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Supreme Court justices William O. Douglas, Felix Frankfurter, and Owen J. Roberts at the White House.

FDR’s Compliant Justices

The Supreme Court’s deference to FDR during World War II resulted in unjustifiable ethical breaches.
by Jed S. Rakoff via New York Review of Books on November 14, 2024
Political cartoon showing Supreme Court Justice Sutherland handing a woman worker a decision on minimum wage.

The Most Conservative Branch

Stephen Breyer criticizes recent Supreme Court decisions and argues for a more pragmatic jurisprudence.
by Jed S. Rakoff via New York Review of Books on August 29, 2024
Donald Trump walking onstage, next to four American flags.

‘The Dred Scott of Our Time’

The Supreme Court has invested the presidency with quasi-monarchial powers, repudiating the foundational principle of the rule of law.
by Sean Wilentz via New York Review of Books on July 4, 2024
William Howard Taft, with the Supreme Court building under construction in the background.

The Architect of Our Divided Supreme Court

100 years ago, Chief Justice William Howard Taft made the Court more efficient and more powerful, marking a turning point whose effects are still being felt.
by Jill Lepore via The New Yorker on January 22, 2024
Exhibit

Supreme Thwart

Ever since the Supreme Court gave itself the power of judicial review in 1803, its role in the federal government and its influence on American life has been bitterly contested.
Lincoln being sworn in by Chief Justice Taney.

We Are Already Defying the Supreme Court

The risks of calling on politicians to push back against the court must be weighed against the present reality of a malign judicial dictatorship.
by Samuel Moyn, Ryan D. Doerfler via Dissent on January 22, 2024
Supreme Court Justice Harlan F. Stone photographed with a book.

The Supreme Court's World War II Battles

Cliff Sloan’s new book explains how the Franklin Roosevelt-shaped Court wrestled with individual rights as the nation fought to save itself and the world.
by Robert L. Tsai via Washington Monthly on September 22, 2023
In July 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt swore in Attorney General Robert Jackson as a Supreme Court justice. Jackson and Roosevelt often played poker together.

How FDR’s Influence Over the Supreme Court Transformed History

In “The Court at War,” Cliff Sloan examines the close relationship between FDR and the high court during World War II.
by Michael Bobelian via Washington Post on September 22, 2023

Constrain the Court—Without Crippling It

Critics of the Supreme Court think it has lost its claim to legitimacy. But proposals for reforming it must strike a balance with preserving its independence.
by Laurence H. Tribe via New York Review of Books on July 27, 2023
The Supreme Court in 1904.

The Insular Cases Survive Because the American Legal System Keeps Them Safe

The justices’ decision not to hear challenges to the explicitly racist Insular Cases is part of a long tradition of favoring process over substance.
by Peter Shamshiri via Balls And Strikes on November 14, 2022
Cartoon of the Supreme Court with its columns tangled.

The Problem of the Supreme Court

It’s time to admit that the nation’s highest court has been a source of harm more often than it’s been a force for justice.
by Louis Michael Seidman via The Nation on June 20, 2022
Artwork of the Supreme Court but with chess pieces used as columns..

The Supreme Court Is Not Supposed to Have This Much Power

And Congress should claw it back.
by Daphna Renan, Nikolas Bowie via The Atlantic on June 8, 2022
Justice William O. Douglas. Photography from Bachrach / Getty

Scooping the Supreme Court

The first Roe v. Wade leaks happened fifty years ago.
by Jane Mayer via The New Yorker on May 6, 2022
Black and white people sitting at a lunch counter.

When Rights Went Right

Is the American conception of constitutional rights too absolute?
by David Cole via New York Review of Books on March 31, 2022
The Fuller Court

Whose Side Is the Supreme Court On?

The Supreme Court and the pursuit of racial equality.
by Randall Kennedy via The Nation on August 9, 2021
Photograph of people lining up to hear arguments in Brown v. Board of Education.

The Case for Ending the Supreme Court as We Know It

The Supreme Court, the federal branch with the least public accountability, has historically sided with tradition over more expansive human rights visions.
by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor via The New Yorker on September 25, 2020

The Great Liberal Reckoning Has Begun

The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg concludes an era of faith in courts as partners in the fight for progress and equality.
by Alan Z. Rozenshtein via The Atlantic on September 22, 2020

How Abraham Lincoln Fought the Supreme Court

As Lincoln recognized, it's not enough to question the decisions, justices, or even the structure of the Court. We need to challenge the foundation of its power.
by Matthew Karp via Jacobin on September 19, 2020
Americans in line to vote

The Supreme Court’s Starring Role in Democracy’s Demise

With democracy hanging in the balance in 2020, the Court is clearly playing a decisive and destructive role. Unfortunately, we’ve been here before.
by Carol Anderson via Boston Globe on September 6, 2020

How the Republican Party Took Over the Supreme Court

The 50-year effort to advance a conservative legal agenda.
by John Fabian Witt via The New Republic on April 7, 2020
Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruther Bader Ginsburg speaking at the Congrsssional Women's Caucus.

The First and Last of Her Kind

The legal academy has grown dismissive of Justice O’Connor, but the Supreme Court is not a law school faculty workshop. She saw herself as a problem-solver.
by Linda Greenhouse via New York Review of Books on October 17, 2019
Supreme Court building under dark rainclouds.

The Supreme Court Is in Danger of Again Becoming ‘the Grave of Liberty’

Supreme Court decisions have practical consequences, which justices too often blithely ignore.
by Eric Foner via The Nation on July 1, 2019
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall; painting by Henry Inman, 1832.

Hail to the Chief

“John Marshall...exhibited a subservience to the executive branch that continues to haunt us.”
by Jed S. Rakoff via New York Review of Books on November 22, 2018

The Bosses' Constitution

How and why the First Amendment became a weapon for the right.
by Jedediah Britton-Purdy via The Nation on September 12, 2018

The Supreme Court Is Headed Back to the 19th Century

The justices again appear poised to pursue a purely theoretical liberty at the expense of the lives of people of color.
by Adam Serwer via The Atlantic on September 4, 2018

Court-Packing is the Democrats’ Nuclear Option for the Supreme Court

Why an FDR plan from the 1930s is suddenly popular again.
by Dylan Matthews via Vox on July 2, 2018

The Last of the Small-Town Lawyers

Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement marks the end of an era on the Supreme Court—and a turn toward hard-edged partisanship.
by Garrett Epps via The Atlantic on June 27, 2018

The Court’s Supreme Injustice

How John Marshall, Joseph Story, and Roger Taney strengthened the institution of slavery and embedded in the law a systemic hostility to fundamental freedom and basic justice.
by Allen Mendenhall via Los Angeles Review of Books on May 24, 2018
partner

A Bullet Can Cross the Border. Can the Constitution? The Supreme Court Won’t Say.

The Supreme Court punts on Hernandez v. Mesa, leaving the Constitution lost in the borderlands.
by Sarah A. Seo via Made By History on June 27, 2017

The History Test

How should the courts use history?
by Jill Lepore via The New Yorker on March 27, 2017

In Defense of Court-Packing

When the Supreme Court willfully misreads the Constitution, FDR’s plan doesn’t seem so bad.
by Ian Millhiser via Slate on February 23, 2015
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