The Justice of Contradictions
Antonin Scalia and the Politics of Disruption
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Narrated by:
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Jesse Einstein
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By:
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Richard L. Hasen
About this listen
An eye-opening look at the influential Supreme Court justice who disrupted American jurisprudence in order to delegitimize opponents and establish a conservative legal order
Engaging but caustic and openly ideological, Antonin Scalia was among the most influential justices ever to serve on the United States Supreme Court. In this fascinating new book, legal scholar Richard L. Hasen assesses Scalia's complex legacy as a conservative legal thinker and disruptive public intellectual. The left saw Scalia as an unscrupulous foe who amplified his judicial role with scathing dissents and outrageous public comments. The right viewed him as a rare principled justice committed to neutral tools of constitutional and statutory interpretation. Hasen provides a more nuanced perspective, demonstrating how Scalia was crucial to reshaping jurisprudence on issues from abortion to gun rights to separation of powers. A jumble of contradictions, Scalia promised neutral tools to legitimize the Supreme Court, but his jurisprudence and confrontational style moved the Court to the right, alienated potential allies, and helped to delegitimize the institution he was trying to save.
Download the accompanying reference guide.©2018 Richard L. Hasen (P)2018 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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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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Freedom for the Thought That We Hate
- A Biography of the First Amendment
- By: Anthony Lewis
- Narrated by: Stow Lovejoy
- Length: 5 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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More than any other people on earth, Americans are free to say and write what they think. The reason for this extraordinary freedom is not a superior culture of tolerance, but just 14 words in our most fundamental legal document: the free expression clauses of the First Amendment to the Constitution.
Anthony Lewis tells us how these rights were created, revealing a story of hard choices, heroic (and some less heroic) judges, and fascinating and eccentric defendants who forced the legal system to come face-to-face with one of America's great founding ideas.
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Freedom of Expression: 163 years of Solitude
- By Dudley H. Williams on 12-21-11
By: Anthony Lewis
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Broken Government
- How Republican Rule Destroyed the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Branches
- By: John W. Dean
- Narrated by: Paul Michael
- Length: 10 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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In his eighth book, Dean takes the broadest and deepest view yet of the dysfunctional chaos and institutional damage that the Republican Party and its core conservatives have inflicted on the federal government. He assesses the state of all three branches of government, tracing their decline through the presidencies of Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II.
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Attention Policy Wonks - This is the book for you
- By Neal on 09-19-09
By: John W. Dean
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A People's History of the Supreme Court
- The Men and Women Whose Cases and Decisions Have Shaped Our Constitution
- By: Peter Irons, Howard Zinn - foreword
- Narrated by: David Drummond
- Length: 28 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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A comprehensive history of the people and cases that have changed history, this is the definitive account of the nation's highest court.
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Really enjoyed this book
- By Paul on 02-19-20
By: Peter Irons, and others
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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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Supreme Power
- 7 Pivotal Supreme Court Decisions That Had a Major Impact on America
- By: Ted Stewart
- Narrated by: Art Allen
- Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Best-selling author Ted Stewart explains how the Supreme Court and its nine appointed members now stand at a crucial point in their power to hand down momentous and far-ranging decisions. Today's Court affects every major area of American life, from health care to civil rights, from abortion to marriage. This fascinating book reveals the complex history of the Court as told through seven pivotal decisions.
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Polemical, downright ridiculous at times
- By Joe Igla on 11-04-17
By: Ted Stewart
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To End a Presidency
- By: Laurence Tribe, Joshua Matz
- Narrated by: L. J. Ganser, Laurence Tribe - preface
- Length: 10 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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The history and future of our democracy's ultimate sanction, presidential impeachment, and a guide to how it should be used now. To End a Presidency addresses one of today's most urgent questions: when and whether to impeach a president. Laurence Tribe and Joshua Matz provide an authoritative guide to impeachment's past and a bold argument about its proper role today. In an era of expansive presidential power and intense partisanship, we must rethink impeachment for the 21st century.
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A Primer on Impeachment and our Present Dilemma
- By J.B. on 05-20-18
By: Laurence Tribe, and others
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My Own Words
- By: Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Mary Hartnett, Wendy W. Williams
- Narrated by: Linda Lavin
- Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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The first book from Ruth Bader Ginsburg since becoming a Supreme Court Justice in 1993 - a witty, engaging, serious, and playful collection of writings and speeches from the woman who has had a powerful and enduring influence on law, women's rights, and popular culture. My Own Words is a selection of writings and speeches by Justice Ginsburg on wide-ranging topics, including gender equality, the workways of the Supreme Court, being Jewish, law and lawyers in opera, and more.
