
Making Our Democracy Work
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $1.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Linda Greenhouse
-
By:
-
Stephen Breyer
About this listen
Stephen Breyer, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, gives an insider's perspective on the court as an American institution today and its shaping of our future.
Justice Breyer talks about what the Supreme Court must do to maintain public confidence and interpret our Constitution in a way that works in practice, and discusses the relationship between the Court and the President, Congress, administrative agencies and the states - along with the role each plays in our democracy.
©2011 92nd Street Y (P)2011 92nd Street YListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics
- By: Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Jim Seybert
- Length: 1 hr and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A growing chorus of officials and commentators argues that the Supreme Court has become too political. On this view, the confirmation process is just an exercise in partisan agenda-setting, and the jurists are no more than “politicians in robes” - their ostensibly neutral judicial philosophies mere camouflage for conservative or liberal convictions.
-
-
Excellent overview of Suo. Ct. Purpose, position and how it actually works
- By Georgia on 09-19-21
By: Stephen Breyer
-
The Court and the World
- American Law and the New Global Realities
- By: Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Stephen Breyer
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this original, far-reaching, and timely book, Justice Stephen Breyer examines the work of SCOTUS in an increasingly interconnected world, a world in which all sorts of public and private activity - from the conduct of national security policy to the conduct of international trade - obliges the Court to consider and understand circumstances beyond America's borders. At a time when ordinary citizens may book international lodging directly through online sites, it has become clear that judicial awareness can no longer stop at the water's edge.
-
-
Thought-provoking
- By Jean on 09-24-15
By: Stephen Breyer
-
Justice on the Brink
- A Requiem for the Supreme Court
- By: Linda Greenhouse
- Narrated by: Beth Hicks
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Justice on the Brink, legendary journalist Linda Greenhouse gives us unique insight into a court under stress, providing the context and brilliant analysis readers of her work in The New York Times have come to expect. In a thrilling narrative, she recounts the twelve months when the court turned its back on its legacy and traditions, abandoning any effort to stay above and separate from politics.
-
-
A Must Read, Then A Must Act.
- By Brad and Janean on 11-29-21
By: Linda Greenhouse
-
The Federalist Papers
- By: Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 19 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Originally published anonymously, The Federalist Papers first appeared in 1787 as a series of letters to New York newspapers exhorting voters to ratify the proposed Constitution of the United States. Still hotly debated and open to often controversial interpretations, the arguments first presented here by three of America's greatest patriots and political theorists were created during a critical moment in our nation's history.
-
-
Changes key words and concepts from the original
- By Some guy on 08-14-20
By: Alexander Hamilton, and others
-
The Great Dissent
- How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind and Changed the History of Free Speech in America
- By: Thomas Healy
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Free speech as we know it comes less from the First Amendment than from a most unexpected source: Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. A lifelong skeptic, he disdained all individual rights, including the right to express one's political views. But in 1919, it was Holmes who wrote a dissenting opinion that would become the canonical affirmation of free speech in the United States.
-
-
How a 78 year old man can learn & change his mind
- By Jean on 09-23-13
By: Thomas Healy
-
The Anglo-Saxons
- A History of the Beginnings of England: 400 - 1066
- By: Marc Morris
- Narrated by: Roy McMillan
- Length: 13 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen hundred years ago Britain left the Roman Empire and swiftly fell into ruin. Grand cities and luxurious villas were deserted and left to crumble, and civil society collapsed into chaos. Into this violent and unstable world came foreign invaders from across the sea, and established themselves as its new masters. The Anglo-Saxons traces the turbulent history of these people across the next six centuries. It explains how their earliest rulers fought relentlessly against each other for glory and supremacy, and then were almost destroyed by the onslaught of the vikings.
-
-
"Pretty Good"
- By Stephen on 05-30-21
By: Marc Morris
-
The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics
- By: Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Jim Seybert
- Length: 1 hr and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A growing chorus of officials and commentators argues that the Supreme Court has become too political. On this view, the confirmation process is just an exercise in partisan agenda-setting, and the jurists are no more than “politicians in robes” - their ostensibly neutral judicial philosophies mere camouflage for conservative or liberal convictions.
-
-
Excellent overview of Suo. Ct. Purpose, position and how it actually works
- By Georgia on 09-19-21
By: Stephen Breyer
-
The Court and the World
- American Law and the New Global Realities
- By: Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Stephen Breyer
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this original, far-reaching, and timely book, Justice Stephen Breyer examines the work of SCOTUS in an increasingly interconnected world, a world in which all sorts of public and private activity - from the conduct of national security policy to the conduct of international trade - obliges the Court to consider and understand circumstances beyond America's borders. At a time when ordinary citizens may book international lodging directly through online sites, it has become clear that judicial awareness can no longer stop at the water's edge.
