The Agenda
How a Republican Supreme Court Is Reshaping America
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Narrated by:
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David H. Lawrence
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By:
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Ian Millhiser
About this listen
From 2011, when Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives, until the present, Congress enacted hardly any major legislation outside of the tax law President Trump signed in 2017. In the same period, the Supreme Court dismantled much of America's campaign finance law, severely weakened the Voting Rights Act, permitted states to opt-out of the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion, weakened laws protecting against age discrimination and sexual and racial harassment, and held that every state must permit same-sex couples to marry. This powerful unelected body, now controlled by six very conservative Republicans, has and will become the locus of policymaking in the United States.
Ian Millhiser, Vox's Supreme Court correspondent, tells the story of what those six justices are likely to do with their power. It is true that the right to abortion is in its final days, as is affirmative action. But Millhiser shows that it is in the most arcane decisions that the Court will fundamentally reshape America, transforming it into something far less democratic, by attacking voting rights, dismantling and vetoing the federal administrative state, ignoring the separation of church and state, and putting corporations above the law. The Agenda exposes a radically altered Supreme Court whose powers extend far beyond transforming any individual right - its agenda is to shape the very nature of America's government, redefining who gets to have legal rights, who is beyond the reach of the law, and who chooses the people who make our laws.
©2021 Ian Millhiser (P)2021 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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A must read to understand why voting is essential.
- By Brandon WIlliams on 10-05-19
By: Thom Hartmann
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U.S. Constitution for Dummies
- 2nd Edition
- By: Dr. Michael Arnheim
- Narrated by: Dr. Michael Arnheim
- Length: 18 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Want to make sense of the US Constitution? This new edition walks you through this revered document, explaining how the articles and amendments came to be and how they have guided legislators, judges, and presidents - and sparked ongoing debates along the way. You'll get the lowdown on all the big issues - from separation of church and state to impeachment to civil rights - that continue to affect Americans' daily lives. Plus, you'll find out about the different approaches to interpretation and how the document has changed over the past 200+ years.
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Much better than I anticipated.
- By JoEllen LeVitre on 08-30-20
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How to Read the Constitution - and Why
- By: Kim Wehle
- Narrated by: Kim Wehle
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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The Constitution is the most significant document in America. But do you fully understand what this valuable document means to you? In How to Read the Constitution - and Why, legal expert and educator Kimberly Wehle spells out in clear, simple, and common-sense terms what is in the Constitution and most importantly, what it means. In compelling terms and including text from the United States Constitution, she describes how the Constitution’s protections are eroding.
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very biased
- By Anonymous User on 01-25-20
By: Kim Wehle
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The Constitution
- An Introduction
- By: Michael Stokes Paulsen, Luke Paulsen
- Narrated by: Walter Dixon
- Length: 14 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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From war powers to health care, freedom of speech to gun ownership, religious liberty to abortion, practically every aspect of American life is shaped by the Constitution. This vital document, along with its history of political and judicial interpretation, governs our individual lives and the life of our nation. Yet most of us know surprisingly little about the Constitution itself, and are woefully unprepared to think for ourselves about recent developments in its long and storied history.
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The Constitution-A must reading for All Americans
- By Robert on 06-12-15
By: Michael Stokes Paulsen, and others
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The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution
- By: Kevin R.C. Gutzman
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Instead of the system that the Constitution intended, judges have created a system in which bureaucrats and appointed officials make most of the important policies. While the government claims to be a representative republic, somehow hot-button topics from gay marriage to the allocation of Florida's presidential electors always seem to be decided by unelected judges. What gives them the right to decide such issues? The judges say it's the Constitution.
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The best PIG to date
- By Matthew Groom on 05-16-08
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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
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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.
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Amar is a Brilliant Arguer
- By MJ Schirmer on 11-16-16
By: Akhil Reed Amar
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Making Our Democracy Work
- A Judge’s View
- By: Justice Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Luis Moreno
- Length: 10 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer delivers an impassioned argument for the proper role of America’s highest judicial body. Examining historic and contemporary decisions by the Court, Breyer highlights the rulings that have bolstered public confidence as well as the missteps that have triggered distrust. What emerges is a unique approach - certain to be admired for years to come - to interpreting the Constitution.
