover – June 10, 2014

Great book about a great man. Couldn't put it down and if I did it came with me whereever I went until it was finished

Useful, but not very engrossing at the end of the day. Fights shy of the real issues with him I think.

What a fascinating read!! I won't put the man down, but we certainly think differently!

Not only a great judge, but a great person.

Revealing narrative of the Supreme Court today and in particular of a Justice who deems himself as an individual answerable to nothing and no one--the emperor of the Court.

Murphy does an excellent job of demonstrating how Scalia defined terms in such a way as to always reach the conclusion in line with his personal preferences.

Great book.

I'm not ashamed to say that I am a huge fan of the work of the Supreme Court and an admirer of Antonin Scalia. For this reason, I eagerly anticipated Bruce Allen Murphy's book "Scalia: A Court of One" when I learned it was going to be released. After reading it, I have to say that the book is thoroughly researched and very well written. It is easily readable and keeps your interest through the entire book. It's one downfall (and why I didn't give it 5 stars) is that it is simply unbalanced, biased, and designed to malign Antonin Scalia in every way possible. This book makes this brilliant man sound like a petty, callous and cold individual who takes any opportunity he can to advance his agenda. While Mr. Murphy may have done scrupulous research to come to this conclusion, I, for one, refuse to accept his characterization of Justice Scalia.

The book describes Justice Scalia's beginnings, including his earlier years, upbringing and early education. The focus, however, is upon his time on the Supreme Court. It reviews his service on the court from the beginning and through the most recent terms. Throughout the book, Murphy takes the attack approach about Scalia's opinions, dissents, speeches, and public comments, highlighting the negative elements of all of these. He then goes on to make value judgements about why Scalia says what he says and acts how he does, and therefore brands the man as volatile and childish man, which I refuse to accept as true. One thing that is lacking in Murphy's character assassination is the attribution of his sources when he makes a specific claim. While I appreciate that he may have obtained his materials under confidence, it seems hardly possible that he is unable to tell us who told him ANY of the things he shares in the book. It makes one wonder just how true they all are.

Now, let me be clear, I will admit that Antonin Scalia is a sometimes controversial figure who freely shares his controversial approach and opinions. He does not sugar coat things and I can see how others might be offended by him. But I believe all of this is in the spirit of his approach to the law and being a judge. Put simply, his originalism approach is very clear in its scope and characterization of how he renders his decisions. Murphy's claims that he fits his originalism approach to his personal decisions is not clearly supported by the examples he writes about in the book.

Antonin Scalia is a man with a strong faith who takes job very seriously. It's clear that he likes to debate topics, and he may 'step on toes' when he renders an opinion. But the characterization that Mr. Murphy puts forth in this book is so biased that is approaches character assassination.
Now I don't know Justice Scalia, and so I cannot speak to how he 'really' is. But I think that one of the most telling things is the close friendship that Justice and Mrs. Scalia have with Justice Ginsburg (and her late husband). Does it seem possible that the man in Mr. Murphy's book could be so friendly with someone on the court who is his polar opposite? I don't think so.

In this end, this is a very good book as long as you don't believe all the characterizations that Mr. Murphy puts forth about Antonin Scalia. Sadly, Mr. Murphy appears to have written biographies of other notable Supreme Court justices, but after reading this one, I am not sure I would read them.