The Supremes' Greatest Hits: The 34 Supreme Court Cases That Most Directly Affect Your Life | 
| Author: Michael G. Trachtman
Publisher: Sterling
List Price: $9.95
Buy New: $4.99
You Save: $4.96 (50%)
New (34) Used (12) from $4.97
Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 83047
Media: Paperback
Pages: 176
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5 x 0.7
ISBN: 1402741073
Dewey Decimal Number: 347.73260264
EAN: 9781402741074
ASIN: 1402741073
Publication Date: October 28, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
| |
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Can the government seize your house in order to build a shopping mall? Can it determine what you can do to your own body? Why are you allowed to copy songs on a CD, but not music files the Internet? The answers to those questions come from the Supreme Court—and its rulings have shaped American life and justice. Here are 34 of the most significant issues it has grappled with—from equal rights to privacy rights, from the limits of speech to the boundaries between church and state. Many of these cases read like thrillers…right down to their cliff-hanging endings. Among the most intriguing: the Dred Scott decision, Miranda v. Arizona, Brown v. Board of Education, Roe v. Wade, and Bush v. Gore.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
Interesting, very readable, overall excellent January 31, 2007
Gaetan Lion
32 out of 33 found this review helpful
This is a very well written easy to read interesting book on the subject. My knowledge of the Legislative and Executive Branch is fair. Meanwhile, my knowledge of the Judicial Branch is close to nil. I suspect my experience is representative of the American public. This is because the other two branches get so much more exposure in the press, media, and nonfiction. Also, the Judicial Branch deals in a Byzantine language called legalese that none of us understand including even lawyers on certain occasions. I thought this book would shed some light on the topic without boring me to death using comprehensible prose. The author succeeded on all counts.
The author fleshed out the cases' implications. That made for fascinating reading. It makes you understand as a layperson why a specific case shaped the history of our modern society or will affect it for a long time to come.
The book is well organized. The 34 cases are grouped within 10 different chapters focusing on relevant judicial themes such as the separation of Church and State, discrimination, right of privacy, and free speech among others. In case you are much more interested in a specific issue it is easy to zero in on it.
I learned a few interesting related things along the way. For instance, among Supreme Court Justice the word "conservative" has a different meaning than within the two other branches of government. In this situation, conservative means traditional or literal. This means a justice applies the Constitution literally as written. Given how much our society has changed over the past two centuries since the document was written, it seems such a conservative position is increasingly challenging to maintain. And, I gather whether a justice is conservative is more a relative scale than a yes/no absolute answer.
The author also indicates that the politics of a justice before his or her nomination to the Supreme Court is apparently a poor indicator of this person's future political bent once on the Supreme Court. He mentions the case of Chief Justice Warren who was politically very conservative before joining the Court. But, he turned out to be a very liberal and activist chief justice.
You can tell that I strongly recommend this book. Usually, I always recommend other related books. In this case, I really can't because I am totally outside of my field of expertise. That tells you right there this is fit reading for a layperson. You certainly don't need to be a legal eagle to enjoy this short book.
 A fantastic overview of landmark cases March 20, 2007
doc peterson (Portland, Oregon USA)
20 out of 22 found this review helpful
Written for the lay reader, _The Supremes' Greatest Hits_ clearly outlines the issues, decisions and relevance of Supreme Court decisions that have an immeadiate impact on daily life. The cases you'd expect to find are here (Marbury v. Madison, Roe v. Wade, Miranda v. Arizona, Brown v. Board) but there are also several cases that I'd never heard of but are no less important (Griswold v. Connecticut, Texas v. Johnson). The facts of each case are broadly discussed, how they relate to the Constitutiuon is outlined, and a brief (1 - 2 page) explaination of why the Court made its decision is explained. A great introduction to landmark cases.
The Supremes' Greatest Hits December 12, 2006
KKC
10 out of 10 found this review helpful
The Supremes' Greatest Hits is as entertaining as it is informative. In a non-lawyerly style, it presents each Supreme Court case that really matters as a compelling story involving real people, and brings the case to the level of everyday life in a way that people can understand and appreciate.
The Supreme Court is in many respects the most powerful branch of government -- it can nullify the actions of the other two branches. But while there is always a great hue and cry when a new Supreme Court justice is nominated, most people never get beyond a very few hot button issues and don't understand what the fuss is all about. In fact, as this book makes wonderfully clear, the Court has a dramatic impact on all of our lives in a wide variety of ways, and the institution itself is as fascinating as what it has done and is likely to do in the future.
There are books that focus on the history of the Supreme Court and on landmark decisions of the Supreme Court, but they don't home in on how the Court directly affects the lives of everyday people in a way that is easily understood. This book fills that gap and is at the same time a great read.
Good book, easily accessible, but... June 5, 2007
Just Another Customer (Huntington Beach, CA)
10 out of 17 found this review helpful
I bought this book and in general I really like it. Very light on jargon and written in relatively simple prose, it was very easy to understand. The selection of cases seemed very thoughtful and historical context of the cases was very interesting. But I just can't give it five stars.
The simple writing makes the book easy-to-read but I felt like I was reading something written for a high-school-level audience and while the level of detail was adequate, it is just barely so--I finished the entire book on a two-hour plane flight and had nothing to read by the time I got to the hotel.
Quick and easy to read February 23, 2007
P. Delsignore (Phila, PA)
6 out of 8 found this review helpful
Easy to read. No lawyer-ease to try to decifer. Good point of view that looks at how these cases have broader impact then just the case itself. If it doesn't wake you up to be more involved in your family, community, country...maybe you took too many sleeping pills.
|
|
|