-
-
Thought-provoking
- By Jean on 09-24-15
By: Stephen Breyer
-
Justice on the Brink
- A Requiem for the Supreme Court
- By: Linda Greenhouse
- Narrated by: Beth Hicks
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Justice on the Brink, legendary journalist Linda Greenhouse gives us unique insight into a court under stress, providing the context and brilliant analysis readers of her work in The New York Times have come to expect. In a thrilling narrative, she recounts the twelve months when the court turned its back on its legacy and traditions, abandoning any effort to stay above and separate from politics.
-
-
A Must Read, Then A Must Act.
- By Brad and Janean on 11-29-21
By: Linda Greenhouse
-
The Federalist Papers
- By: Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 19 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Originally published anonymously, The Federalist Papers first appeared in 1787 as a series of letters to New York newspapers exhorting voters to ratify the proposed Constitution of the United States. Still hotly debated and open to often controversial interpretations, the arguments first presented here by three of America's greatest patriots and political theorists were created during a critical moment in our nation's history.
-
-
Changes key words and concepts from the original
- By Some guy on 08-14-20
By: Alexander Hamilton, and others
-
The Great Dissent
- How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind and Changed the History of Free Speech in America
- By: Thomas Healy
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Free speech as we know it comes less from the First Amendment than from a most unexpected source: Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. A lifelong skeptic, he disdained all individual rights, including the right to express one's political views. But in 1919, it was Holmes who wrote a dissenting opinion that would become the canonical affirmation of free speech in the United States.
-
-
How a 78 year old man can learn & change his mind
- By Jean on 09-23-13
By: Thomas Healy
-
The Anglo-Saxons
- A History of the Beginnings of England: 400 - 1066
- By: Marc Morris
- Narrated by: Roy McMillan
- Length: 13 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen hundred years ago Britain left the Roman Empire and swiftly fell into ruin. Grand cities and luxurious villas were deserted and left to crumble, and civil society collapsed into chaos. Into this violent and unstable world came foreign invaders from across the sea, and established themselves as its new masters. The Anglo-Saxons traces the turbulent history of these people across the next six centuries. It explains how their earliest rulers fought relentlessly against each other for glory and supremacy, and then were almost destroyed by the onslaught of the vikings.
-
-
"Pretty Good"
- By Stephen on 05-30-21
By: Marc Morris
-
Dissent and the Supreme Court
- Its Role in the Court's History and the Nation's Constitutional Dialogue
- By: Melvin I. Urofsky
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 19 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the admired judicial authority, author of Louis D. Brandeis (“Remarkable”—Anthony Lewis, The New York Review of Books; “Monumental”—Alan M. Dershowitz, The New York Times Book Review), Division and Discord, and Supreme Decisions—Melvin Urofsky’s major new book looks at the role of dissent in the Supreme Court and the meaning of the Constitution through the greatest and longest lasting public-policy debate in the country’s history, among members of the Supreme Court, between the Court and the other branches of government, and between the Court and the people of the United States.
-
-
Incisive
- By Jean on 08-30-16
-
The Constitution Today
- Timeless Lessons for the Issues of Our Era
- By: Akhil Reed Amar
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 19 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the stories that lead our daily news involve momentous constitutional questions, present-minded journalists and busy citizens cannot always see the stakes clearly. In The Constitution Today, Akhil Reed Amar, America's preeminent constitutional scholar, considers the biggest and most bitterly contested debates of the last two decades. He shows how the Constitution's text, history, and structure are a crucial repository of collective wisdom, providing specific rules and grand themes relevant to every organ of the American body politic.
-
-
Amar is a Brilliant Arguer
- By MJ Schirmer on 11-16-16
By: Akhil Reed Amar
-
Kissinger
- A Biography
- By: Walter Isaacson
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 34 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the time Henry Kissinger was made secretary of state in 1973, he had become, according to a Gallup poll, the most admired person in America and one of the most unlikely celebrities ever to capture the world’s imagination. Yet Kissinger was also reviled by large segments of the American public, ranging from liberal intellectuals to conservative activists. Kissinger explores the relationship between this complex man's personality and the foreign policy he pursued.
-
-
A dissapointment
- By Mike From Mesa on 12-16-13
By: Walter Isaacson
-
The House of Morgan
- An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 34 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A gripping history of banking and the booms and busts that shaped the world on both sides of the Atlantic, The House of Morgan traces the trajectory of the J. P.Morgan empire from its obscure beginnings in Victorian London to the crash of 1987. Ron Chernow paints a fascinating portrait of the private saga of the Morgans and the rarefied world of the American and British elite in which they moved. Based on extensive interviews and access to the family and business archives, The House of Morgan is an investigative masterpiece.
