Download Free The Rehnquist Court And The Constitution Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online The Rehnquist Court And The Constitution and write the review.

Thoughtful, wide-ranging, and intelligently written, this volume is an insightful look at the Rehnquist Court and its impact on law and American life.
In this authoritative reckoning with the eighteen-year record of the Rehnquist Court, Georgetown law professor Mark Tushnet reveals how the decisions of nine deeply divided justices have left the future of the Court; and the nation; hanging in the balance. Many have assumed that the chasm on the Court has been between its liberals and its conservatives. In reality, the division was between those in tune with the modern post-Reagan Republican Party and those who, though considered to be in the Court's center, represent an older Republican tradition. As a result, the Court has modestly promoted the agenda of today's economic conservatives, but has regularly defeated the agenda of social issues conservatives; while paving the way for more radically conservative path in the future.
In 1986, the Supreme Court's leading conservative, William H. Rehnquist was made Chief Justice. Almost immediately, legal scholars, practitioners, and pundits began questioning what his influence would be, and whether he would remake US constitutional corpus in his own image. This collected volume gathers together a distinguished group of scholars, journalists, judges, and practitioners to reflect on the fifteen-year impact of the Rehnquist Court.
This analysis of the decision making of William H. Rehnquist from the beginning of his tenure as an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court in 1971 until he was nominated to be Chief Justice in 1986 presents a refreshing new perspective on the Burger Court's most conservative member. The common assessment of Rehnquist's career on the Supreme Court is that he has tried to put his own political agenda into effect--deciding as he wishes and justifying it later. Davis disputes that view through careful, insightful analysis of his opinions, his votes, and his public speeches. She argues that Rehnquist does, indeed, have a judicial philosophy--one that has legal positivism at its core. By examining the interaction between the facets of that judicial philosophy and Rehnquist's particular ordering of values, Davis reveals the coherence of his decision making. The author finds that Rehnquist's hierarchy of values gives paramount importance to state autonomy, or the "new federalism." He sees the protection of private property as secondary to the significance of federalism, followed, finally, by the protection of individual rights. Originally published in 1989. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
With seven of its justices appointed by Republican presidents, today's Supreme Court has significantly altered America's legal landscape since 1986 by tilting constitutional jurisprudence to the right. That was the goal of Presidents Reagan and Bush in filling court vacancies and has been felt in cases related to federalism, economic rights, and affirmative action. However, liberal issues such as abortion have moved only marginally to the right, while rulings by the Court on school prayer and gay rights have moved constitutional doctrine slightly to the left. In this collection of original articles, prominent constitutional scholars are joined by new voices from the cutting edge of academia to subject the Rehnquist Court to closer scrutiny and to show that its brand of conservatism is less extreme than many have supposed. Reflecting views across the political spectrum, the contributors help readers understand the Court dynamic, its constrained conservatism, and the forces that shape constitutional law in general. As these authors show, the overall pattern of decision-making in the Rehnquist era cannot be attributed to any single, unified approach to constitutional analysis. Instead, today's Court can only be understood as the product of a complex interaction among individual justices, each with an idiosyncratic view of the proper interpretation of the Constitution and the role of the Court in the American political system. These provocative essays are designed to provide readers with insight into this interaction by focusing on each member of the bench. From the staunch conservatism of Clarence Thomas, to the "accommodationism" of Sandra Day O'Connor, to the "liberal constitutionalism" of David Souter, the essays analyze the unique approach of each justice to interpreting the Constitution. They also show that the current justices are the product of a nomination and confirmation process that has undergone a major transformation in recent decades one which favors experienced, often unknown jurists over high-profile public servants. By concentrating attention on its members, "Rehnquist Justice" allows us to better understand the Supreme Court as a whole. And by assessing today's judiciary in light of a public philosophy that looks askance at government, it shows us that the Supreme Court has truly become a mirror of its times."
Constitutional scholars Christopher P. Banks and John C. Blakeman offer the most current and the first book-length study of the U.S. Supreme Court's "new federalism" begun by the Rehnquist Court and now flourishing under Chief Justice John Roberts. While the Rehnquist Court reinvorgorated new federalism by protecting state sovereignty and set new constitutional limits on federal power, Banks and Blakeman show that in the Roberts Court new federalism continues to evolve in a docket increasingly attentive to statutory construction, preemption, and business litigation
The Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution at a level sufficiently general to guide lawmaking while avoiding great detail. This four-page document has guided the United States of America for more than two centuries. The Supreme Court has parsed the document into clauses, which plaintiffs and defendants invoke in cases or controversies before the Court. Some, like the Interstate Commerce Clause, are central to the survival of a government of multiple sovereignties. The practice of observing case precedents allows orderly development of the law and consistent direction to the lower courts. The Court itself claimed the final power of judicial review, despite efforts to the contrary by the executive and legislative branches of the national government and the state supreme courts. The Court then limited its own awesome power through a series of self-imposed rules of justiciability. These rules set the conditions under which the Court may exercise the extraordinary final power of judicial review. Some of these self-imposed limits are prudential, some logical, and some inviting periodic revision. This book examines the detailed unfolding of several Constitutional clauses and the rules of justiciability. For each clause and each rule of justiciability, the book begins with the brilliant foundations laid by Chief Justice John Marshall, then to the anti-Federalist era, the Civil War, the dominance of laissez faire and social Darwinism, the Great Depression redirection, the civil rights era, and finally the often-hapless efforts of Chief Justice Rehnquist.
Incisive commentary on recent Supreme Court decisions from America's foremost constitutional scholars For nearly all his tenure as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, William Rehnquist has enjoyed the support of a slim but usually solid majority of his fellow justices. With it he has been able to effect a dramatic shift to the right in many vital areas of constitutional law. Displaying a judicial activism not seen since the 1930s, Rehnquist and his allies, in a series of 5-4 decisions, have undermined civil rights and weakened the federal government's ability to respond to pressing social needs. As the Rehnquist court concludes its fifteenth term, the well-known constitutional authority Herman Schwartz has assembled seventeen distinguished legal scholars to evaluate its record on the many controversial issues that have come before it. Among them are Stephen Bright on capital punishment, Charles Ogletree on criminal procedure, Norman Redlich on religion, Allan Morrison and David Vladeck on regulation, and John Mackenzie on Bush v. Gore. The book concludes with an overall reflection on Rehnquist's legacy by Tom Wicker.