Kategoria BISAC: Political Science >> American Government - Judicial Branch

This text is a general introduction to American judicial process. The authors cover the major institutions, actors, and processes that comprise the U.S. legal system, viewed from a political science perspective. Grounding their presentation in empirical social science terms, the authors identify popular myths about the structure and processes of American law and courts and then contrast those myths with what really takes place. Three unique elements of this "myth versus reality" framework are incorporated into each of the topical chapters:

1) "Myth versus Reality" boxes...

Few American institutions have inflicted greater suffering on ordinary people than the Supreme Court of the United States. Since its inception, the justices of the Supreme Court have shaped a nation where children toiled in coal mines, where Americans could be forced into camps because of their race, and where a woman could be sterilized against her will by state law. The Court was the midwife of Jim Crow, the right hand of union busters, and the dead hand of the Confederacy. Nor is the modern Court a vast improvement, with its incursions on voting rights...

Europeanization of Judicial Review argues that the higher complexity of the political framework in which laws are made today leads to less well-designed laws and loop-holes, allowing politicians to leave decisions to the courts. The higher complexity of the political framework is a result of the need in the EU to consider both national and European legal and political rules when phrasing new laws. Both to decrease the complexity in the design of legislation and to preserve the ideal of the rule of law, the courts now are more likely to rule laws unconstitutional.

In The Long Reach of the Sixties, Laura Kalman focuses on the late 1960s and early 1970s, when Presidents Johnson and Nixon attempted to dominate the Court and alter its course. Using newly released--and consistently entertaining--recordings...

Intrusive searches for alcohol during Prohibition destroyed middle-class Americans' faith in police and ushered in a new basis for controlling police conduct. State courts in the 1920s began to exclude perfectly reliable evidence obtained in an illegal search....

In June 2015, the Supreme Court declared that marriage violates the United States Constitution. The federal court marriage decisions, culminating in the 2015 Supreme Court decision, are a symptom of a potentially fatal condition impacting American society. The foundation of the American experiment in self-government is a common core of objective foundational truths. These are not sectarian or doctrinal truths. Rather, they are the "echo" of the Judeo-Christian principles that have been the basic foundation stones of Western civilization. In When the Echo Dies, recent federal court cases...

In June 2015, the Supreme Court declared that marriage violates the United States Constitution. The federal court marriage decisions, culminating in the 2015 Supreme Court decision, are a symptom of a potentially fatal condition impacting American society. The foundation of the American experiment in self-government is a common core of objective foundational truths. These are not sectarian or doctrinal truths. Rather, they are the "echo" of the Judeo-Christian principles that have been the basic foundation stones of Western civilization. In When the Echo Dies, recent federal court cases...

Intrusive searches for alcohol during Prohibition destroyed middle-class Americans' faith in police and ushered in a new basis for controlling police conduct. State courts in the 1920s began to exclude perfectly reliable evidence obtained in an illegal search....

Regulating Judicial Elections provides the first full accounting of the efficacy and consequences of such rules. C. Scott Peters re-frames debates over judicial elections by shifting away from all-or-nothing claims about threats to judicial independence and focusing instead on the...

Regulating Judicial Elections provides the first full accounting of the efficacy and consequences of such rules. C. Scott Peters re-frames debates over judicial elections by shifting away from all-or-nothing claims about threats to judicial independence and focusing instead on the...