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Timely
- By Don on 05-17-17
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Active Liberty
- Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution
- By: Stephen Breyer
- Narrated by: Stephen Breyer
- Length: 3 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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First published in September 2005 and based on a series of lectures delivered at Harvard, Active Liberty is a tight, extremely readable, almost memoir-like guide to interpreting the Constitution. Written by a justice of the Supreme Court, it focuses on a pragmatic approach to this great document that may become crucial as the Supreme Court faces deeply divisive decisions.
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Engaging, If Somewhat Dense
- By Maki on 09-04-07
By: Stephen Breyer
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Corruption in America
- From Benjamin Franklin's Snuff Box to Citizens United
- By: Zephyr Teachout
- Narrated by: Jo Anna Perrin
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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For two centuries, the Framers' ideas about political corruption flourished in the courts, even in the absence of clear rules governing voters, civil officers, and elected officials. In the 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court began to narrow the definition of corruption, and the meaning has since changed dramatically. No case makes that clearer than Citizens United.
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Law Review+
- By Ben P. on 01-02-17
By: Zephyr Teachout
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The Second Founding
- How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution
- By: Eric Foner
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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From the Pulitzer Prize-winning scholar, a timely history of the constitutional changes that built equality into the nation's foundation and how those guarantees have been shaken over time.
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Excellent book - problematic narrator
- By Jennifer on 10-01-19
By: Eric Foner
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The Conscience of the Constitution
- The Declaration of Independence and the Right to Liberty
- By: Timothy Sandefur
- Narrated by: James Foster
- Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Timothy Sandefur's insightful book provides a dramatic new challenge to the status quo of constitutional law and argues a vital truth: our Constitution was written not to empower democracy, but to secure liberty. Yet the overemphasis on democracy by today's legal community - rather than the primacy of liberty, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence - has helped expand the scope of government power at the expense of individual rights.
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Liberty!
- By David W. Norman on 05-03-15
By: Timothy Sandefur
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Enlightened Democracy
- The Case for the Electoral College, 2nd Edition
- By: Tara Ross
- Narrated by: Tara Ross
- Length: 7 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Enlightened Democracy traces the history of the Electoral College from the Constitutional Convention to the present. The Electoral College protects our republic and promotes our liberty. Americans should defend their unique presidential election system at all costs.
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Hold your breath
- By Ein on 03-13-20
By: Tara Ross
What listeners say about The Agenda
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Adi Weiss
- 06-19-23
Clear, Succinct, Insightful
I selected this book primarily because I enjoy Mr. Millhiser’s writings and for the section on voting rights. Each section provides context for rulings on the docket, that might someday be on the docket, and that have been decided. Readers will come away more knowledgeable about the issues of the day.
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- Danielle McLean
- 03-31-21
Essential book
This book clearly lays out how the conservative court is going to unravel LGBTQ protections, voting rights, regs, and allow the Republican Party to govern, and nobody else. Scary but critical book. Ian is an excellent writer and this book is a must read.
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- Matt Gilbert
- 10-04-21
short but informative
lot to untangle in this book but timely and a food start to a Constitutional Law novice like myself!!!
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- Diana
- 10-22-21
It isn't about the politics.
Most importantly, this book explains how the Supreme Court seems to be reversing precedent in a way that favors one political party. This is not strictly about politics. I disagree with the author on some points where he discusses the merit or vileness of specific decisions that align with or contradict specific values of the major parties, but overall I am persuaded by the fact that these decisions are not even-handed. Recent decisions are inconsistent with past decisions, and even internally inconsistent in some cases, and there is a pattern that clearly favors one party. What is most worrying about this favor is not just what values are espoused, but in where power is concentrated. This makes the information in this book extremely valuable, in pointing to what types of cases to watch, even if they aren't the highest profile.
