The Nine by Jeffrey Toobin

My brother-in-law, Stuart, was reading this book when I visited them a few weeks ago. He kindly finished reading it so I could take it back on the plane. I used to follow the Supreme Court decisions a lot more, but over the past 10 years with the exception of Gore v. Bush, I have not paid a lot of attention. Somehow the whole Clarence Thomas hearing thing and the tilt to the right depressed me and I just turned it off. 

So I enjoyed catching up on the 9 justices. I have always like Sandra Day O'Connor. I read her book about growing up on the Lazy B Ranch (poorly written, but an amazing story)  in Arizona. I enjoyed the tidbits in here about how she viewed attractive and unattractive behavior. As the swing vote for the Court, it was interesting to see how she, Breyer, Souter and Kennedy formed and interesting block and moved the Court for a short time more to the center from 2001-2005. Rehnquist turns out to be a good administrator processing the Court's business efficiently. Thomas, does not believe in the precedent of former cases "stares decisis".. A supporter of Ayn Rand and rugged individualism, he does not get assigned many opinions because few justices supported his extreme view.  

The politics of the religious right in pushing to overturn Roe v. Wade and pushing for Terry Schiavo to remain alive in her vegetative state, the Bush nominations of Harriet Miers and John Roberts all made for some good reading. I was most interested in how international law and the visits that Justices made abroad influenced their thinking on issues like the death penalty and the harshness of our juvenile justice system.

The current court has now decidedly moved to the right. One of the tragedies of the loss of the Gore presidency in 2000 is the shaping of the court  for the next 15 years. Yet even with his loss, it was interesting to note how over time, a number of the Republican justices, like O'Connor, shifted their politics more to the center.