The American Judicial Tradition: Profiles of Leading American Judges

by G. Edward White

In this revised third edition of a classic in American jurisprudence, G. Edward White updates his series of portraits of the most famous appellate judges in American history from John Marshall to Oliver W. Holmes to Warren E. Burger, with a new chapter on the Rehnquist Court. White traces the development of the American judicial tradition through biographical sketches of the careers and contributions of these renowned judges. In this updated edition, he argues that the Rehnquist Court's approach to constitutional interpretation may have ushered in a new stage in the American judicial tradition. The update also includes a new preface and revised bibliographic note.

Genres: History, Law

Paperback

First published September 2, 1976

About the author

G. Edward White is the David and Mary Harrison Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1983.

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are few aspects of the American governance system more arcane than that of judging. From the municipal benches to the United States Supreme Court, judges are called upon to make decisions based on both the circumstances before them and the relevant bodies of laws. Nor are their determinations necessarily final, as the process of appeal permits the scrutinization, reevaluation, and critiquing of the results – in effect, a judging of judges. Even the decisions of the Supreme Court are themselves the subject of criticisms, with much speculation expended on how the members of the nation’s highest court reached their conclusions. That all of this often takes places behind closed doors, with the announced decisions explaining the reason for results but not how they were reached, only enhances the mystery.

In this book, G. Edward White attempts to rationalize aspects of the judicial process by trying to discern a “judicial tradition” on the nation’s appellate courts. This he does in a series of biographical essays chronicling some of the most important jurists in American history. While most of his essays focus on famous members of the Supreme Court, he includes a couple of key federal appellate judges (Learned Hand and Jerome Frank) and state appellate judges (James Kent, Charles Doe, Thomas Cooley, and Roger Traynor) who were especially well regarded for their decisions and who made important contributions to American legal procedure. This tradition he sees originating in the chief justiceship of John Marshall, the subject of his first essay. The elements he identifies defining Marshall’s lengthy tenure as chief justice – the tension between independence and accountability, the relationship with politics, and trade off between the powers of a judge and the institutional constraints on the judiciary – are ones that exist in the judiciary today. Upon this later generations of jurists added other aspects to this tradition, such as the “oracular theory” prominent throughout much of the nineteenth century, that create the rich of mosaic of concepts which still influence American jurisprudence today.

White is an extremely lucid scholar, and the essays of his book share a readability that elevates what could easily be a dry topic. On their own they serve as very discerning summaries of the lives of his subjects and their contributions to the development of American jurisprudence. Where the book falls short, however, is in providing any sort of overarching examination of jurisprudence that connects his brilliant points into a cohesive firmament. That the whole doesn’t measure up to the sum of its parts is unfortunate, but it doesn’t detract from the many insights that can be offered within the book’s pages. It is a book that is best dipped into for the perceptive analysis of its individuals rather than the unifying argument White attempts to make out of their oftentimes different approaches to the art of judging.

[Shawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collection of brief biographies of great American judges. Some are truly inspiring.