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- James
- 01-14-22
A concise look at the supermajority's plans
Millhiser has written a very good, concise book on what the Roberts court likely intends to get up to with their new supermajority. Although everyone's eyes are on Roe v. Wade, Millhiser is quite correct to put little emphasis on that precedent; although overturning the federal right to an abortion would rightly be considered a catastrophe, it really is merely the tip of the iceberg for what the conservative majority have planned (and let's face it, Roe—which was already in some respects a mediocre opinion to begin with—has kind of been a moribund precedent for some time now thanks to Casey's "undue burden" standard).
Millhiser instead lays out how Gorsuch, who seems to be the ideological leader, longs to lead the court back to the freedom of contract doctrine of the Lochner court, which would comprehensively strip the American worker of power and tip the scales even further in favour of the wealthy. I was struck by the anecdotes of the shocking conditions bakery workers experienced in the Lochner era, working mercilessly long hours in revolting environments. When one thinks of what Amazon et al. are already able to get away with, the prospect of handing them even more power to dominate their workforces fills one with dread. Gorsuch's other big project, to dismantle the administrative state and agency regulations (because blah blah chevron deference and non-delegation doctrine), seems potentially so vast in its consequences I can scarcely even imagine the damage that could be caused if he's successful.
Millhiser engages in a bit of lawyerly gotcha rhetoric of the sort that I often see in Supreme Court journalism where the hypocrisy of conservative self-proclaimed textualists/originalists is pointed out (Millhiser points out that they used two different definitions of "commerce" in Circuit City v. Adams, depending on which suited their preferred outcome). I often feel authors can get a bit too wrapped up in criticism of this sort, taking elaborate routes to their gotcha moments that conservatives don't pay one iota of attention to, as they're too busy thinking "haha, majority opinion go brrrrr." I always think about the peyote case on this point: one might think that a conservative would consider the case to have raised perplexing issues about how to consistently apply the principle of free exercise of religion and respect the rights of religious minorities, or something to that effect; an actual conservative seems just to think, "Are the plaintiffs Christians? No? And they're doing drugs? They can fuck off, then." Conservatives have no problem discarding their professed principles as soon as it suits them, and liberals arguably waste their energy when they tie themselves up in knots trying to wield conservative jurisprudential philosophies that they probably shouldn't really care much about in the first place.
The other topics Millhiser addresses are just as alarming—voter suppression, exemptions from anti-discrimination laws for religious conservatives, allowing class action lawsuits to be quashed before they occur. I think my biggest takeaway lesson might be on the decidedly more law school 101 matter of the Carolene Products footnote, the source of strict scrutiny, which I must have heard of before, but now I'll actually remember it (it has already popped up in the next book I've started reading, so it truly is the most famous footnote in constitutional law).
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- Bryan
- 04-01-21
Like a Journal Article, but Good
The author does an excellent job reviewing conservative and reactionary jurisprudence from the Lochner era to the modern day; highlighting the shift from judicial restraint to judicial activism in service of reaching certain outcomes.
Partly by implication, the persistent myth of a non-partisan Supreme Court takes a major hit.
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- Scott
- 04-27-21
Extraordinarily important, educational & insightful foray into the greatest existential threat to our democracy
This book should be read by every US citizen who cares about democracy in this country. The Supreme Court has become the fulcrum of the deliberate destruction of the United States’ “experiment in democracy” by authoritarian, religious, and corporate activists. That citizenry understand the dynamics of this power play is critical to any prayer of saving our 250 year experiment.
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- Philo
- 12-29-21
Pretty alarmist, but well thought, a worthy listen
There is useful information here, and it is intelligently told. It is, however, skewed WAY progressive, and from a viewpoint that the sky is falling. Maybe; we'll see, eh? Regardless, I think it is a worthwhile listen for any concerned observer of the condition and trends of the USA's most important institutions. It will sharpen your awareness and legal thinking tools. It is very well composed and put together, sorting the issues very clearly.
Post-script (Spring 2022): Now that Roe vs. Wade is apparently to be undone, the author's points do have an added relevance. I would like, however, more of an exploration of the arguments and exponents of the other side of these debates. I prefer that sort of more rounded and complete explanation, from either side. I don't mind that an author has a point of view (and bias), but I think it most respectful to the reader when the viewpoints are fleshed out. To this author's credit, some effort on that is apparent here.
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