-
-
The construction of the House of Morgan
- By Darwin8u on 10-22-18
By: Ron Chernow
-
His Majesty's Airship
- The Life and Tragic Death of the World's Largest Flying Machine
- By: S. C. Gwynne
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The tragic fate of the British airship R101—which went down in a spectacular fireball in 1930, killing more people than died in the Hindenburg disaster seven years later—has been largely forgotten. In His Majesty’s Airship, S.C. Gwynne resurrects it in vivid detail, telling the epic story of great ambition gone terribly wrong.
-
-
O, The Humanity
- By Glenn G Poole II on 06-11-23
By: S. C. Gwynne
-
And There Was Light
- Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Jon Meacham
- Length: 17 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hated and hailed, excoriated and revered, Abraham Lincoln was at the pinnacle of American power when secessionists gave no quarter in a clash of visions bound up with money, race, identity, and faith. In him we can see the possibilities of the presidency as well as its limitations. This book tells the story of Lincoln from his birth on the Kentucky frontier to his leadership during the Civil War to his tragic assassination: his rise, his self-education, his loves, his bouts of depression, his political failures, his deepening faith, and his persistent conviction that slavery must end.
-
-
A Winner
- By Diane Moore on 10-31-22
By: Jon Meacham
-
Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann, Jon Meacham
- Length: 18 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this magnificent biography, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Lion and Franklin and Winston brings vividly to life an extraordinary man and his remarkable times. Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power gives us Jefferson the politician and president, a great and complex human being forever engaged in the wars of his era.
-
-
A Man and Biography Relevant to Our Day
- By Darwin8u on 11-14-12
By: Jon Meacham
-
A Republic, If You Can Keep It
- By: Neil Gorsuch
- Narrated by: Neil Gorsuch
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Justice Gorsuch draws on his 30-year career as a lawyer, teacher, judge, and justice to explore essential aspects our Constitution, its separation of powers, and the liberties it is designed to protect. He discusses the role of the judge in our constitutional order, and why he believes that originalism and textualism are the surest guides to interpreting our nation’s founding documents and protecting our freedoms. He explains, too, the importance of affordable access to the courts in realizing the promise of equal justice under law.
-
-
In present political climate crucially important!
- By Amazon Customer on 09-18-19
By: Neil Gorsuch
-
Presumed Guilty
- How the Supreme Court Empowered the Police and Subverted Civil Rights
- By: Erwin Chemerinsky
- Narrated by: Perry Daniels
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Presumed Guilty reveals how the Supreme Court allows the perpetuation of racist policing by presuming that suspects, especially people of color, are guilty.
-
-
Required Reading
- By Robert Bragaw on 02-26-23
-
The Words That Made Us
- America's Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840
- By: Akhil Reed Amar
- Narrated by: Fajer Al-Kaisi
- Length: 27 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Words That Made Us, Akhil Reed Amar unites history and law in a vivid narrative of the biggest constitutional questions early Americans confronted, and he expertly assesses the answers they offered. His account of the document's origins and consolidation is a guide for anyone seeking to properly understand America's Constitution today.
-
-
And the words that made Us
- By Anonymous User on 10-17-22
By: Akhil Reed Amar
-
Worse than Nothing
- The Dangerous Fallacy of Originalism
- By: Erwin Chemerinsky
- Narrated by: Daniel Henning
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Originalism, the view that the meaning of a constitutional provision is fixed when it is adopted, was once the fringe theory of a few extremely conservative legal scholars but is now a well-accepted mode of constitutional interpretation. Noted legal scholar Erwin Chemerinsky gives a comprehensive analysis of the problems that make originalism unworkable as a method of constitutional interpretation. He argues that the framers themselves never intended constitutional interpretation to be inflexible and shows how it is often impossible to know the "original intent" of any provision.
-
-
Impeccably Logical, Backed by 100 Specific Example
- By Amy Eaton on 03-17-23
-
Power Divided Is Power Checked
- The Argument for States' Rights
- By: Jason Lewis
- Narrated by: Jason Lewis
- Length: 3 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jason Lewis reminds us that the concept of states' rights, as bequeathed by the Founding Fathers to a grateful nation, was about a constitutional framework intended to limit the missteps of government and provide the greatest amount of freedom by not allowing the consolidation of power in the nation's capitol. He defines the essence of our constitutional republic and highlights the legal history of the relationship between the states and the federal government.
-
-
Excellent
- By Kegster on 10-03-22
By: Jason Lewis