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Title details for Packing the Court by James MacGregor Burns - Available

Packing the Court

The Rise of Judicial Power and the Coming Crisis of the Supreme Court

by James MacGregor Burns
Norman Dietz
Audiobook
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1 of 1 copy available
For decades, James MacGregor Burns has been one of the great masters of the study of power and leadership in America. Now he turns his eye to an institution of government that he believes has become more powerful—and more partisan—than the Founding Fathers ever intended: the Supreme Court. Much as we would like to believe that the Court remains aloof from ideological politics, Packing the Court reveals how often justices behave like politicians in robes.


Few Americans appreciate that the framers of the Constitution envisioned a much more limited role for the Supreme Court than it has come to occupy. In keeping with the founders' desire for balanced government, the Constitution does not grant the Supreme Court the power of judicial review—that is, the ability to veto acts of Congress and the president. Yet throughout its history, as Packing the Court details, the Supreme Court has blocked congressional laws and, as a result, often derailed progressive reform.


The term packing the court is usually applied to FDR's failed attempt to expand the size of the Court after a conservative bench repeatedly overturned key elements of the New Deal. But Burns shows that FDR was not the only president to confront a high court that seemed bent on fighting popular mandates for change, nor was he the only one to try to manipulate the bench for political ends. Many of our most effective leaders—from Jefferson to Jackson, Lincoln to FDR—have clashed with powerful justices who refused to recognize the claims of popularly elected majorities. Burns contends that these battles have threatened the nation's welfare in the most crucial moments of our history, from the Civil War to the Great Depression—and may do so again.


Given the erratic and partisan nature of Supreme Court appointments, Burns believes we play political roulette with the Constitution with each election cycle. Now, eight years after Bush v. Gore, ideological justices have the tightest grip on the Court in recent memory. Drawing on more than two centuries of American history, Packing the Court offers a clear-eyed critique of judicial rule and a bold proposal to rein in the Supreme Court's power over the elected branches.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    July 9, 2009

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781400192113
      • File size: 283252 KB
      • Duration: 09:50:06

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Most U.S. citizens of the 21st century take for granted that the Supreme Court will decide the most divisive issues of our day--but this is not what the Constitution's framers had in mind when they wrote that document. The author's argument is that the Court has become too partisan and has misused it power to overturn state and national legislation. Narrator Norman Dietz has a deep, assured voice that lends authority and gravitas to the book. His tone and pacing make it easy to follow the constitutional arguments, and he pauses at crucial intervals to allow listeners to consider Burns's ideas. At times, he sounds like a professor at the lectern, but he's an interesting professor who demands our attention. R.I.G. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      April 27, 2009
      Pulitzer-winning historian Burns gives a brisk, readable tour of the history of the appointment of Supreme Court justices since 1789. In this respect, the book is fresh and compelling. But Burns (Running Alone
      ) has another aim. Particularly aggrieved by the Rehnquist and Roberts courts, he argues that every president since Washington has sought to fill the Court with justices who think as he does; that judicial review is unconstitutional; that the unelected Court has never been “politically accountable to the American people”;and that a courageous president (like Barack Obama, he suggests) should simply announce that, like Andrew Jackson, he won't abide by Supreme Court rulings that invalidate laws enacted by Congress and signed by him. Known for the liberal flags he flies, Burns runs up the radical pennant here. There's no evidence that the American people are as aggrieved over the Court as Burns is. And the term “packing” should be reserved, as until now it has been, for extreme manipulative efforts like FDR's. This is a terrific little book—save for its politics run amok.

    • Publisher's Weekly

      October 26, 2009
      Pulitzer Prize–winning author Burns's latest is a jeremiad against the influence and unelected power of the Supreme Court. Burns ably guides reader through a brief history of the court, concentrating on its instances of overreaching the bounds of its authority, condemning the unconstitutionality of judicial review and closing with a series of suggestions for reform that include more rigorous presidential oversight of Supreme Court rulings. Norman Dietz is as polished and assured as ever; he reads ably and clearly, eliding Burns's exasperation and laying out the facts with a minimum of inflection and understated authority. A Penguin Press hardcover (Reviews, Apr. 27).

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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