Overview

The Supreme Court in Conference offers a fascinating and unprecedented look at the private debates between Justices on nearly 300 landmark cases from 1940-1985. Major decisions such as Roe v. Wade and Brown v. Board of Education are covered and the notes of Justices Felix Frankfurter, William O. Douglas, Frank Murphy, Robert Jackson, Harold Burton, Tom Clark, Earl Warren and William Brennan are opened to shed light on what goes on behind the closed doors of the secretive conference room. In this unique and revealing work on some of the most profound rulings made at a turbulent time in American history, the reader is given insight into how and why certain decisions were reached. With expert editing by Del Dickson--who provides annotations and an introduction to each case, placing them in legal and historical context--cases on issues such as free speech, the rights of the accused, religion, Presidential power, equal protection, affirmative action and the death penalty are discussed. Dickson also includes a lively and incisive history of the Supreme Court, from its beginning to the present, illuminating how the conference works, how it has evolved, its various animosities, triumphant successes and glaring failures. As the first major reference work on this subject, this easy-to-use book offers the most reliable evidence available on the internal workings of the Supreme Court. It is the ideal source for scholars, law students, historians and anyone interested in how Supreme Court decisions are truly made.

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9780195126327

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Reviews

Well-writen and quite interesting --Appellate Practice Journal [T]his book will utterly change the way we view Supreme Court decision-making. It is a joy to read and is absolutely essential for anyone who wishes to see what goes on when that case goes up. --New York Law Journal The court shows its public face at oral argument, but decisins are made in private conferences...Del Dickson, a political science professor at University of San Diego, had the brilliant idea of stitching together the notes available from modern-era justices to create a narrative of how the court reached its decisions. --National Law Journal

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