Injustices, Ian Millhiser
Injustices, Ian Millhiser
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Injustices
The Supreme Court's History of Comforting the Comfortable and Afflicting the Afflicted

Author: Ian Millhiser

Narrator: Joe Barrett

Unabridged: 10 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 03/24/2015


Synopsis

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.

In this powerful indictment of a venerated institution, Ian Millhiser tells the history of the Supreme Court through the eyes of the everyday people who have suffered the most from it. America ratified three constitutional amendments to provide equal rights to freed slaves, but the justices spent thirty years largely dismantling these amendments. Then they spent the next forty years rewriting them into a shield for the wealthy and the powerful.

In Injustices, Millhiser argues that the Supreme Court has seized power for itself that rightfully belongs to the people's elected representatives, and has bent the arc of American history away from justice.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Dan on September 06, 2015

Since I was a student in grade school and understood what our Constitution was, I always regarded the Supreme Court as the guardian of justice. I always felt that the nine people who sit on the court were able to leave aside their prejudices and allow themselves to be unbiased when it came to judgin......more

Goodreads review by Todd on December 23, 2015

The Supreme Court has made some really bad decisions in its time. Take a recent example of the Citizens United case in which corporations were granted the right to spend nearly unlimited sums to sway elections and to keep those donations secret. Justice Kennedy thought this was fine and dandy since......more

Goodreads review by Kay on April 21, 2015

So, full disclosure: Ian and I work together, and he's an incredibly nice guy. Luckily his book is a delightful and engaging read that actually looks at the real stories behind some key Supreme Court decisions. Rather than batting about the constitutional implications of decisions in dry legal terms......more

Goodreads review by Bob on April 09, 2015

This book spells out, in maddening detail, the darker side of the Supreme Court. It focuses especially on three periods: post-Civil War, in which the Court essentially nullified the war and its constitutional results; the Lochner period, in which the Court handed the country over to Gilded Age big b......more

Goodreads review by Sahitya on May 09, 2022

More of a 3.5 I think. To be honest, maybe I shouldn’t have picked it up at this time. It’s been a while since I borrowed it but with all that’s happening irl, I thought why not read about a part of the Supreme Court’s history now. I think I didn’t gauge my headspace correctly. The Roe v Wade draft......more