Overview

From the early days of European settlement in North America, Christianity has had a profound impact on American law and culture. This volume profiles nineteen of America's most influential Christian jurists from the early colonial era to the present day. Anyone interested in American legal history and jurisprudence, the role Christianity has played throughout the nation's history, and the relationship between faith and law will enjoy this worthy and unique study. The jurists covered in this collection were pious men and women, but that does not mean they agreed on how faith should inform law. From Roger Williams and John Cotton to Antonin Scalia and Mary Ann Glendon, America's great Christian jurists have brought their faith to bear on the practice of law in different ways and to different effects.

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Reviews

'I enthusiastically recommend this wonderfully conceived volume on the intersections of Christian thought and the American legal tradition. The editors Daniel L. Dreisbach and Mark David Hall have provided an enormous service by illuminating the enduring but contentious influence of Christian belief on some of the most prominent jurists in American history.' Thomas S. Kidd, Vardaman Distinguished Professor of History, Baylor University, Texas 'If you dig beneath almost anything, you are likely to find religion or something closely akin to it. Law is no different. The implications for law of one's deepest convictions can be either thoughtful or not so thoughtful. Great Christian Jurists in American History contains essays about and by some of the people who have thought most deeply about the connections between Christian faith, morality, and American law. An understanding of the jurists discussed in these essays is essential for anyone who wants to understand the religious roots of American law and the critique Christian faith might bring to American law.' Robert F. Cochran, Jr, Louis D. Brandeis Professor of Law and Founder of the Nootbaar Institute Pepperdine University, California 'I enthusiastically recommend this wonderfully conceived volume on the intersections of Christian thought and the American legal tradition. The editors Daniel L. Dreisbach and Mark David Hall have provided an enormous service by illuminating the enduring but contentious influence of Christian belief on some of the most prominent jurists in American history.' Thomas S. Kidd, Vardaman Distinguished Professor of History, Baylor University, Texas 'If you dig beneath almost anything, you are likely to find religion or something closely akin to it. Law is no different. The implications for law of one's deepest convictions can be either thoughtful or not so thoughtful. Great Christian Jurists in American History contains essays about and by some of the people who have thought most deeply about the connections between Christian faith, morality, and American law. An understanding of the jurists discussed in these essays is essential for anyone who wants to understand the religious roots of American law and the critique Christian faith might bring to American law.' Robert F. Cochran, Jr, Louis D. Brandeis Professor of Law and Founder of the Nootbaar Institute Pepperdine University, California

'I enthusiastically recommend this wonderfully conceived volume on the intersections of Christian thought and the American legal tradition. The editors Daniel L. Dreisbach and Mark David Hall have provided an enormous service by illuminating the enduring but contentious influence of Christian belief on some of the most prominent jurists in American history.' Thomas S. Kidd, Vardaman Distinguished Professor of History, Baylor University, Texas 'If you dig beneath almost anything, you are likely to find religion or something closely akin to it.  Law is no different. The implications for law of one's deepest convictions can be either thoughtful or not so thoughtful. Great Christian Jurists in American History contains essays about and by some of the people who have thought most deeply about the connections between Christian faith, morality, and American law. An understanding of the jurists discussed in these essays is essential for anyone who wants to understand the religious roots of American law and the critique Christian faith might bring to American law.' Robert F. Cochran, Jr, Louis D. Brandeis Professor of Law and Founder of the Nootbaar Institute Pepperdine University, California 'This highly readable and invaluable volume is part of an impressive series by Cambridge University Press that describes and analyzes Christianity's enormous role in shaping the history of law. The book analyzes the intersection of faith and law in the lives of nineteen distinguished American jurists. Profiling Winthrop, Penn and Dickinson as well as Jay, Story, David Brewer, Harold Berman, Scalia, Mary Ann Glendon, and Robert P. George among others, it will interest scholars in history, political theory, theology, and law.' Joshua J. Bowman, Religious Studies Review

Author Information

Daniel L. Dreisbach is a professor in the School of Public Affairs at the American University in Washington, DC. His research interests include the intersection of religion, law, and politics in American public life. He has authored or edited ten books, including Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation between Church and State (2002) and Reading the Bible with the Founding Fathers (2017). He has published numerous book chapters, reviews, and articles in scholarly journals, including American Journal of Legal History, the Journal of Church and State, Politics and Religion, and William and Mary Quarterly. Mark David Hall is Herbert Hoover Distinguished Professor of Politics and Faculty Fellow in the William Penn Honors Program at George Fox University. Mark has written, edited, or co-edited a dozen books, including Did America Have a Christian Founding?: Separating Modern Myth from Historical Truth (forthcoming); Roger Sherman and the Creation of the American Republic (2013); and The Sacred Rights of Conscience: Selected Readings on Religious Liberty and Church-State Relations in the American Founding (2009).

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