A review by miscbrah
The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court by Bob Woodward, Scott Armstrong
3.0
Good book and revolutionary for its' time, however it lacks a clear storyline. Just a bunch of cases over an 8 year period. It's great that the author provides a lot of behind the scenes action and what happens before/after an oral argument. Although, at times, this book was very boring.
The author doesn't get into the details of the cases. He ust skims the surface and brings up the key legal issues that were debated by the justices. What did enable me to get through this book was the development of the characters(justices). To see how they interact with eachother and the funny stories they have is great. You kind of get to understand the justices on a personal level through the book.
This book is on a lot of recommended reading lists for 0Ls. It's not bad but you need to be a Supreme Court junkie to really get a lot out of this book. I would recommend reading the US Constitution before reading this book. You need to understand article 2-3, 4th, 8th, and the 1st ammendment. It would also be wise to go over the Earl Warren years of the Supreme Court via Wikipedia. Just to get a nice primer for this book.
The author doesn't get into the details of the cases. He ust skims the surface and brings up the key legal issues that were debated by the justices. What did enable me to get through this book was the development of the characters(justices). To see how they interact with eachother and the funny stories they have is great. You kind of get to understand the justices on a personal level through the book.
This book is on a lot of recommended reading lists for 0Ls. It's not bad but you need to be a Supreme Court junkie to really get a lot out of this book. I would recommend reading the US Constitution before reading this book. You need to understand article 2-3, 4th, 8th, and the 1st ammendment. It would also be wise to go over the Earl Warren years of the Supreme Court via Wikipedia. Just to get a nice primer for this book.