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Spectacularly Dry
- By CMP on 07-27-18
By: Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and others
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Our Republican Constitution
- Securing the Liberty and Sovereignty of We the People
- By: Randy E. Barnett
- Narrated by: Barry Abrams
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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The Constitution of the United States begins with the words "we the people". But from the earliest days of the American republic, there have been two competing notions of "the people", which led to two very different visions of the Constitution. Those who view "we the people" collectively think popular sovereignty resides in the people as a group, which leads them to favor a democratic constitution that allows the will of the people to be expressed by majority rule
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Read the book, don't listen
- By I Keep AMZN in Business on 06-23-16
By: Randy E. Barnett
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The Bill of Rights Primer
- A Citizen's Guidebook to the American Bill of Rights
- By: Akhil Reed Amar, Les Adams
- Narrated by: Tim Lundeen
- Length: 8 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Many Americans reference the Bill of Rights, a document that represents many of the freedoms that define the United States. Who doesn’t know about the First Amendment’s freedom of religion or Second Amendment’s right to bear arms? In this succinct volume, Akhil Reed Amar and Les Adams offer a wealth of knowledge about the Bill of Rights that goes beyond a basic understanding.The Bill of Rights Primer is an authoritative guide to all American freedoms. Uncluttered and well-organized, this audiobook is perfect for those who want to study up on the Bill of Rights without needing a law degree to do so.
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At this length, basic; but at that, great
- By Philo on 06-10-15
By: Akhil Reed Amar, and others
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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
What listeners say about The Justice of Contradictions
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- Barbara Fromert
- 04-14-18
Great book!
loved the book! Very educational about justice Antonin Scalia's life. highly recommend reading the book!
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- Jean
- 03-06-19
Superlative
This book is not a biography of Antonin Scalia (1936-2016) but a scholarly examination of Scalia’s jurisprudential legacy. Hasen discusses the two methods of interpreting the Constitution and statues that Scalia claims to have developed, textualism and originalism.
Hasen is a professor of law at the University of California Irvine. The book is well written. Hasen supports his critique with analysis of pertinent cases and legal commentary. The author clearly explains the fundamental theoretical and practical weaknesses so a lay person, like me, can understand it. Hasen questions the approach by Scalia in a scholarly manor. I found it particularly interesting when Hasen pointed out the different interpretations between Thomas and Scalia as they both are originalist. I think this book is written primarily for the legal profession, but I found the academic analysis of textualism and originalism interesting.
The book is eight hours and five minutes. Jessie Einstein does a good job narrating the book. It is my first time listening to this narrator. He is an actor and award-winning audiobook narrator.
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- Dr. JSH
- 01-19-19
Fantastic story about a fanatical
One might expect a book about judicial history and legal philosophy to be dry, but Hasen's "The Justice of Contradictions" is anything but.
I don't think anyone would doubt that the late Justice Scalia's reputation as the most caustic and divisive (and Schadenfreude-driven, I'll add) is well deserved.
DISCLOSURE: In my opinion, Scalia was Trumpian before Trump became president. He was a wealthy elite who acted as if he was "one of the people," despite lacking empathy for victims of injustice. He was a big mouth with narcissistic traits who had contempt for gays, minorities, and others who were denied due process and equal protection under the laws because the states' tyranny of the majority had decided these groups should be isolated, stigmatized, ostracized, and denied the inalienable rights they should have equally had.
DISCLOSURE TWO (and TOO): "Originalism" is a make-believe judicial philosophy used to cut off discussion when judges and justices like Scalia (and Gorsuch and Kavanaugh and...) have already decided cases' outcomes based on their own biases and political affiliation. By citing "originalism," they can lie to others (maybe themselves too) that they are obligated to rule in a certain way, which is absurd, really, given, as Hasen notes, the great number of times "originalists" disagree on case resolution and the reasons why they came to such a conclusion using "originalist" thinking.
Hasen treats Scalia gently, sincerely asking if Scalia personally despised gay lives or if "originalism" brought him to inequality for gays for purely objective reasons. To me, the answer is the former. Indubitably. Scalia once asked a public assembly of his fans: "If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder?" His auto-response shows a man -- well-known for his commitment to Roman Catholicism (his son is a priest) -- who gladly tramples the Establishment Clause, wrongly equates sin with immorality, and denies gays' innate dignity and respectability. And his fans, assembled in that room and worldwide, cheer his degradation of gay lives and amplify their own efforts to deny gay rights. Scalia gave them validity.
In his Lawrence dissent, Scalia wrote: "[T]he so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct."
Also, "Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their children, as teachers in their children’s schools, or as boarders in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their families from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive. The Court views it as 'discrimination.'”
These are the words of a proud bigot who sees gays (and other "unpopular groups") as the rightful victims of religious intolerance and discrimination, not protected by the 14th Amendment, deemed illegal in their very existence by mob democracy. This is a man who defies the knowledge that discrimination based on identity is ALWAYS irrational and should find no quarter in law. Scalia's strong opinion that groups can be rightfully marginalized in democracy, which our nation is not, and their sole recourse is to wait for the blessed day -- if it ever comes -- when the majority finally decides to relieve their oppression.
More subtly than I could, Hasen brings such issues to light and proposes that "originalism" is a conservative ploy to achieve judicial activism without debate.
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3 people found this helpful